I have fun!

I feel the need to remind myself of this (that I have fun), as I have a tendency to be more on the discouraged side these days.

Last weekend for Memorial Day, I stayed in town (I’m not so much the camping type) and did lots of fun activities.  I made sure that I documented it on Instagram, so that I could look back and remember what fun I had had. 

I started my weekend with lunch with one of my favorite new friends.

Then Ellie and I went to see Iron Man 3.  Popcorn for dinner?  Yes, please.

On Saturday, I worked in my yard (and got a sunburn).  Then, I met some friends at my mom’s house, because they have a goldendoodle that’s a week older than hers!  Arthur mostly loved it.  These are some of my favorite people in the whole world, so I totally loved it.

On Sunday, I went to brunch, went home for a nap, then went to see my favorite new band, Dawes, play at the Gothic (which is incidentally, a tiny venue a few blocks from my house).  It was an amazing show, and, I think they’re on the brink of getting really big, and it’s going to be so fun someday to say, “Yeah, the first time I saw them was at the Gothic.”

On Monday, Mom and Dad and I drove Nellybelle  (my new CRV) down to Colorado Springs to hang out with my brother’s fam for my nephew’s birthday.  It was nice to see how she did on the highway (it’s embarrassing how much I love this car).  The birthday party was awesome.  It’s so fun to be near the little guys for events like this.  And, as icing on the cake to my weekend, my score was the new top score in Whackamole.  Suckers!

A Goodbye and A Hello

When I bought my VW Beetle in 2006, I named it “Samuel.”  In my family, we name everything. 

When I was a kid, my little brother caught a ladybug and wanted to keep him for a pet.  He put “him” in a jar with leaves and holes punched in the lid, and affectionately named the ladybug Samuel.  After a couple of days, my mom feared my brother would not do well when the little bug succumbed to life trapped in a small jar, being shaken and overly loved by a four year old, rough little boy.  So, she convinced him that the best thing to do was to release him, but promised him that he would be able to catch him again someday.  As the older sister, I totally played along.  For years after that, every time a ladybug was caught, we’d say, “Look, Gabe, its Samuel!”  We’d catch it, play with him a while, then let him go.  So, he never really had to say goodbye. 

I had wanted a Beetle for so long, and when I finally got one, with it’s likeness to a ladybug, it felt only right to give him a name in homage to my brother’s little pet.

In the summer of 2009, we had three major and expensive repairs, which made Sawan and I start thinking about a new car.  We were planning to start a family anyway and would need a bigger car, one that would fit child's car seats, and had looked at Honda CRVs.  That was what I wanted.  But, when he died, and car seats were no longer going to be a possibility for me, I put the idea aside, and decided to drive the Beetle until the wheels fell off.  Sawan had helped me buy the Beetle, and I didn’t want to buy a car without him.  Not until it was absolutely necessary.

Last week, it became absolutely necessary.  When I took Samuel in to the shop they told me the sound that I had been hearing in the engine was terminal.  I needed a new car. 

Everything, every decision is complicated when you’re a widow.  I still wanted a CRV.  But, did I want a CRV because I still wanted to buy the car for the life that I would have had with Sawan?  Was I wanting to buy a car for a life I would never have?  Or was it just the convenience of a bigger car and four wheel drive?

As I got into the new CRV at the dealership to do my test drive, we turned on the radio to hear the speakers, and the song was Fleetwood Mac’s “You Make Lovin’ Fun.”  One of “our songs.”  It felt as though Sawan was telling me he was there, he was supporting me, supporting my decision.  He loved me.  I relaxed a little.

Saying goodbye to the Beetle was saying goodbye to a piece of my life that I would never have back.  It was another end of an era.  It was the end of an era that I loved.  It was saying goodbye to the memories that I had in that car.  Memories of road trips, of driving around with our little puppy on my lap.  Memories of our ordinary life, so full of love, Sawan driving the car, stopped at a red light, his hand on my knee, me reaching across to put my hand on the back of his head, the softness of his fine hair on the palm of my hand.

