Your path is mirroring mine for all the reasons you wrote except that I'm just a bit younger. However, I can hear my clock ticking too. When I remind myself that now is all I really have, that now is usually just fine. Slipping back to the past is painful and there are so many uncomfortable emotions I want to leave them there- in the past. If I fear the future I stop to face the fear knowing it could easily turn into those yucky emotions of the past and I did get through it. For now, all is well. I do my best to stay here, in the now. Thank you Mona for so eloquently strumming my life with your words, now!
Again,Mona, i love your writing. this time you left me sad then happy. grieving is a strange duck. everyone is different and no one can tell you how to feel. you control that. it’s part of life’s cycle.
I absolutely loved every bit of this. After going through assorted sadnesses in my own life, I foolishly thought that retirement might be clear sailing. It is SO difficult not to get stuck in the past even whilst doing things to help others, volunteering and being profoundly grateful each day for what I do have. I'd like to hear you talk more about fear - and its even meaner cousin, Dread. And just to let you know this is a great read. Thank you! See you on The Binders which is where I found you in the first place.
I hear you loud and clear. My husband departed this life in November of 2007. More than 15 years ago. It kind of amazes me when I realize it's been that long, but I've kept busy with many and diverse activities. I eventually had to retire from stage directing when I was 78 and realized standing through 3 hour rehearsals 3 days a week had become at least difficult, and walking across an icy parking lot into the high school where I directed for over 20 years was probably at the very least a bad idea. But in the meantime I'd started writing books, and I'm still doing that. Working on book number 17 at present, and fortunately, like you, my eyes, fingers and most of my brain seem to be working pretty well. Nights are tough because lots of memories come flooding back sometimes...and lots of "if onlys". I'm still not sure why I'm still here, but I've decided to make the best of it and hope things don't get too complicated. Whether that's a good attitude or not I have no idea, but at the moment, that's where I am. My books take me away for hours at a time and that's definitely a good thing. My voice students give me joy (most of the time). I'm grateful my eyes are holding up though my back definitely is not, and I for sure get that not walking a mile in anybody's shoes, especially mine, these days. I'm trying to take it one day at a time. The average life expectancy for females in this country is currently 85, and I just joined that club. I wish I had something more inspirational or encouraging to say, but I don't. And I found myself talking aloud to myself in the supermarket parking lot this morning. Yikes.
Love Horace's whole quote which being the Pollyanna I mistakenly am, I saw as (here comes another cliche!) 'live for the moment'.
With that in mind, we finally have summer, and I have Day Two of Grandchild Aged Four, so tired as I am, I shall seize the day and try and look at the beach, sea and life through his eyes. Despite his endless energy, he's so refreshingly simple and joyful. Maybe that's the key - simplicity and joy...
You express my daily struggle. After two years, the hole in my heart is as large or larger than ever. As you say, the holidays were nice, but that one person , who made my life special, wasn't sharing it with me. I keep looking for the bright side - but it seems to be missing in action.
No one knows what tomorrow may bring and one of my favorite sayings is "Life is what happens when you've made other plans" (that seems to date back to 1950's Reader's Digest, at least in this particular form). So now I make less plans and just let life happen.
As a young person, I hated the phrase "Everything changes." Fortunately, at some point I learned that Ovid didn't stop after "Omnia mutantur." He finished the observation with "...nihil interit"
Everything changes...nothing is lost.
So far, I've found that I can, eventually, deal with everything changing when I remember that nothing--no love, no happiness, no knowledge, no sacrifice--is ever lost.
I admit to being a cliche-user as well. They're just so apt and tend to grease conversations along. Now I want to try to have a conversation with someone just using cliches. That sounds fun!!
I don't think Horace's original quote is a downer. It's more of a plea to enjoy today because you don't know what tomorrow will bring. In today's parlance, we call it being mindful or present-focused. His words were more poetic.
I'm glad for your Pollyanna tendencies. We need all the hope we can get!
LOL! I would rephrase the Horace quote as, “Enjoy the day! (Tomorrow could be worse.)”
I can work with that. 😁
{*{*{*hugs*}*}*} Ramona!
