So what’s the right timing? When the world or some book says it is? I will struggle in my first relationship right? Why put off or postpone the struggle? Why not work through it now? Even if it doesn’t work in the end? Why wait in life and live according to someone else’s definition of correctness? . It’s been 8 months. Life is short. I could be dead by next month! And then what did I gain by waiting? So many people ask me this question..I suppose it’s a valid point. But I can only do what my heart and soul tells me to do. Perhaps if I wasn’t stuck in a foreign port with immigration staring me down and only a large ocean between me and the next safe country, I may have waited. No women captains that contacted with me clicked with me. Not many men did either. So I looked locally for someone that I could at least be friends with and share a common goal with..to sail across the Atlantic Ocean on my sailboat. Michael and I clicked from day 1. We are now sailing together full time. Not without bumps for sure, and this may not be forever. We both know this. But at least we are both mutually gaining something by doing this trip together. It may be too soon for me to have a successful relationship right now, for sure…But delaying it by a year or two years doesn’t serve any purpose at all, except to waste my time AND my life. I hope that make sense to you. I should not really care what people think about my movements in life..it’s my life. And Michael’s life and he’s full aware how But I do think it’s an opportunity for people to learn that when someone important passes, you shouldn’t feel you have to run your life in a way that is socially accepted or embraced. Like this may be an opportunity to suppress a stereotype you may have in your head about widows…and what we should or shouldn’t be doing and when…Life after your spouse passes should be how you want it to be. There is nothing to prove by not moving on… by not living your life, doing what you yearn to do. “Oh I loved him so much I am just paralyzed and can just never love another and just want to sit in a corner and cry for a few years”. I’ve mourned for 2 years so obviously I’ve proved to the world my love for my husband…” That is NOT what Patrick ever would have wanted, and it’s certainly not how I would spend my life no matter if the whole world agreed it should be this way or that. I feel so bad for widows that ARE paralyzed and can’t move on. I have a friend who has mourned for 8 years now….so paralyzed…and has wasted so many good years of her life. As a widow, one should move as they feel, and not be told it’s too soon or to hurry up. But it’s never too soon to start figuring out the rest of your life, when life is so darn short. I love being with a friend full time, I love working through my issues with someone to hold my hand as I do it, and Michael does that so well. And I love that I’m not sitting in a corner balling my eyes out. YES…I probably cry every single day for what I have lost. And I may always cry that my best friend never got to see what I saw today. But I’m not going to let this consume my life, eat my heart and my soul out. I’m not going to let this be the end of my life. I have a lot of life yet to live, a lot of the world still to see, and yes a lot of love yet to share. I WILL find it if it’s not already sitting right here on my boat with me, and I WILL live my life how I want to live it..not how some book or social etiquette tells me to live it. I will allow myself to mourn for years if I want to. I will not try to make every beautiful moment one of laughter..I will remember him and feel bad he isn’t here with me whenever I want to. I will let my tears flow, and my heart tremble and I will talk about Patrick freely if I want, or not at all if that’s what I want…You can think whatever you want to think…but I have not a single iota of anything to prove to anyone about what I felt for Patrick and my life with him. You can never ever know how a widow feels without walking in their exact exact shoes. You can never know how I feel, or what it means…
Please don’t sit behind your desk and tell me I moved to slowly…or moved too quickly, or didn’t do this right. I did it MY WAY, and I