This process was also a hello, though.  Hello to a new life.  A new me.  I have never owned a new car before.  I got to get exactly what I wanted (white, heated seats, and a sunroof).  Brand new.  I have four-wheel drive, I sit high up, and it’s automatic.  It has every safety feature I could have thought of.  For someone who has high anxiety when they drive, this is a great little car.  I feel so relaxed, no fear.  I have never loved a car the way I love this one.  I don’t want to get out of it.  I just want to drive. 

And, like the ladybug and my four year old brother, I never really have to say goodbye, when I see little black Beetles on the road, I can say, “Look, it’s Samuel!”

Samuel.

The new CRV, Nellybelle.

Throwback Thursday

A friend sent me these photos a while back.  They're from a wedding that was four years ago today.  In 2009, Colorado had the same idea of spring that it does in 2013, and on April 18 dumped a snow storm on Denver that measured in feet. A quick plan B had to be come up with for a venue, as the Plan A venue (for an outdoor mountain wedding) couldn't even be driven to in the storm.  It became a beautiful story of community and creativity and letting go, and Sawan and I ended up helping more than just my hairstyling committments.  Afterward, we got to party a bit.  Here are the photos:

I love that they show us as so ordinary.  An ordinary couple with extraordinary love.

The Treadmill of Life

I feel restless to the very core.  I feel like everyone else’s life is moving, and I stay in the same place.  Like I’m running on a treadmill as fast as I can, and everyone else is jogging past me on solid ground, waving.  Some of them are cheerfully enjoying the exercise, others are complaining about how tired they are, but their lives are still moving past mine while I struggle and sprint and still stay in one place.

I’m lonely.  I have finally chosen to live.  And yet, I feel like the life that I would choose if I could involves a husband and a family, and I have to wait in order for that to happen.  What does choosing life look like apart from that? In this season where my heart lies fallow, I’m trying to learn.  I’m trying to give up on planning, just surrender the control that I long to have and let life happen. 

There are things in my life that are going supremely well.  I am super thankful for the blessings that I enjoy.  While there is no man in my life, there are women!  Holy cow, are there some amazing women!  I have budding relationships with women that are blessing my socks off.  I am spending my days thinking, “Huh.  People like me.”  I recognize that that’s a pretty good place to be, all told, and eases the loneliness in a huge way.

Then, I am able to do some really fun projects starting this summer at the Pink House.  First priority is the upstairs bathroom.  It’s such an awkward space; the arrangement of it is such that I have permanent bruises on my knees and shins from running into the bathtub after going potty in the middle of the night.  Those days are almost over, my friends.  Plus, when I looked at the house initially, I said that it was pretty much my dream house, it only lacked a claw foot tub and a fireplace.  I get to put in a claw foot tub now, so it’s getting even closer to the space that I dreamed of even as a little girl.  How lucky am I?

And, baseball has started.  It’s so good to have the game on in the background; it makes loading the dishwasher so much more fun!  I went to the home opener, and had beautiful weather, but since the opening weekend, Colorado has seemed to have forgotten that it’s supposed to be springtime (I’m looking out at snow-globe snow right now) and I seem to be the definition of a fair-weather fan.  I don’t want to go and sit at a game in the freezing cold.  I’ll wait until it’s a bit warmer, thank you very much.  Until then I can watch it from my warm living room while I multi-task by getting it very clean.

And yet, with all of this to be thankful for, I still feel restless.  In search of silver lining, I guess I know that I am getting in great shape running on this treadmill.  Someday I’ll get to get off and jog alongside everyone else.  Hopefully.  But, I guess that’s the crux of it.  I do have hope that I will get off someday.

Happy "Sawan's Day"

When I was cleaning and organizing my office a few weeks ago, I found this:

It’s a card that I made for Sawan for his “birthday,” his special sobriety date (they call it a birthday in the recovery world), the first one we ever spent together.  It would have been nine years of sobriety today.

It was so interesting to me to read it.  Because it’s been so long since we’ve had an actual interaction, sometimes I forget, or think that I made it up, how much I loved him, how deeply, how fiercely, even from the very beginning.

