Some years ago I found myself to be in some sorrow.
I had spent twenty-seven years as a married man. Life had its ups and downs, as it should, and I learned to gather enjoyment from both the good times and from our ability to deal with the not so good times.
All that ended the day after my twenty-seventh wedding anniversary when my wife passed away.
It was not unexpected
Her health was such that her passing could have happened at any time. But it happened that day. And I was plunged into an abyss of sadness and loneliness.
I did not let it rule me, but I also could not shake it off. I made my way through life acting as if I was surviving well. I managed to get on with things. I “kept a stiff upper lip” as they say.
And I used my life
I used my new found freedom to become more creative. I found I could write songs rather easily, often drawing up inspiration from the well of my pain and anxiety.
I also found myself with a job that required me to write ten blog posts every week. And at one point I began a new novel and abandoned the previous two that were barely started anyway.
I reached a kind of balance, managing my grief and pain along with my freedom and creativity. I engaged in friendships and relationships and immersed myself in community.
What wasn’t expected?
I was not expecting to be accosted by realization after realization of where I was, where I found myself, my place in this world.
For instance, it took me a while to understand that I had not passed away with the passing of my wife, that the end of our relationship was not the end of my world.
Slowly I came back to live among the living, and slowly I discovered I needed to move on. Gradually I found my way. And gradually I retrieved my life.
I am here
I am surprised to find myself saying that it took five years for me to recover from that loss, and six more to get where I am now, a point in my life when I can finally write about these things. And if I cannot quite write about them freely then I certainly am able to do so with less reservation, and with a sense of obligation to the page and the reader.
The part of me that suffered, yet grew at the same time, the thing inside me that endured adversity and at simultaneously flourished, the thing that flowered under the stress of the harsh environment of loss, was my writing.
What I’m trying to say is …
Good times seem to be when I don’t write as much, and bad times feel like times when I don’t have the opportunity. But the lesson of the worst times was this, when I was overwhelmed by my life I had to write to work through things, to explore my feelings and emotions, to heal. I was forced to express myself, even if it was just for me.
The truth is, I’ve written more in the last eleven years than I did in the first fifty-two, and I’ve written brighter things as well as darker things in these recent times. My reaction to trauma is the same as my reaction to hope or love or fear. I write.
And the thing that carries me forward today is still that same ability.
I am a writer.
This, is what I do.
