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The Letter
The letter arrived in the mail a few weeks ago. It was addressed to me. Inside, I found two notes from an old friend of Shawn’s – someone he knew in university who we’d kept up with over the years. “I wrote a note to Claire,” the first note said, “and I want you to look over it and see if it’s okay for her to read.” I opened up the next piece of paper. Inside was a 2-page typed letter addressed to my daughter. “Dear Claire,” it began, “You might not remember me, but I have heard about you since you were born. Your father Shawn and I were…
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Young Love
I was flying to the Cayman Islands to take a break from my life. It was just after Christmas, and the plane was filled with people vacationing. I located my seat, and then I saw the people sitting next to me – a really young couple who were holding hands. I took a deep breath and sat down. I’ve written before about how hard it can be at times to hang out with my happily married friends. But a newly in-love couple….well, that’s a whole other ball game. “Hi!” the girl said in the happiest voice I’d heard in a long time. She was darling, and so was the boy…
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Across the Doctor’s Office
Almost daily, someone asks me why I decided to write this blog. Here’s the response I usually give: In the beginning it was a way for me to connect with my loved ones and get my feelings out into the open. But then the blog (and my motivations behind it) changed a bit. DC Widow became a place of where I could connect with people that I didn’t know, specifically other young widows. My posts sparked conversations with my friends both online and in person. Soon, I found that I had a new reason for writing. I wanted my loss to have some sort of meaning. One of the posts…
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Salsa in my Cup
Two years ago, Shawn and I threw a party that was particularly crazy. We didn’t really mean for the party to get so wild. We just wanted to have a few friends over to celebrate the year and toast our successes, failures, and ability to have merely survived. As I remember, we were still reeling from the 2016 election, because that was the election that was supposed to have meant a big, important job for Shawn and ultimately didn’t pan out that way. Instead, we threw a party. Somehow, we all had way too much wine, in the way that you can when you aren’t really trying to have too…
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Remembering Shawn as He Really Was
“I’m going on an adventure with Dave!” Austin shouted to me as he grabbed his swimsuit and ran out the door. We were staying with our friends Elissa and Dave for the long weekend, and Austin was overjoyed to be on a farm away from the city. Claire ran after him and the two of them came back hours later with sunburned and smiling faces. They were in kid heaven. It took months to plan this trip. Our group of friends had scattered across the country, so figuring out how to get us all in one place was difficult. Two of them had moved abroad and another one had become…
There’s No Handbook for How to Do This
