When numbness slows my typing hands

So I've just got in from my shift at our church's community coffee bar, The Loft. It's almost 1am. It's silent. And I know I just have to write.

My attempt to break the ice in my last post didn't really work. I have a great desire to write, a great sense of purpose in my writing, I thank God that I have the ability to write, but despite all these things I've been struggling to sit down and do just that; to write. Really really struggling. I've been frustrated with myself. I've let others waiting on me down. And still, nothing. Why don’t the words come out?

It's not just blog entries that have decreased. Diary entries, notebook musings, emails to friends - they've all been in short supply. My writing has consisted of 140 character tweets and Facebook status updates. Snippets can be thought provoking but there is great need too for the bigger picture; quotes can easily be twisted when isolated from their context. My life sometimes feels like those short quotes, those tweets - made up of lone moments where all appears to be 'fine', only for the cracks to show when I'm away from the public eye. It took me a long time to let those moments come, to write little quotes, to face people with a smile, for fear of people thinking that I'm ok, that I'm normal, equipped to face life on my own, all the time.

The inability to get my words out on screen doesn't come alone. Numbness, a state of being I cannot stand, has plagued me of late. And as I feel that numbness wallow over me, it seems natural that a writing inspired by such intensity of grief and emotion, should suffer. The numbness doesn't kill the love. The love still bursts inside; it just kills its expression and influence for good.

Tonight though, as I soon as I closed the car door after my shift, the tears began to flow. He wasn't there in the passenger seat beside me. He hasn't been for over 14 months now but still at times it hits me. It did tonight. I wanted him there, his company, his conversation, his companionship, his taking me home. With numbness you don't feel the hits. But you miss them. You need them. They bring such release. Suddenly in all the grief and tears is all the love and beauty that you miss so much.

I've always been aware of the isolation, the separation that comes with widowhood. If we were only friends with people at the same 'life stage' as us then I'd have none right now. Fortunately it doesn't work like that and I have some amazing friends who I am eternally grateful for (that sentence doesn't give justice to just how grateful I am - there just aren't words my dear friends). But there's an isolation which is far stronger than simply not having friends; even surrounded by people, you cannot escape it. You are isolated from your other half, a part of your very being, and that void becomes all too clear at times.

Looking for advice or opinions on big decisions or simply sharing the mundane details of the day. I wonder if people think it's strange that I've shared certain things with them, like it's not their place to know. But the person whose place it is to 'know' is too far away to share these things with, & in his absence, I share things with others that I wouldn't normally, just like I share this blog with you all. I want to be able to talk through decisions with Ems, to tell him about the silly mundane things of the day, but I can't. And the silence, his silence, is deafening, made louder by still, by naturally non-committal responses from others to questions they should never have been asked, to mundane details that only the most intimate of lovers takes interest in; the way he takes interest in everything that you are. Some things are now solely my decision to make and others can't possibly enter in to that loneliness.

Ems and I bought a 'project' of a house. A beautiful old house with character, light and space; we both loved it immediately. You could walk around and see the 1970s wallpaper and crumbling plaster in places, or you could see what the house would become. We knew it would take ten, maybe twenty years to get the house how we knew it could be, yet we didn't mind. It was to be a labour of love, and it was already full of love; already 'home'. In many ways, despite what other eyes might see, Ems and I lived in the finished article despite having only owned the house for 6 months. With every morning's wake and every walk through the door we saw what it was going to be, not what it was. Our mattress on the floor might as well have been a four poster bed, the ageing paint work the most luxurious wallpaper, as far as we saw it.

In the last few weeks the builders have started work on the house which I haven't lived in since Ems passed. It was time, and as they commence what will be months of work, I continue the build up to living there again, this time alone. This isn't the way I wanted it to be but it's the way I want it to be. It currently stands with its guts taken out, walls knocked down, floors churned up (two words - damp proofing!). Yet as it stands as a shell it still feels every bit our home. It always will.

Massive decisions need to be made on what to do with the layout of the house and again I find myself lost. I am presented with options and ideas and I shelve them to discuss later, yet the person I am shelving them to discuss with is not around to discuss anything. These decisions are now mine to make yet with every one of them, I still think of we. This is not my house but our house. I am suddenly carrying out our plans.

