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After death of a spouse, Aging, Being a Widow, Bellaghy, Castledawson, Death and dying, Dennis O'Driscoll, Derry, Dispatch from the Diaspora, FInal wishes, Funeral, Grieving, Keeping Going, Loss, Love, Memoir, Milestones, Mourning, Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland Culture, Postscript, Rituals, Seamus Heaney
P.S. Seamus Heaney and a Grave Situation
When I returned to Bellaghy this summer, I visited Seamus Heaney's grave again. This time, a simple wooden cross stood in the dirt. This time, I was a widow, changed and contemplative, convinced that cosmic strings keep us connected. This time, I wondered about the spiritual space in which both men might move. Where are they?
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Act Two, Aging, Being a Widow, Birthdays, Breast Cancer Advocacy, Breast Cancer Treatment, Castledawson, Coming of age, Death and dying, Dying, Family, Fatherless daughters, FInal wishes, First birthday without him, Funerals, Great Advice, Grieving, Loss, Love, Marriage, Memoir, Mourning, Northern Ireland, Poetry, Robin Williams, saying goodbye, Thanksgiving, Themes of Childhood, Tommy Edwards, W.H. Auden, Wedding Anniversary
Remembering Ken on our 25th ‘Anniversary’
Twelve days after Ken died, I wrote this post. I haven’t read it since, and I’m not going to read it tonight. Somewhere in the middle of the grief-stricken ramblings, I remember is a pure – and good – memory of this day twenty five years ago – January 13, 1990 – the day when Ken and I embarked on what we both knew…
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Aging, Being a Widow, Being young, Birthdays, Death and dying, Grieving, Loss, Marriage, Memoir, Milestones, Mourning, Poetry, Rites of passage, W.H. Auden, Walt Whitman, widowed
no sense of direction . . .
One of the first gifts my husband ever gave me was a silver pocket compass. Having noted very early in our relationship my stellar capacity for getting lost – and notwithstanding the fact that I was then a novice driving on the American side of the road – my man intervened as he knew best. I hadn’t the heart to…
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Awesome Women, Being young, Breaking Bad, Fireworks, Friendships, Grieving, James Gandolfini, Lou Reed, Love, Marriage, Memoir, Mother Daughter Relationship, New Year, Northern Ireland Culture, Rites of passage, Robert Frost, saying goodbye, The Sopranos, Themes of childhood, Time, Writing
cups of kindness
“Life isn’t some vertical or horizontal line — you have your own interior world, and it’s not neat.” Patti Smith How do I begin to put the stuff of the past twelve months in a box and tie it up in a big red bow? Just begin. Pluck out a memory and wrap it up. Move on to the next.…
