Category Archives: Miscellaneous

FOUR self DISCOVERIES and ONE PONDERING while TRAVELING to Israel

Miscellaneous

I’ve just returned from one of the highlights of my life. While on this trip to Israel the 2nd  anniversary of his passing occurred.  That day held solemn moments and remembrance of him and our life, all while enjoying my current activity.  I had not purposefully planned this trip around the anniversary date however the two coinciding may just have been a blessing in disguise.

A blessing in disguise because on the trip I discovered:

  1. I don’t feel guilty about traveling without him.  (Yet I wonder if that is because going to Israel was not on Loren and my bucket list?)
  2.  I believe I need to travel while I am young enough  to get out there and walk those 6 miles a day to see the sights and take in a full day.  (I’m not convinced waiting for more money or retirement is a better time to travel.)
  3.  I’m not interested in traveling the world by myself  so traveling with other’s works best for me. (And maybe having a hotel room by myself will be OK next time?)
  4. I can enjoy new experiences and places even when when I am still moving forward in grief.

 

During my 11 day adventure I often pondered if going to heaven and leaving your loved ones behind on earth wasn’t a lot like me going on a trip  and leaving my loved ones at home; for I was aware of my loved ones who were far away at home, even missed them, all the while thoroughly embracing the new sights and experiences  I had found. I was content and could’ve stayed away far longer.

I leave you with the following quote I had read 16 months ago…it’s just now that this quote is applicable in my present journey:

”Grief is learning that it’s possible for a part of you to die WHILE you are still learning.”  John Pete.

I choose to keep learning.  I choose to stay on the path towards life.

 

THAT MAGIC 2 YEAR MARK and LOVING LIKE YOU’RE GONNA LOSE THEM

Children, Death, Faith in God, Family, Grief, loving your deceased spouse, Marriage, Miscellaneous

It’s March. I think my body and emotions will forever remember this time of the year.  As time presses closer the world seems to close in. I have to fight tunnel vision.  Every task seems strenuous. I’m physically exhausted again.  Feeling like I’m back to point A in the grief, but I know I’m not. Things are better.

 If I sound abstract it’s only because I feel abstract.  As an abstract painting.   Happy and sad colors splashed in random places.

I had purposed to retain every memory of he & I, every scent, every emotion…I honestly thought I might remember every minuet detail because in our empty nest years we had found heightened pleasure by living in the moment, living in “our moments”.  But I find myself forgetting the depth of the emotions.  This brings deep angst.

I now think I knew I was going to lose him….because snippets of memories periodically pass through my mind.  How I sensed we weren’t going to live to a ripe old age together.  How I tried to ignore my thoughts, thinking they were mere fears. How I felt driven, compelled, even spurred on to love him with unbridled passion and fervence.  All as if there were no tomorrow.  All as if wanting to partake of every good thing with and in each other.

In hindsight I know, for certain, that he had a sense that our time would come to an end earlier than we wanted….by the things he said, even the day before he unexpectedly passed.  Things he had said to our children at a Thanksgiving dinner. Things he had said to the Gingerich family on his 60th birthday.

Thankfully I had taken the time to gaze at him, to savor those precious moments and let time stand still with him.  We had learned to vacation within our home.  We had learned to let the world slip by.  No words of love were held back.

But I go forward. Yes, with God.  Not lost ~  but certainly by myself.  (But I still wonder if our loved ones  in heaven aren’t praying and caring for us….I swear I feel this).

STEEL BARS and RE-MARRIAGE and VALENTINES

Death, Grief, Loss, loving your deceased spouse, Marriage, Miscellaneous

STEEL BARS… WRAPPED ALL AROUND ME….I’ve been your prisoner since the day you found me…I’m bound forever ‘til the end of time, steel bars, locked around this heart of mine.”  Michael Bolton’s song, STEEL BARS, was one of the numerous songs I had put on a CD I had made for Loren in December of 2014.  This song had re-sounded in me for years. Now, at an earlier point in our marriage this same song rang true but with frustration because we were struggling.