Many have and will be asked for their opinion but the resounding cry of 'it's whatever you want to do' will remain. Yet what I want to do is by the by now. None of this is what I want to do and I long for my sweet darling boy to come and decide with me.

Yet, even as I write I know that the focus was never and will never be the bricks and mortar of the house. The focus was our love which made it home. And I am aptly reminded not to worry about big decisions I have to make or little details I cannot share, because all this we see is temporary. Everything we see is in a state of decay, yet the things beyond vision continue forever. There is nothing and no one visible who won't one day not be here. But the faith despite the circumstance, the hope in the despair, the love in the darkness; those things will continue to grow. The numbness must fade, and the release of it will bring pain, yet forever I know it will be worth it for the purpose and love which has brought me this far and which will ever lead me home. Oh God I hope I write as this journey goes on.

[Memory #25: The ‘would you like your order now’ episode
It was my first birthday since we’d started going out and Ems took me to really nice local restaurant, Y Polyn. I’d been starving myself all day to fully appreciate the tasty delights we were anticipating that evening. We’d both wanted to go to the restaurant for ages and he’d decided to treat me for my birthday as a surprise (having already tried to on Valentines day too – not that I knew at the time – but without success due to it being booked out). We arrived and were asked if we wanted to sit down with a drink or go straight through, I didn’t mind, and Ems took the decision to go straight through. The waiter then came to ask if we were ready to place our order and Ems decisively asked if we could wait a while before placing it. I can clearly remember him being so decisive on both counts (very unlike him at times!) and thinking it was because he hadn’t yet decided on his choice of food. After the waiter had left though he confessed to having eaten a pasty when he’d got in from work and ‘wasn’t really hungry’! He’d done too good a job of starving himself through the day and couldn’t wait any longer. He regretted that decision, particularly in realising I’d been successful in holding out and was resultantly famished. Fortunately, another of Ems strengths was his hearty appetite and as soon as the delicious goodies appeared in front of us, the pasty was quickly forgotten and a hearty helping was much enjoyed by my boy who loved his food.]

The reality of it all

Not that I’ve ever faltered from it but I’m warning you that you’re about to hear the honesty I’ve promised you all along. I wish I could have a warning for the different depths of this journey, the different hurts that lay ahead. When I wrote last week about the dawn of November and the grief and fears it presented, I had no idea how raw, how fresh, how agonisingly all-consuming the pain could be again.

There is no other word for it than agony. It isn’t any better than just under a year ago when it was new. It isn’t any better than a few months in when the shock started to wear off. It isn’t like a medical condition that improves with time. Perhaps because I’m young there are different expectations because of all that I’m physically still able to do, but like the old widows with whom I’ve shared many conversations confirm, it doesn’t get better – it gets worse. It’s just different.

Car journeys have never been the same since Ems died. It’s not just his absence because I was often in the car without him; it’s that rather than simply be a mindless journey from one place to another, they’re now burdened with emotional heaviness as I have no escape from my own thoughtful company. Lately I find I rarely take a journey alone, long or short, without crying at some point if not all the way. I’d thought those days were behind me, saved now for the odd ‘special’ occasion, but no.

I’m unable to work out where on my face the burning pain is worse because both eyes and cheeks sting ferociously from relentless tears. Yet they both pale into insignificance compared to the weighty, excruciating throbbing of my shattered heart.

Tears spill into day time, into ordinary moments while daylight is upon us, rather than reserving themselves for the loneliness of nights without sweet Ems at my side. For a while I thought I had mastered control of my tears in public, grasped the ability to play it cool and not upset anyone, to make it easier for others. Now I once more find myself being asked by my boss if I’m 'ok' and without warning rivers flow; Now I stand in church singing and open my eyes to see the droplets of tears on the floor below me; Now I just can’t always promise to keep back the tears, hard as I try at times.

There is no monopoly on hurt. Many hurt around me and I hate it. I often wish that I had the monopoly on pain; that I wouldn’t have to see others suffer too. The one advantage of a broken heart is that it makes you far more sensitive to other’s pain. I've realised that God doesn’t just use us in spite of our brokenness; He actually uses our brokenness to reach out to others. There really needs to be some re-shift in our thinking that the most useful and effective people are the ones with no worries, no hurts, no pain, with the hard exteriors and perfect faces. When we let it, pain will fix our minds on something far greater because the only alternative is to focus on our pain and its harrowing affect on our lives, and that only ever leaves us in despair.

