Never in my life did I ever think that I would want or need to go to a place known as Camp Widow.

I expected to grow old with my husband, travel and eventually end up getting kicked out of the nursing home for streaking or some similar escapade.

I never expected to be a widow, but I am. And in widowhood, I never expected to find the community that I found online. These men and women have lifted me up these last two years, have held my hand, dried my tears, and have just been there, which as any widowed person knows, is what we need the most.

Camp Widow would be an opportunity to meet these people in person, hug their necks, and tell them just how much they have meant to me. It would be a time to laugh, to cry, to remember. I hope that I get the chance to go back to camp in my life, if only for a little while.

As February comes to a close, the arrival of March both excites and saddens me.

March means warmer days, springing forward, flowers, the beach, St.Patrick’s day and hours spent outside prepping for the months ahead.

It brings the 10th which was our “second second” anniversary. We eloped on December 15 but had our wedding and reception March 10th with our friends in our favorite city, New Orleans.

March also brings the 20th.

The first day of spring.

And two years ago that day, the last day of my husbands life and the end of mine as I knew it.

Yet again, the calendar mocks me. The colorful text announcing “First Day Of Spring” makes me want to smile and at the same time curl into a ball, clutching the page that I want to tear from it’s binding, as if somehow it will make that day disappear and bring him back.

I try not to let it get to me.

I try, and I fail.

It is forever in my mind that my husband died on the first day of spring of the year 2009, and my father died the first day of winter of the same year. Every remaining year of my life the calendar will remind me, no matter how hard my mind tries not to do the same. Even though each day I feel better, lighter in my grief , on those days especially, I will feel the weight return, and with it the sadness will come.

I hope that the first days of summer and fall continue to be kind.

I’m having a recurring dream lately.

In it, I keep calling Gregory on the phone, but he doesn’t pick up. Everyone I encounter in the dream asks me what’s wrong and I just keep saying “he won’t answer, he won’t answer.”

Tears stream down my face, but I don’t make a sound. It’s a very weird scene, and it seems more like a fleeting “sleep thought” than an actual nightmare. It doesn’t seem to last long, like dreams often do.

When I wake up, I’m not crying, but I remember the sequence. And this morning, I swear I heard a phone ring right before I jolted awake. But no phones here made a sound.

There’s a Jimmy Buffett song called “If The Phone Doesn’t Ring, It’s Me.“

I think this paragraph pretty much sums it up for me….

I’ve had good days and bad days And goin’ half mad days I try to let go but you’re still on my mind I’ve lost all the old ways I’m searchin’ for new plays Puttin’ it all on the line

Searching for new plays, lost all the old ways. That’s for sure.

The thought of the dream doesn’t make me wail and weep , but it does makes me sad in a deep place in my heart. It makes me wish for what was, when he was as close as a phone call. When I thought we had it all ahead of us. Before the worst.

Strange how you can go through some days basking in the sun, but when the darkness comes, it comes for you hard.

Even though there is more sunshine now than darkness, it still hurts. It’s still scary and sad, every day.

But, I gotta keep putting it all on the line. I’m here, he’s not.

As he would tell me, gotta “Keep on truckin’ baby.”

Somedays I wish the road wasn’t quite so rough.