We had only been together six months when I wrote him this card, but my love for him oozes off the page.  Not in a gag-me sort of way (and it was only intended for his eyes, anyway), but just in a real, ordinary, “I’m madly in love with you.  Love, Noel” sort of way.

I miss him.

Happy Sunshine!

It’s March, folks. 

I have gotten tired of people asking me how I’m doing and responding, “Medium.”

We’ve had a pretty mild winter around these parts, but even with the lack of snow and cold weather, I’ve realized that I really hate winter.  Not only because I hate to be cold, but because I hate the short days.  I hate it that even on a day when it’s noon and sunny outside, you can tell that it’s February out there because the color of the sun is different.  It’s not June sun.  It’s not April sun.  I even love October sun.  But February sun leaves much to be desired with it’s pallor. 

I start feeling gross right around November, get a bit of a reprieve once January hits and I can feel the days elongating just a bit, and then by February every time anyone talks to me I try not to spill my cranky all over them and find myself saying stuff like, “Let’s just move.  How about Mexico?”

But it’s March.  I’m sitting outside at a coffee shop getting some writing done, in short sleeves.  It’s sunny.  It’s March sun, so it’s starting to get a little of it’s lemony glow back.  I know in my heart that March is Denver’s snowiest month, can remember the blizzard that hit on St. Patrick’s day a few years ago where we got six feet of snow, but the end is in sight.  This is the home stretch, and we’re getting some breaks in between.   I feel it in my soul, cheering me up.  It’s a beautiful thing.

I’ve never loved March as much as I love it this year. 

DearMarch,

Welcome.  Thank you for coming.  I’ve always wanted to ask you, what are your “Ides?”  I really look forward to your friend, April, but I’m going to enjoy every ounce of you until she gets here.

Love,

Noel

Arthur, soaking up some rays at Stella's Coffee Shop.

I never have to do that again...

My big resolution for 2013 (or we could call it a “goal,” I don’t really like “resolutions”) was to have no more rooms containing boxes in the Pink House.  After two years, I don’t think that was really too overambitious.

On Friday, my mom came over to help me tackle it, by motivating me to do the last room, the office.

Now, I want to say something in my own defense.  This was no ordinary office.  It contained boxes that hadn’t been unpacked, or even looked at, since the condo.  It contained stuff of Sawan’s that I hadn’t seen, boxes full of emotional landmines.  I needed to open up the file cabinet and box up the old files to be kept for tax purposes for a couple more years, stuff with his handwriting on it, stuff that he had just “stashed.”  After he’s been gone for three and a half years, I finally felt ready to face it, mostly because I could no longer handle my hoarder style filing system and want to move on, so that I can get my taxes done for this year.

I steadily moved through the stuff.  I was prepared for it to be an emotionally taxing day.  I thought I mostly knew what I was going to find. 

There was a basket that we had kept by the door, his sort of “catch-all” full of jewelry, change, pocketknives, his AA chips.  I threw things away that were trash, kept the things that I wanted, and when I finished, I thought, “I never have to do that again.”  I cried, but I mostly felt good about it.

Then, I found our financial planning binder.  In the front pocket was a sweet little note in my handwriting, “Baby, here’s how the monthly payment broke down.  I love you.”  And in his handwriting, the form filled out for his life insurance, which he went as far as to even have the exam for, but never signed the paperwork.  I have never been as angry as I was on Friday.  I sobbed.  I wanted to throw things.  I have been angry about this particular issue a lot in the past three years, but seeing the actual papers made me feel it in such a tangible way.  I guess you could say that it’s a good thing he’s already dead (and, the fact that I’m able to make a joke about it, already, only three days later, means I’m starting to do a little better).

In spite of all of the pain, there were love letters from me that he had kept, and it was so good for me to see, in my own handwriting, how much I loved him.  He was an amazing man.  He was full of flaws, human, like all of us, I guess, but I really loved him.

I only got about 60% of the office completed, but the rest should just be the filing that has not gotten done in the last three years because I was afraid of my filing cabinet.  So, it won’t be emotionally charged and should be tedious but not overly taxing. 

Here’s to no more rooms with boxes in the Pink House!  Hip!  Hip!