On its own schedule

I was talking to Stella, the counselor I'm seeing, last week, and mentioned that I was imagining that people are getting tired of me being sad.  I said I thought maybe people wanted me to be "past it" by now, feeling better, being better, not constantly repeating myself about how much I miss Jerry and how I wish he were still here and we had our old, happy life back again.  Although, I pointed out, no one has actually said anything of the sort to me.

But, I went on, what I think it really is is that I am the one who is tired of me being sad.  I'm the one who wants to be happy, I'm the one who wants to stop feeling so damaged and wrecked.  But I can't make it happen when I want it to.  I can actually enjoy things now, but not without a background of sadness, and I never stop being aware of Jerry's absence.  I feel apart from the world in a lot of ways  - I always have, for that matter, for lots of reasons, but now there's this additional curtain of sadness between me and everyone else.  And I want it to go away.  But it doesn't.  Not yet.

I had a dentist appointment this morning - last time I had my teeth cleaned, in April, the hygienist sent me home with a bag of dry mouth remedies for Jerry, since I'd told her he was having chemotherapy and was having some problems with that.  Today she hugged me and told me she was sorry about my husband, and talked about how hard it all must be for me - just said all the right things.  You never know who'll do that and who won't - everyone means well, but not everyone can say the right things.  Some of the best things I've had said to me have been from people who tell me they have no idea what it must be like to go through this, and how sorry they are that I have to.  It's simple, but it's true - no one can know another person's pain, but acknowledging that that pain is there helps - it means it's real, it's not just my imagination or my inability to cope with what life doles out, it's a real thing that I'm going through, not a thing to be compared to anything else, not a thing to be diminished or played down or ignored.  It helps to know that people realize that this is just hard.

No word back from the people I interviewed with on Monday.  I'm guessing this means they're not offering me a job, which is fine.  It would have been nice to be offered it, but it's not the end of the world not to be, either.  I'm still very ambivalent about taking any job here in Illinois, since I don't want to be in Illinois long-term, although a good job might change my mind about that somewhat, I suppose.  (I did tell them that I started a blog when my husband died, so if you're reading this, people in Des Plaines... uh, hi.)  The interview was a good experience, my first job interview in something like 16 years.  Onward.

Favorite quote from last night's first episode of the final season of Friday Night Lights, which I get to see now because I have DirecTV: "You love the game of football. You just don't know it yet."  I feel like Jerry would possibly understand the new Auburn thing because we both enjoyed watching FNL, and as I told Karen, I consider it my gateway drug into Auburn football - first got used to the fake football on FNL, now enjoying the real thing on Auburn games.  Jealous of Coach and Tami now, as I get jealous of any depiction of a marriage these days (crying fit following on the latest episode of Modern Family, for instance).  Why do they get to be together and alive and healthy and happy?  Why is my marriage over?  I don't expect answers to "why" questions, I never really do ask for them, and I never expected life to be fair... but God, it makes me sad.

Yup, still sad.  The sadness will do what it wants, on its own schedule, for as long as it takes.  And maybe someday it'll be different, less painful, less there.  But not now.  Not yet.