An ordinary day

There is peace in the commonplace

It is the start of an ordinary day. I have nothing scheduled on my calendar, there are no meetings to attend, no pressing visits I need to make, no big expectations. I have a few ordinary tasks to tend to: preparing for worship, writing an article, answering emails. It is a contrast to yesterday, fraught as it was many memories and considerations as I marked the first full year since I heard Claudia’s voice. An online meeting I was part of was cancelled unexpectedly, so I chose to work from home, although much of my work yesterday was of the grieving kind.

I was surprised at how emotional the day was for me. I knew I would have some feelings, but I didn’t expect to experience such raw pain again. I suppose I thought that after a year’s time I would be more regulated and accustomed to my new life, but apparently grief takes longer than one would expect. It’s not that I was curled up in my bed mid-day sobbing, nor that I was incapacitated, wandering around in a daze. I wasn’t even feeing especially lonely. There were simply flashes of remembrance — mostly good ones, and a few hard ones — that choked me up a bit.

To help my children and grandchildren observe the first year of Claudia’s death, I was preparing votive candles and a brief letter telling them how I would be spending March 26th. The candles are simple glass vessels with a transparent royal blue label (Claudia’s favorite color of blue; one of the colors for our wedding, which was thirty years ago this June), her name and dates in gold. As I prepared each votive I prayed for the recipients, my thoughts traveling back over the years of our family’s life.

To speak of “our family’s life” is to speak of Claudia. The idealist I am, I always thought adopting older children was a noble thing to do, but I doubt I would have made any progress with the idea were it not for my wife. We were married in June and by October of that year we had our first foster placement; by January we had our second. Our two first sons to join the family are now my two adult sons who live in the same city I do.

I still marvel at the way God has returned me to the same “neighborhood” where my first full-time pastoral appointment, the start of my married life and the beginnings of forming a family all coalesced thirty years ago. A year ago at this very time I had no idea what my future looked like. It was the day after Claudia’s emergency neurological surgery, and she was still in a medically induced coma. I was waiting, arduously praying for her recovery, a prayer that was never answered. Well, my prayer was answered, I suppose, just not in the way I wished. I will probably spend the remainder of my life wondering about that.

As I packaged up the votive candles with the letter about my remembrance plan, I wondered what would be a good way to mark the anniversary of her “significant brain event” (those words delivered by her surgical neurologist will never leave me). I spent time in gratitude for the days we had together, I listened to music that alternately moved me to tears and soothed my soul, and then I decided I would do something more sensorily deliberate.

At lunchtime I got into my vehicle (not the snow-covered Kona yesterday) and drove to a restaurant in town. I’m not sure how many years this restaurant has been here, but I know it’s been at least thirty years, because Claudia and I and our first two little boys (they were two and one at the time; they are now 31 and nearly 30) ate there a number of times during the four years we lived in the area. I am not bothered by eating out alone (something Claudia could never really understand; she would never eat out alone), so that wasn’t awkward for me.

I glanced at the menu and decided to order as a side an item that Claudia always loved in those days (potato skins filled with cheese and bacon). As I ate my pre-entree salad, I remembered that Claudia would be rolling her eyes and clearing her throat in disgust because she abhorred anything that was leafy and green. My sirloin steak arrived (the first I’ve eaten, I think, since I moved to Minnesota nine months ago), and as I chewed its protein-satisfying chunks, I remembered that for the last two years of her life, Claudia was focused on eating virtually carb-free.

As I enjoyed my food, I glanced around the interior of the restaurant. I’m sure it’s been updated over the years, but there are some standard fixtures, like the fireplace and the arrangement of tables and booths that are likely as they were in 1996. I envisioned our young family: two active little boys, two young adult parents, beginning a life together that would be filled with all sorts of adventures and possibilities.

It was a positive way for me to remember and to commune, even if in a deeply soulful way, with Claudia another time. It’s hard for me to describe the enduring nature of relationships following the death of a loved one. It’s not anything like I imagined it would be, because even though Claudia is no longer physically with me, she is with me. Perhaps it’s only my thoughts and memories that make it seem that way, but I have the sense that it’s much deeper than that, that when you spend nearly three decades together, the inner beings of two separate people gradually seep into one another, forming a new bond that endures.

So that was how I spent yesterday. In nine days I will honor Claudia’s life by remembering the first anniversary of her death. It will be another meaningful moment in time, a special day filled with memories and pain and yes, peace.

These unique moments are important to observe, but this morning I am thankful for what I think will be a simple, ordinary day, where peace will find me in the commonplace activities before me.