Barb Caffrey's Blog

Folks, about a week ago, I observed the title milestone, one I wish I’d never have had to face.

There’s this weird thing about numbers, you see. They can really freak you out. I remember September 21, 2011, as that was the seventh year since Michael died. Supposedly, all the cells in your body are replaced within seven years. I didn’t like that milestone either.

Others I haven’t liked included in that same year the day I turned a day older than Michael was when he died (no, I’m not going to mention which day) and of course the day my best friend, Jeff Wilson, died in November.

So, the sad milestones (“sadaversaries” in my parlance, a contraction of sad and anniversaries) have kept piling up. Ten years without Michael on September 21, 2014. Twenty years without him, last year. And twenty-one years without him this year…it’s something we do, as human beings, to both mark the passage of time and the people who shaped us and meant the most to us. It must not be too surprising that I always know exactly how long it’s been without my beloved husband. But it’s still difficult, challenging, and frustrating.

The reason twenty-one years is significant has to do with something I once heard about learning music and other skills. If you have the talent and you put in the work, it supposedly takes twenty-one years to be adept in any given discipline.

How does that apply, though? Does that mean I’m adept at grieving now?

I don’t know. I wish I did.

There’s a lot of people I miss in this life. My grandma. My father. My aunt Laurice and uncle Carl. Jeff Wilson. Those are all huge losses, and I will remember them all until the end of my life.

But nothing and no one has ever been more important to me than my late husband. Michael understood me and I understood him. We fit in every possible way, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically. We had amazing, wide-ranging conversations, we were both creative (in addition to his writing, he was a great cook and an excellent artist), we both wanted most of the same things — stability, honesty, a deep and abiding commitment to one another, and to be together as long as we possibly could.

We did get almost three years from the time I met him, and two years, two months, and twenty-eight days of marriage. After so much loss, so much sadness, it seemed absolutely miraculous to meet Michael, and I know he felt the same way about me.

I’m still struggling with trying to find a new place to live. I’m also struggling with many other things at the moment, none of them particularly pleasant. But it does help me to know that Michael always believed in me, and he thought no matter how long it took, I would always find a way through any problem.

In short, I’d always survive.

When he was alive, of course, it would’ve been “survive and thrive.” But right now, survival is what I need to cling to, along with the belief that I can, will, and must get out of the current situation and into a better one.

Michael would tell me, if he could, that I have not failed. Not as a writer, as a musician, as a scholar, as a wife, or even as a widow. That I have not failed. So long as I keep trying, so long as there’s even a breath remaining in my body, I have not failed.

I’m trying to keep that thought in the top of my mind, these days, as the struggle continues.