I scream ‘why me’ but I know I have no more rights than the next person. I have no right over anyone else to a long marriage. None of us do. I had no right over anyone else to the beauty of being in love with a man who was as equally and beautifully in love with me. I still don’t hold that right but I’m blessed with it.

I don’t love Ems any less than anyone who loves the husband right next to them. I don’t desire or need him any less. I don’t want to share the little details of the day with him any less. The love, the wants, the needs - they remain. The difference is solely that he’s not here. The wants and the needs remain frustrated; the love it continues to grow. Until you experience it you can’t possibly imagine it but though the days apart grow longer, the love grows deeper and the heart misses more; the love does not switch off – it is stronger than death and doesn’t change. You just begin to learn to live with only memories of whispers coming back your way; of his arms to hold you after the tough days; of him, your confidant, sharing your deepest fears and desires and fighting for them alongside you.

You begin to learn to live with it; but you still hate it.

I refuse to wallow in self pity. I have never demanded special treatment because of the pain I relentlessly carry. Though I cannot control my feelings, I can control what I choose to do or say, what passions I choose to run with, what purpose I’ll seek to fulfil. We can all choose that.

And so it goes, in the brutal honesty I have promised you; be encouraged that I still believe there is purpose in pain, but don’t think that the pain goes away. I run not because I am pain free, but in spite of it, because of it, knowing that the final destination will make all this worthwhile.

I remember when Ems died not just wishing I had the monopoly on hurt, that no one else would have to feel like I did, but also naively thinking that nothing else could hurt me now. How I wish we all had a quota so that once it was full we could feel no more hurt. But alas, even though my love and grief infiltrate every second and action of my waking day, and I start to believe I couldn’t possibly feel greater loss, more pain, there it is. And just as the grief surprises you with increased vigour, so other hurts are magnified in the light of your open wound. There is no hard shell for hurts to bounce off; it’s all absorbed, deeper and deeper into the gashes that one sweet day will be but memories themselves.

Running with an injury can make the injury flair up at times. But this isn’t a broken leg which can be rested before training resumes. Waiting for my broken-heart to heal is as little an option as waiting for Ems to walk back through the door. So do I stop? There are moments when desperation comes over me to run away from it all; but there is no escape route, there’s nowhere to run to, this isn’t a choice. I can choose to stop but I won’t; I’ll keep running. The stitch will pound and the knees will buckle, there’ll be dehydration, and long, slow hills, but I will run; not in spite of it all, but because of it all, and one day I’ll win.

[Memory #23 The "running" episode
Ems was a man who could teach us all a thing or two about perseverance. As you'll have read in earlier blogs he suffered with Seasonal Affective Disorder in these winter months and yet never let it conquer him. It would reduce the amount he could do, yes, but he never caved into bitterness, never took it out on others, never stopped being grateful for the things he did have, never took his eyes off the main thing, he always always loved. One day, lacking energy as he did, he decided that in spite of it, he was going to start running that night in order to increase his (already fairly high) fitness levels.
As I watched the rain begin, then start to pour, outside my office window I expected his resolve to be postponed to another day. But not Ems, he was determined. As soon as we were in through the door, he was up the stairs, changed, then back down, asking me how long dinner would take, before setting out for his 'first' run in the pouring rain. He ran hard despite the elements and got back just in time for dinner!]

Normal

I am aching incredibly right now. Just over 10 months ago I never wanted to be normal. Just over 10 months ago I wanted to go against the flow, to make a difference.

Right now in this moment, I would give anything be 'normal'.

I don't even know what 'normal' is and am pretty sure no such thing exists but I want to stop this rollercoaster that keeps speeding round; that just when I think I'm starting to climb, I'm suddenly hurtling down with uncontrollable speed.

I do still yearn to make a difference. And to make a difference, we have to be different. No one ever changed the world by being like it after all. 

I am grateful that my mind is continuously aware of a bigger picture that I can't yet see. Nothing like tragedy can make you so acutely sensitive to how truly fragile life truly is; to how little control we really have. I don't want to be complacent; I don't want to be so at ease with what's around me that I forget that there is more: More to life, more to give, more to receive.

