If you need me, I’ll be hiding in the pool.

It’s always great to get a phone call from an old neighbor telling you that your formerly pristine yard now looks like crap. Actually, I believe the exact phrase he coined was “Gregory would be rolling in his grave if he could see this.” Well, if he had  a grave. I thought I had heard some odd noises coming from that urn, but I chalked it up to the wine.

In case you don’t know, I am stuck in probate hell. My former stepdaughter, instead of talking directly to me about the will, decided to fight me and brought attorneys into it, screwing herself and me. Basically, we’ve been tied up in court for almost two years, and the attorneys will get most of the money that would have gone to me, her and my stepson. Not too smart. Took after her mother.

Basically, the whole situation has been taken over by the Shelby County Probate Court. The estate made me move out of the house 7 months ago because they put it up for sale instead of giving me the option to buy it, and according to the Shelby County Probate Court, the executor they assigned to the case is supposed to be taking care of the home and promoting the sale of it.  I know the house note is getting paid because I get the e-mail every month, but otherwise, I don’t know what in the hell they’ve been doing.

I drove to the old manor on one of my excursions out of the sticks, and OMG. No wonder my neighbors are pissed. Now I’m no realtor, and I’m certainly no attorney, but I know that a house with a yard that looks like this? It’s not gonna sell.

Weeds three feet high. Hedges untrimmed. Leaves everywhere. Trash in the yard. The holly tree has gone uncut and has grown into and under the gutters. The back porch is covered in trash and things left in the house. It looks like crap.

I took pictures, which I sent to my attorney and to the court. I also spoke to the head of the management company that oversees the subdivision, and she is sending a scathing letter to the courts and is considering filing a zoning violation claim against the estate if things aren’t cleaned up. Maybe this will force them to do something. Or, like everything else, they’ll drag their feet and take their sweet time doing nothing except collecting their money. Another fabulous part of being a widow. Can’t you taste the sarcasm?

Good job running that probate case Shelby County. Hope everything else you deal with doesn’t turn to crap.

The second anniversary of Gregory’s death came and went a few weeks ago, and I made it through fine. I spent the day on the water and with family cooking out and lazing by the pool. I thought about him a lot, I missed him, and I did a video post with our pictures to one of his favorite songs. I didn’t crawl into a ball and wail, I smiled, I laughed, I thought about the good times. I was happy. And I wondered if that was ok. I think I was waiting for the tears to come, and they didn’t.

This past Sunday would have been Daddy’s 72nd birthday. I spent the day outside, and tried to think about the good times with my father. I didn’t go to the cemetery. He’s not there, just ashes. It didn’t feel like the place to go. He always told me he’d be in my heart forever, so I looked inward to that to honor and remember him. And again, the tears didn’t come.

Am I ignoring the grief I feel over losing them or am I just getting used to it?

That’s a horrible thought, isn’t it? Getting used to grief? Sounds like a bad episode of Oprah.

Am I doing this right? I don’t know. It’s been two years since my husband died, other widows I know with less time in than that are dating, or trying to. I’m not trying, I figure when and if it happens, I’ll go with it. Like most everything else in my life, somehow things always seem to work out. Not always like I imagine they should, but what can you do?

As a friend of mine likes to say “haters gonna hate.”  People will judge me no matter what I do, and most of the time I don’t give a rip what they think. So why am I doing it to myself?

Why, after two years, do I sometimes still feel lost?

And why do I beat myself up about it?