 At year 37 we were flying high. Deeply, even madly, in love. More enthralled with each other than ever. More attached than ever because weLoren & Julia had put blood, sweat, and tears into our marriage union.  Add that with our history…”Loren & Julia’s story”…we were unstoppable.  Heart Valentines.

Because of the heart connection we shared, I HAVE WONDERED..simply put, I have questions:

  • Will I always feel so in love with him?  There are times it feels torturous to be so in love with someone when you can’t be with them. At other time’s I carry a smile, secretly comprehending the love we enjoyed.
  • Would becoming a widow have been easier if he & I would have had a mundane “put-up-with-each-other” relationship?
  • How can some widows and widowers possibly move on by this time  (23 months) and find another person to be with?
  • Doesn’t any of them feel the sense of loyalty to the spouse that is deceased?
  • Are the widow or widower just wanting someone else to replace  what they HAD with their deceased spouse…or maybe what they DIDN’T HAVE with their spouse?
  • Is that even fair to the other person when you still deeply love your deceased spouse?
  • Is it true that some remarry for the sheer sake of companionship?

I wonder.  With no clear answers.  And very possibly I wouldn’t have as many questions if my marriage had ended with a painful divorce vs death….

But I don’t need to wonder about THIS:  how I feel grateful, even vibrantly alive, that I was blessed to have found that undying love with one person. Those steel bars of connection. Blessed to have found the deep pools of warm, enduring love that kept us warm, alive, and bonded.  For there are some married couples who never quite find that place……….that place that can be said, “We,  AS A  COUPLE, are home.”

FEELING GOD for the 1st TIME

Faith in God, Grief, identifying positive things, Miscellaneous

6DG_3857For the past 22 months I have not felt God.   For the past 22 months I have not felt His presence. I’m sure He’s been there all the while but grief had numbed me.  I have worshipped out of sheer choice.  Sheer determination.

That is until 3 Sundays ago.  When I felt God for the 1st time!  When the windows of Heaven slid open.  Again!

Since his passing I’d been faithful  in going to church even though it would’ve been easier to have stayed at home, to hibernate….to not place myself in one more uncomfortable social setting where I’d be forced to face my loss.   I’d been faithful in believing God to be faithful towards me.  I have stayed on the straight and narrow out of sheer will power along with my memory of God’s goodness towards me in past times.

When Loren died a part of me died….a vast desert awaited for me.

Until…THaT Sunday!  The Sunday that I had a vivid awareness that my soul was awakening.  The Sunday when I had a vivid awareness that life was returning to me, in me.

I still grieve for my loss but I now feel God near me, as I had prior to his passing.  I covet God’s presence. Sensing God’s presence is precious.  Simply priceless because…..

  • It gives me renewed hope that God watches out for the widow
  • It gives me increased courage knowing that He is with me
  • It gives me a type of tangible proof that He will go with me and before me in life
  • It gives me a sign, even a landmark, when I felt that God remembered me on that specific day
  • It gives me encouragement that God will still use me for His glory in this phase of my life

Because I now know what it feels like to not recognize God’s presence, should I have a friend who loses a loved one~  I know how I will pray….  I will pray they will once again feel God.  That is, to once again feel God’s presence.

 For God’s presence is gold.  Priceless gold.

 “So, God, my earnest prayer today is to never let me be foolish to live in such a way where You could not dwell in me, inhabit me.  For that would surely be death and more sorrow, again.  I’ve tasted the death and sorrow.  I’m tasting tidbits of renewed life.  I need life. I choose life.  With and in You.”

TAXES & DEATH CERTIFICATES & SUCH

Death, Grief, identifying positive things, Loss, Marriage, Miscellaneous, unexpected things in life

This tax season I am no longer a widow.  Thankfully I had that 1st year where the government recognized me as a widow to help me slowly adjust to those taxable changes, the tax adjustments, the decrease in deductions I could use.  This tax season I am being taxed as a single.  The first time in my life paying taxes as a single person.

And, last week I had to once again produce another death certificate for a business transaction.   I foresee having to prove his death in more situations as they show themselves.  You’d think this would come to an end after 22 months.