But I am also human. I am fragile. I am easily thrust into moments that leave me crying out for 'normality'.

Sometimes when I am alone I can begin to think that this...that this is normal! I pop to our house to check the post as though everyone has a home they don't live in right now. I smile at memories or photos as though that is the way every 27 year old thinks on their spouse.

And then suddenly there I am, taking a call outside church from friends with good news, and suddenly I'm all too aware that I'm standing in the graveyard where my husband's body lies. And in moments like that I know this isn't how it was meant to be. For a moment I want to be someone in hope of sharing such news myself one day or of turning to my husband to share the good news I've just heard, rather than knowing that I will never be that person.

And even though it hurts, I still know that all I am called to be is me. This is the lot I've been assigned. 11 months ago, I thought it was the most beautiful lot imaginable. When I look forward, I know it is going to be even more beautiful. So right now, I have to just be.

I may want to be 'normal' but I have to be me.

And it's ok for me to get lost in thinking that my situation is normal sometimes. I have to run the race without looking to the right or the left, without looking at those around me. I may have lost the thing most dear to me but if I keep focusing on the goal ahead, I can still win my race. When I stop comparing myself to others, I don't think about normal, about what I don't have. And if I really think about it, even though I'd do anything to have Ems here to live our lives out together as was normal to us; looking back I know that we had so much, so much more than 'normal'. Looking ahead, I know that just as our story together way exceeded anything I could have imagined, I'll one day have way beyond it. It's just right now that hurts so much. And 'right now' will one day be history. Oh help me to realise that. One day at a time.

My heart breaking for 'normality' feels a little foolish considering this poem I wrote this morning.

I would rather be me

Despite the pain,
I would rather be me.
Despite the fact that you're not here,
I would rather be me.

I would rather be me
with all my battles,
all my wounds.

With all my memories.
With all the love I have for you in my heart.
With your love's fingerprints tattooed upon my soul.

Others' climbs may seem less steep, their roads more smooth,
their hearts less scarred, their hands more full.
But I would rather be me,
empty handed,
with memories of holding your sweet hand,
than to be another that had never felt your touch.

I would rather be me,
grief my constant companion
and my heart bursting with the love you lavished upon me,
than to take the burden of being another.

Oh, I don't recommend that any other be me right now.
But I wouldn't have wanted to be any other back then.
I won't want to be any other when I join you in endless light.
And so it is.
Past beauty.
Future gain.
I can't want to be anyone else in this present.

For your love is ever with me,
and though I walk the shady valley of death,
the same light that shined for us, shines for me,
and the light always wins.

I would rather be your me.

Darkness

Sorry for the long absence. I had a week's 'break' in Cornwall with the family. The change of scenery was positive but there are some things I can't take a break from. Coming 'home' has been emotional - Ems was my home and he's not here.

I wrote this in my prayer diary last night and thought it'd make a true and honest blog entry. It might upset some people but it's real...

God, I hate this. I hate my life. There, I've said it. I do. I hate what my life has become. I hate him not being here. I do hate my life.

I loved Ems so much. I love him so much. The love isn't past tense even though his presence on earth is. I love him.

I get so frustrated at little things - some things really don't matter anymore and others seem to get to me even more than they did before. I get really frustrated at people who text to ask how I am and then ignore my response. I don't expect words of wisdom. I'd just rather people didn't ask in the first place. It is nice to be asked but when there's no acknowledgment of the response it kind of takes away any sincerity they may have had in asking. It gives me a fear of answering honestly. I think I'm hypersensitive right now and I have to keep reminding myself that the reason life sucks isn't because people don't text back but because Ems is gone. I just hate it. I was never one to get upset by these things. The loneliness isn't something that texts/emails back will cure anyway.

I look for lumps hoping that I'll find one. When I have a headache or get a cold I hope the symptoms may actually be a sign of something way more sinister. I just don't want to be here.

Don't go thinking I'm suicidal. I know my times are not my own to decide, just like Ems' times weren't his. I'm actually jealous of him right now - the fact he was gone in an instant, ready for the next world and thrust into heaven without a chance to think about the fact he was on his way there - no more tears for him. Ever.

