I Can't Describe It

Two years and a day without my Greg. My rock. My strength. My love. My all.

Driving was all I knew to do yesterday and had intended to drive all day. A lifelong friend called me before I hit the road, so she joined me. We did some shopping, ate lunch in one town, had dessert in another town, and took a roundabout way back to town. Along the way we talked about our husbands, the gaps in our lives without them, and the emptiness – for lack of a better word at the moment – we felt without them.

When I said emptiness would be something I could deal with, my friend said there was no way to really describe the feeling. Grief is one thing. So are sorrow and sadness, and the wanting things to be the way they were before our husbands died. 

But this lacking that can’t be identified, this something indescribable, is haunting. A feeling of being unsettled, lost in a wilderness that has no end, no maps, no paths, no markers, no guides to let me know where I am going nor who I am at this point in my life, is about the best way I can describe this feeling my friend and I talked about yesterday. 

I know I’m sad and doubt that the sadness that underlies everything I do since Greg’s death will ever go away. Grief will always be with me; today I’m grieving, but without the intense pain that has accompanied grief many times. Though I don’t really feel lonely, some of the feeling of being unsettled may be loneliness – I don’t know.

Today I have cried. I have done housework. I have listened to music. Nothing suits. Nothing appeals. Nothing helps. I have tried driving, but couldn’t manage that today. I can’t get interested in reading which, for me, is as unusual as pigs growing wings. I don’t want to interact with anyone in any way. 

So . . . I’ll return home. Have a light supper. Go to Greg’s grave and talk to Greg and God. Shed tears of grief and longing that today will be tinged with frustration. Wonder what my life will be like tomorrow, next week, next month, next year, ten years from now.

Pray that God’s peace will settle my mood and provide a night of restful sleep to enable me to face another tomorrow without Greg.

And I still won’t be able to describe this feeling.