As I’ve had to continue producing death certificates I’ve discovered:

  • It no longer bothers me to read his death certificate. For the most part, I read the death certificate as I would read any other document.  In my mind his death certificate is associated with all things related to finances and legalities.
  • Reading the death certificate somehow solidifies, even cements, THAT day ~ that landmark in time, those 5 hours in our home when he passed away quickly, when the EMT’s worked on him, when the coroner arrived, when my daughters and I said our goodbyes on that bedroom floor for 3 ½ hours, when Brenna sang from the grand piano when the funeral directors took his body from our home out to the van, watching them take his body down the driveway, and then away.
  • As he seems to fade in my life, those death certificates are a wonderful reminder that I was his wife. I love to see my name on that death certificate.  Death certificates.  Confirming a solemn, life changing event. Julia 56 years old. February 2014

 I’m also not bothered receiving mail that may have his name on it.  In fact, I somehow enjoy seeing mail addressed to him.

  • It brings a comfort, another reminder that he and I had shared our life.
  • It puts perspective in to my life. He and I had shared our finances. We were attached.
  • We were recognized as an entity ~ together. I wish it could stay that way forever…….

 

…and those letters of advertisement and pieces of random mail can keep coming…with his name alone or ours together posted on the envelope.  I’m not ready for them to stop.  When they completely stop I for sure will most certainly feel alone.

MY 10 POSITIVES OF BEING SINGLE

Faith in God, Family, Grief, identifying positive things, Marriage, Miscellaneous
This image was captured the day after Loren's Celebration of Life.
This image was captured the day after Loren’s Celebration of Life.

Since his death, I’ve found myself becoming more like Loren. Is it my way of compensating for the loss?  Is it because it’s my way of keeping his memory alive?  Is it new additional strength arising in me?

Loren was the ultimate dreamer. An optimist.  At times he had called me the pessimist.  I would immediately shoot back verbally, telling him I was the realist between the two, to help him keep his feet on the ground, to be his balancing counterpoint.

At 21 ¾ months out I’ve found myself listening to the talk radio shows he’d listen to when driving truck.  I’ve found myself reading more news articles to keep myself updated with current events ~ he was the one who kept me abreast with world- wide news.  I’ve found myself reading more articles on the Dow Jones and financial forecasts.

 I’ve found myself rising up to the challenge, new challenges……stepping up to the plate, new plates…..and taking the bull by the horns when I absolutely must. But, I still don’t like bulls and I don’t like horns.

Even though I feel the negatives of being single very much outweigh the positives, I am learning there are positives to being a single lady.

Thus, MY LIST of  10 POSITIVES OF BEING SINGLE:

  • I don’t have to cook and bake, unless I want to.
  • I don’t need to shave my legs as often. Who cares if I have prickly legs?
  • I have complete control of the TV remote in our bedroom suite.
  • I can be a bed hog.
  • If I wanted to, I could wear footie PJ’s to bed.
  • I don’t have to share counter space in the Master bath.
  • I have the entire closet space available to myself.
  • I have complete control in the office…arranging the files how I prefer, arranging the desk top to what works best for me.
  • When it comes to using debit cards, ATM’s, and credit cards, it’s far easier to stay abreast of exact dollar amounts in such accounts.
  • …………………………… well, I was wrong, I can’t think of 10 positives of being single.

 

BUT I AM HAPPY I CAN IDENTIFY 9 POSITIVES OF BEING SINGLE!  Being able to identify 9 positives is monumental!

“So, dear Lord.  Thank you for helping me forge ahead.  Happy times.  Sad times.  Bright times.   Dark times.  In all and through all of them, I know You are with me.”

TOP 10 THINGS I’M DISCOVERING AT 21 MONTHS

Children, Death, Faith in God, Family, Grief, Loss, Miscellaneous

cropped-Julia-56-years-old.-February-2014.jpg

Since his passing I’ve learned positive things.  Things that can contribute to my overall growth as an adult woman.  I am learning to be content without him. I’ve also discovered sorrowful things, but I am focused on pushing through this grief…to not just circle around the grief and avoid the deep pooled places.  Because I believe.  Eventually.  In time.  I will come out on the other side.