I am glad it's him and not me because I always hated the thought of him suffering and wouldn't want him to endure this instead of me (I think you call that love!). I do love that he's full of life and free of all pain right now, consumed with endless joy and freedom. But, boy I can't wait for the day when I get to join him. I don't know what day that will be but I'm ready. I am sorted with God and when that moment comes I will be there in an instant. I can't wait.

Till then, I have (note that this is obligation not choice) to find some way of living with this. It's not going to go away and so I have to find a way to live with loss and pain being a very part of me.

I'm not sure what Paul meant when he wrote 'to live is Christ. to die is gain' but I can see that in my experience.
'to live is Christ...' - God is all I have to help me live right now. He is the only reason I live. Family, friends, places, memories, can bring me nice moments, some distractions, but it is only God that can give me purpose, strength, peace and hope that is permanent; that can bring change.
'To die is gain...' - that bit I really like. The day I die is what will make this life worth living. Heaven awaits for me and there I will have it all. That will be better than anything I have ever had. Ems has it better than he ever had it on earth, even in our very best moments. Understatement. For the believer who dies, it's not the end, it's just the beginning.

Oh Ems, what a void you have left. How perfect it was. How wonderful you were. You can't hear this but I love you.

Another night has come and yet everything around me is night right now anyway.

A glimmer. I see a glimmer from the bright light on the horizon that I'll one day experience for myself. Then all night will end. Right now it's just a glimmer but the light will win.
It has for Ems and it will for me.

Darkness, you may be my constant companion right now but you will not win. You will not win.

[Memory #13 The "You are my sunshine" episode
Ems & I had so few quarrels that I can remember them and can count them before I run out of fingers. On Good Friday 2008 we had marked the day as an 'Ems & Ruthie day' in our diaries. These were days when we spent time we'd set aside for just the 2 of us. Unfortunately on this day, the pressure we'd both put on the day to be perfect because it was long awaited 'quality time', created tension straight away when a little misunderstanding occured in the first 10 minutes of the journey up to the Preseli Mountains. I had a tendency to 'go quiet' when I'm upset (I soon learned) and Ems wasn't a mind reader so by the time we reached the peak we weren't talking to one another and neither of us really knew why. Fortunately, neither of us liked falling out and so a short heated discussion later (that's not an understatement - neither of us were shouters!), and we both knew what was wrong and realised it wasn't actually a very big deal. We made up quickly. As we made our way to our next destination the song 'you are my sunshine' came on the radio. I can't remember which one of us started singing it first but we both sung out the chorus, and I wrapped my arm around him as he drove through the country lanes. I remember us both realising for the first time that the last verse of the song is actually sad and refusing to sing it but we sung the chorus with gusto 'you are my sunshine. my only sunshine. you make me happy, when skies are grey. You'll never know dear how much I love you. Please don't take my sunshine away'. He did know how much I loved him though, as I knew how much he loved me, and neither of us liked any moments that threatened to take away that sunshine.]

More than a day

Here we are. I'm writing. I've been idly browsing facebook and procrastinating wondering whether to blog or not to blog. I'm nervous but I'm here now.

It's been quiet on the writing front, well on here at least. I spend much time writing down notes, thoughts, prayers, memories and the like in my trusty little notebook (I've gone through 4 notebooks since Ems died 11 weeks ago). I like to get things out on paper. I've struggled to write on here this week though, sorry readers.

It's been a very tough week but today has been ok. You'll recall me repeating that I'm going to remain honest to myself (and you) and that I will. I won't pretend this week has been easy but neither will I pretend that today has been the worst day. It hasn't.

Today was Valentines Day. Today was the day that thousands celebrate their mutual love, one with the other. I celebrated my love alone. The love is still very much alive, the memories are vivid, the texts, cards, photos still so very real. But he is not here to share it with.

I'm not going to pretend that I spent the day thinking about the fact it was Valentines day. To be honest, I tried not to. It was excrutiating on Friday, trying to find a birthday card and pretending I didn't notice the countless 'To my wife' valentines cards I had to clamber past to get to the birthday section (only to realise there were no decent cards because they'd all been put away to make room for the Valentines ones).

