Today would have been our 46th anniversary. I woke up with my usual answer to stress. After getting my daughter to her special needs class, I returned home to cook, clean, rearrange, anything to stop remembering.
Being a widow 364 days of the year is manageable; it’s that 365th day that brings us to our knees. The day we said those words, “With this ring I thee wed, and all my worldly goods I thee endow. In sickness and in health, for richer or for poor, ‘til death do us part,” we became an inseparable force for marriage.
Youth protects us, for although we say those words, we somehow don’t understand their strength until the testing comes. That’s when we know whether we meant them or not. When we discover we’re spending more than we’re bringing in, do we figure out a budget and how to pay the bills, or do we get another credit card to keep spending? Money kills more marriages than anything else.
When one of us becomes tragically ill, does the other stand by out of duty or is our love so great, we would do anything to help the other? Do we toss loved ones in a ‘home’ where we can conveniently forget they exist? Or, as one woman did, who loved the fabulous ‘season’ of theater, grand dinners and such; do we literally put our recently dead spouse on ice for burial after Season? After all, wearing black during Season is so boring.
Bru and I grew into our vows. When money problems hit, we solved them. When our daughter was born with Down’s syndrome, we did not point fingers at each other. We drew closer and surrounded our baby with love and understanding. When our son was found to have dyslexia, we found a schooling solution to help him. He was such an important part of our marriage. When illness knocked one of us down, the other was always there because we didn’t want to be anywhere else.
Today, so many do not grow into their vows. They come to marriage thinking, “If I don’t like it, I’ll just get a divorce.” That isn’t marriage. That is a mockery of the highest expression of human love.
Today would have been our 46th anniversary. Today I cried because the house and my life are empty without that special partner enjoying it, too.
However, today, I look forward to a future that may have another person – not my Bru – but maybe someone as good in their own way. Today the widow’s anniversary is coming to an end, but tomorrow I will be ready to dream of a new future once more.