TOP 5 POSITIVE THINGS I AM LEARNING:

  • Love is eternal.  As the famous song from the movie Titanic says, “In my heart you’ll always go on.”  It does.  He does.  In my heart.
  • I’m stronger than I knew. Loren periodically told me, “Julia, you know more than you think you do.” In the areas where he was strong I had let him lead.  He was right.  I know more than I thought.  I am strong.
  • Our 4 children are a direct reflection of he & I. Even though they are strong individuals of their own worth, I look in to each of their eyes and see him.  Pictures of him.  Moments of him in increments of time.
  • My circumstances do not  hold the power to alter the character of who God is.
  • People haven’t changed. It’s me who has changed. The Julia “B.D.” (before his death”) vs the Julia “A.D.” (after his death).  I’m still learning what all of this means….

 

TOP 5 MOST DIFFICULT THINGS I AM LEARNING:

  • After 21 months out I am suddenly “on my own” in the grief journey. The truth be told, by this time many only miss him because they recognize the void in my life.
  • Not even my girlfriends, who are widows or grieving over their loved ones, can completely understand my loss.  We desperately want to understand each other ~ we try.   We reach out in support. At times afraid to be candid about our low, dark times.
  • Sometimes humans cannot bear each others pain.  My kids, my family & friends cannot cure that deep impenetrable hole, that tunnel, where I at times feel lost…even suffocated.
  • Sometimes I feel EVEN GOD cannot cure that deep impenetrable hole.
  • New, additional losses keep appearing. For example, his scent on his robe is still strong.  But the fresh memories associated with that robe are fading.  I’m afraid I’ll lose those special memories.  That scares me.

Even in all of this, I know I am moving forward healthily.  I’ve not avoided my grief. I’ve not denied my Faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.  I’ve not deterred the grief in drunkenness, men, overeating, or overspending.   I know myself ~ that I am a truth seeker ~ that I must face my reality head on.

And I know the day will come when this grief – reality – mission can be laid to rest.

“So, God I thank You.  In the eye of the storm You still see me. “

 

ELTON JOHN and TRYING TO RETURN TO MUSIC with THE SUN GOING DOWN ON ME

Grief, Marriage, Miscellaneous

Blindsided.  While returning to old territory, that is, returning to music.  Maybe again finding the creative Julia, that part of me that wrote music, that part of me that was deeply stirred by music.

Today I watched an Elton John concert that I had pre-recorded.  My body loved the rhythm. I was again enamored with Elton’s astonishing piano skills, his song writing skills.  I was caught up in the sheer talent of the musicians. But, emotionally I wanted to run.  I wanted to turn my TV off.

But at 21 months out I forced myself to sit through the 60 minute concert. I forced myself, for my own good.  A knife may as well have been inserted, pulled back, then pushed through my flesh further, back and forth.  The killer song was DON’T LET THE SUN GO DOWN ON ME. “…like losing everything, is like the sun going down on me.”  Just one song.  Creating heightened searing pain and yet enjoyment.  A tangled mixture.

I know many do not understand me.  But Loren understood me.  He understood me, as the musician.  He tolerated me, as the musician.  He adored me, as the musician. That was his first draw towards me.  Hearing me sing a song I had written while he attended a concert where I was performing. It was after that concert that he approached me and introduced himself to me.

My first gift from him was a new piano, the same acoustic piano that my piano students use in my music studio.  Early in our marriage he would ask me to play and sing for him.  In his perfect world I would’ve done that every day, just for him.  I now so regret I hadn’t made more effort in our busy lives. Thankfully, in our final years I would take the time to sit down and sing some of his favorite songs, those songs I had written about he and I.  Two songs I had written for our wedding, the one song I had surprised him with singing from the grand piano, the other song he and I sang as a duet at our wedding.

12 years ago he surprised me; Loren had purchased an old grand piano from the Beaverton School District, had it restored and it now proudly sits in the great room.  It was his 25th wedding anniversary gift to me.