I'll never receive a 'To my wife' Valentines card. Just like I'll never receive a 'To my wife' Christmas, birthday, anniversary card. Our marriage was so real, so full, so loving, it felt like we'd been married forever and it's crazy to think we didn't mark these dates as husband and wife. It also doesn't take the word 'wife' on a card to prove its worth*.

I got out the 'to my fiancee' card Ems sent me last Christmas at Christmas. I haven't got out the valentines cards he'd sent me today though because I've memorised the words he wrote in them already. I have read those words (Welsh and English) countless times in the last few weeks; all the cards and notes and texts he'd sent me. They bring tears but they also bring smiles, the love behind them as real as the second he sent them.

I've had this overwhelming sense of how perfect our love was today. I am so incredibly grateful for that love; for Ems. The funny thing is, our perfect love is immortalised now. Ems can't screw up on Valentines day; he can't buy me the wrong present or not write enough in the card. Sad as I will always be to not have him here with me, I will always remember how lovely he was. Our love will always be perfect, Valentines Day or any day. Nothing can ever taint it.

Even though I've mentioned it in this post, Valentines Day is more insignificant than ever. I was never overly enthusiastic about it before. Ems and I naturally enjoyed celebrating the first one we shared [see memory #9]. Last year's consisted of wedding suit fittings, McDonalds, rugby and an Indian takeaway with friends. I was a bit dissapointed at the time but a few weeks later Ems surprised me with a massive bunch of flowers and took me out for a delicious expensive meal. The surprise and effort meant far more on a day when Ems was unprovoked than it would have on a day when it was expected. We agreed that Valentines was just an extra excuse to proclaim our love rather than a day where we had to prove it.

I will remember the love we shared every day of my life. Valentines Day will be no exception but neither will it be especially significant. This is better than Valentines Days before Ems came along because I have a very real love to remember. In days gone by I may have sat and wondered if my crush would send me a card but I'll never have to wonder again. The Royal Mail just about manage with earthly deliveries, there's no way anything can be sent my way from Heaven.

I know he is surrounded by love up in Heaven though and so am I. Warm memories of the sweetest love I could ever have known, and the life-giving love of a Saviour who died for me so that one day, we will be reunited.

Real love can't be captured in a day.

Real love is expressed with every breath you take, every day.

I can't write it in a card for Ems this year but I will love him forever.

[*Memory #10 The 'card' episode

Ems loved doing the unexpected, he wasn't really one to take the obvious option.

When I look back at the various cards Ems sent me, it is only last Christmas' 'To my fiancee' card that ever had such a label (that was only because it was pointed out to us both that it would be the only Christmas when we would have such a title).

I remember opening the first birthday card Ems ever gave me, expecting some kind of girlfriend statement or at least a few love hearts on the front. As I pulled it from the envelope, I was surprised to just see a few chickens on the front. They weren't animated or particularly attractive, it was just an old fashioned sketch of some chickens. It was unconventional and the first words he'd written inside were 'You do like chickens don't you?!'.

Completely random, just like Ems was. I didn't particularly like or not like chickens, we'd never made any reference to them. He'd just seen it when looking for my birthday card and decided it was to be the one. He told me he didn't like the obvious ones and would rather write his own words than rely on those printed in a card...so would I. Ems' words were real, loving and beautiful.

Thinking about it, I may never have received a 'to my wife' card even if he was here. That might have been far too obvious for my sweet, unpredictable boy!]

Sing Sing Sing

GarethJonesPhotography 2009

I wanted to share a breakthrough with you.

Thursday morning, for the first time since my lovely Ems passed away, I truly sung.

I don't have a beautiful or gifted voice but I've always been a singer. I used to sing my heart out in the car, the shower, all around the house, I sung.

Ems had a real talent for singing and for all things musical. He sung and played in church - leading, following, solo, or group; he'd played at youth events to hundreds; he'd belted out a number of his own songs by himself (Shipping Forecast) or with various bands (Haybarns on Fire, Rayburn & the Radiators, Venturi Channel, Teeny Bopping Commanders, to name a few - help me with any I've missed guys!); he'd belted out covers with Meica & the Mechanics (with colleagues) and Seren Gwib; he was the music man. Yet when it came to the car or the shower or the house, he sung far less than I did.