Your path is mirroring mine for all the reasons you wrote except that I'm just a bit younger. However, I can hear my clock ticking too. When I remind myself that now is all I really have, that now is usually just fine. Slipping back to the past is painful and there are so many uncomfortable emotions I want to leave them there- in the past. If I fear the future I stop to face the fear knowing it could easily turn into those yucky emotions of the past and I did get through it. For now, all is well. I do my best to stay here, in the now. Thank you Mona for so eloquently strumming my life with your words, now!
Again,Mona, i love your writing. this time you left me sad then happy. grieving is a strange duck. everyone is different and no one can tell you how to feel. you control that. it’s part of life’s cycle.
I absolutely loved every bit of this. After going through assorted sadnesses in my own life, I foolishly thought that retirement might be clear sailing. It is SO difficult not to get stuck in the past even whilst doing things to help others, volunteering and being profoundly grateful each day for what I do have. I'd like to hear you talk more about fear - and its even meaner cousin, Dread. And just to let you know this is a great read. Thank you! See you on The Binders which is where I found you in the first place.
I have yet to master this! It's an ongoing struggle being human.
Thanks! And no problem with the cliches - I think of them as aphorisms, or, as McLuhan said, "From Cliche to Archetype."
I hear you loud and clear. My husband departed this life in November of 2007. More than 15 years ago. It kind of amazes me when I realize it's been that long, but I've kept busy with many and diverse activities. I eventually had to retire from stage directing when I was 78 and realized standing through 3 hour rehearsals 3 days a week had become at least difficult, and walking across an icy parking lot into the high school where I directed for over 20 years was probably at the very least a bad idea. But in the meantime I'd started writing books, and I'm still doing that. Working on book number 17 at present, and fortunately, like you, my eyes, fingers and most of my brain seem to be working pretty well. Nights are tough because lots of memories come flooding back sometimes...and lots of "if onlys". I'm still not sure why I'm still here, but I've decided to make the best of it and hope things don't get too complicated. Whether that's a good attitude or not I have no idea, but at the moment, that's where I am. My books take me away for hours at a time and that's definitely a good thing. My voice students give me joy (most of the time). I'm grateful my eyes are holding up though my back definitely is not, and I for sure get that not walking a mile in anybody's shoes, especially mine, these days. I'm trying to take it one day at a time. The average life expectancy for females in this country is currently 85, and I just joined that club. I wish I had something more inspirational or encouraging to say, but I don't. And I found myself talking aloud to myself in the supermarket parking lot this morning. Yikes.
Love Horace's whole quote which being the Pollyanna I mistakenly am, I saw as (here comes another cliche!) 'live for the moment'.
With that in mind, we finally have summer, and I have Day Two of Grandchild Aged Four, so tired as I am, I shall seize the day and try and look at the beach, sea and life through his eyes. Despite his endless energy, he's so refreshingly simple and joyful. Maybe that's the key - simplicity and joy...
You express my daily struggle. After two years, the hole in my heart is as large or larger than ever. As you say, the holidays were nice, but that one person , who made my life special, wasn't sharing it with me. I keep looking for the bright side - but it seems to be missing in action.
No one knows what tomorrow may bring and one of my favorite sayings is "Life is what happens when you've made other plans" (that seems to date back to 1950's Reader's Digest, at least in this particular form). So now I make less plans and just let life happen.
As a young person, I hated the phrase "Everything changes." Fortunately, at some point I learned that Ovid didn't stop after "Omnia mutantur." He finished the observation with "...nihil interit"
Everything changes...nothing is lost.
So far, I've found that I can, eventually, deal with everything changing when I remember that nothing--no love, no happiness, no knowledge, no sacrifice--is ever lost.
I admit to being a cliche-user as well. They're just so apt and tend to grease conversations along. Now I want to try to have a conversation with someone just using cliches. That sounds fun!!
I don't think Horace's original quote is a downer. It's more of a plea to enjoy today because you don't know what tomorrow will bring. In today's parlance, we call it being mindful or present-focused. His words were more poetic.
I'm glad for your Pollyanna tendencies. We need all the hope we can get!