Loren’s greatest surprise gift ever was Valentine’s Day 2013.  He had taken the time and made the effort to memorize John Legend’s song, ALL OF ME LOVES ALL OF YOU.  We were in our motel room in Seattle. He had started singing the song to me Acapella.  The entire song, while looking in to my eyes ~ without breaking his gaze.   I broke down and cried.  In the past it had always been mIMG_0664 (1)e singing for him. This time I was his private audience. I loved it!  Until the day he died he knew how I cherished it.

Maybe I will never write music again.  Maybe I will never perform privately for another man.  Maybe that part of me has died with him.  And maybe that is OK with me…….

NEW ACKNOWLEDGMENTS and EXPOSED STRUGGLES with HONEST WORSHIP

Faith in God, Grief, Miscellaneous

6DG_3857Just mere months after Loren had passed, my oldest brother Galen Gingerich, pastor of New Horizons Church in McMinnville, (http://New Horizons Church) had taken me out for lunch and while walking to the car he was quietly singing “YOU’RE A GOOD, GOOD FATHER…THAT’S WHO YOU ARE.…”  Not only did I feel dead inside, I truthfully cringed at those words. Something inside of me recoiled.  The God that I had known and served had not demonstrated His goodness towards me, especially with my husband’s sudden death introducing a level of trauma because I couldn’t revive him with CPR.  My pain was so deep ~  grief had it’s way.  Griefs way of blinding me from the goodness God had demonstrated in my life prior to ” THAT  day”.

Recently, while rocking grandson Lincoln before his bedtime, I found myself singing that exact song, “You’re a good, good Father…that’s who You are…and I’m loved by You, that’s who I am…”   I was suddenly surprised to discover a portion of the song  freely flowed from my lips.

This morning marks 21 months.  21 months since THAT day.  I am just now beginning to feel warmth when I sing of God’s love for me.  It’s become easy to sing of God’s love.  I so welcome the ability to once again feel God’s presence.

But I cannot sing, “YOU ARE PERFECT in all of Your ways…..YOU ARE PERFECT in all of Your Ways…”  It’s like my throat freezes.  No sound comes out.  I become stationery.  My body feels like lead. My mind  shifts into neutral… I feel like a mechanical robot. Just during that portion of the song. I can’t seem to sing those words. It would be difficult to force the words out plus I feel it would almost be a form of hypocrisy for me.  It’s like a portion of my widowed heart does not believe those words…..the words, “You are perfect in all of Your ways”.  For certain, I know my heart cannot acknowledge those words.  YET. 

Losing my spouse and purposing to grow through the loss has become my greatest spiritual challenge.  A difficult race.  Even a test, I wonder.  For years I have believed and confessed that God is in control of my life.  Deep inside I still believe that. I still put my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ but I just can’t see the big picture and since I have not readily embraced “the new picture I’m living inside of”, at times, I have turmoil inside of me.  I especially feel the turmoil on this one song.  During this one section of this  song.

But, in time  I’ll need to start singing those words….. “You are perfect in all of Your ways, You are perfect in all of Your ways…”.  I’ll need to sing those words in faith even if I don’t feel it or understand it.  And I know that time is drawing closer.  Closer to more surrender.  I just know it.

MEN WHO KEEP THEIR WORD

Miscellaneous

Wouldn’t you know!  Just when the snow and ice is here, my 4×4 Expedition decides to act up!  But, Dan Burman to the rescue!  At Loren’s memorial service he had sobbed and told me, “If there’s anything you ever need ~ you know I’ll help you out.”  In 20 months this is the first time I’ve needed his assistance with a vehicle.   Dan is a man of his word.

Loren was a man of his word.  If he told someone he’d do something for them he followed through. Granted, he was known to over-extend himself (over commit himself) but he’d follow through.  He believed in the “handshake rule”….man to man.

I feel greatly blessed.  For the Dan Burman’s.  The Marvin Lux’s.  It’s a rarity that I need their assistance but I feel great comfort knowing they’ll respond immediately since I am not a lady who “cries wolf”.

Even though I like to believe I am Miss Independent the truth is I am not. I wish I could be. Being alone is showing me how much I do know at the same time magnifying the areas where I have close to none or -0-  expertise.

Today my heart is full of comfort.  I am not stranded, even if I’m snowed in.  Sometimes I think God lets us need others.   And I’m learning to be OK with that.