Don't get me wrong, he'd sing at times*. He'd come in to the room and ask me what the next line of a song was, or how something went. In my bird like tones (some people have likened them to a crow), I would sing the next line or the rhythm. He'd also sing and play in preparation for the next church service, event, gig. When he sung, it sounded good. When he sung, it was because the lyrics were screaming at him and he just couldn't help but join in. I could never out sing him in quality, but I usually did in quantity.

I'd ask him if my singing got on his nerves but it didn't. I'm sure at times I ruined the odd 'classic' for him as I sung my heart out, but he'd usually just smile over at me. He knew I was singing because I was happy and free and relaxed and he loved that. Those times when he did join in, he'd harmonise brilliantly and it would make the singing all the more pleasurable for me.

When Ems died, I didn't feel like singing.

At his funeral though, I sung my heart out. I remember before his funeral saying that I didn't know if I'd feel like standing or sitting, whether I'd be able to sing or not. But as the music started that day, I knew I wanted to stand, proud that I was his wife, and sing loudly, so thankful that God had brought him into my life and blessed us in the amazing ways He had.

Since then, I have sung at church services. I've meant what I've sung. But I haven't truly sung. I haven't wandered around the house, my heart lost in a song. You know those moments when you're singing your heart out because there's something in you that has to get out?

Until yesterday. Yesterday, for a moment, as I dried my hair, I could hear my singing, even about the noise of the dryer.

I was singing.

It wasn't forced. It wasn't planned. It was my heart overflowing.

I had spent the last 7 weeks looking forward to Heaven solely because it would mean an end to all this pain. I can honestly say that yesterday I was singing, not just because I know I won't have any pain when I get there, but because heaven itself is beyond anything I can see, hear or imagine. And despite the darkness that surrounds me right now, there is hope. Hope, because Ems and I shared the same faith, that he is there now, and one day I'll join him and it will be amazing [understatement of the largest scale].

The dark moments will still come. I've cried since then. I'll cry again. There'll be times when I don't feel like singing, but I'm not going to lose my voice entirely. I'm going to remember Ems when he'd come to church feeling low but sing his heart out in spite of it all, grateful for grace. I won't sing because I'm forced to or because it's what everyone's doing. I'll sing because my heart does.

For all those who have lost loved ones suddenly and tragically in Haiti - my heart goes out to you.

[*Memory #4 The "Early morning sing song" episode
Ems suffered with Seasonal Affective Disorder and one of the symptoms was a cruel disturbance of his sleep. As such, getting out of the bed in the morning could be even more of a struggle than it is for most of us because of the bad night that had gone before. One night when setting his alarm, Ems decided he was going to try and get up at 6am and read the bible for a little while in front of his light box before getting up to face the world.
At 6am Ems jumped out of bed enthusiasically. I was so happy to hear him get up so easily, there was no way I was going to get cross at him for waking me in the process. He left the bedroom, I assumed to go and read elsewhere, and I buried back down into the duvet to snooze for another hour.
A toilet flush and a couple of minutes later, and the door banged open and Ems noisily returned to the bedroom, switched on his light box, and parked his skinny but lovely posterior at the bottom of the bed. I realised that meant he was going to read and do his light therapy in the bedroom, but I was still grateful that he was up and ok so I didn't mind too much. I just buried a bit deeper into the duvet and attempted to snooze.
Then, he started to read. He read out loud! I'd forgotten that little quirk of his. He'd often read out loud to help him concentrate and this was one of those times. I just lay still and smiled at another of his eccentricities.
Just as I started thinking that reading out loud probably wouldn't prevent me snoozing because he was doing so quietly, he spontaneously burst into song!
He started to sing. I buried deep, but when he couldn't remember some of the lines to the old hymn he'd pitched up, I could almost feel him looking at me through the duvet, waiting for me to help him with the lines. I didn't first time around, trying to kid myself I'd still fall back to sleep, and he filled the gaps with 'la las' and 'mmm mmms'. But when he reached that part for the second time, I couldn't help but sing my heart out with him, filling in the lyrics he didn't know, and smile, because not only was he out of bed and ready to face the day, but his heart was overflowing with a song, and so was mine.
What's an extra 45 minutes in bed when you can sing with the one you love instead?

By the way, the above photo, that's us, our hearts overflowing with song on our wedding day.]