How married am I?

I discovered just how much I am still married to Jane today even 41 months after her death. I had thought I was finally emerging into the new reality of life without her. Then I went to a local greenhouse to look for some annuals for the deck. I got back in the car after putting the plants in the trunk and took out my cell phone to tell someone I was coming by to drop off tickets to sell for the Chowder and Clam Cake Dinner we are doing in a couple of weeks.

Today, I discovered it is still there…

It was then I discovered my wedding ring was missing.

Being married’s symbol

For the last several months I have been moving my ring off of my ring finger for several hours each day. I’d told Jane that when she died I would take her wedding ring off her hand–she did not want to be buried with it–and transfer my ring to my right hand, where it would stay until I died. In the event, I found I could not bring myself to take off my ring, though I did take hers off.

…my wedding ring was missing.

When I finally got to the point I was ready to make the swap, I conveniently discovered the finger on my right hand is too big for the ring. I know I could have it resized, but I can’t get myself to have it out of my possession for the day or more it would take to safely do that. Instead, as a move toward that, I wear it on my right pinky-finger for several hours each day, swapping it back to its original home when I do yard work or am in some other place it could slip off without me noticing.

Today, at the greenhouse, I forgot to do that.

No longer married

And then it was gone and I burst into panic and teared up. But I fought it off and checked the plants in the back–maybe it had slipped off into them or into the blankets I keep in the back of the car. But it wasn’t there. I went back into the greenhouse, retraced my steps. Nothing.

…I could not bring myself to take off my ring…

Finally, I found the person in charge of the greenhouse and explained what had happened. She said they would call if they found it–but I had no hope. My high school class ring had vanished one night in college and I’d never seen it again. My marriage really was over now–the one thing Jane had given me that I never wanted to lose was gone.

Reliving loss

I’d been depressed to start the day. Tomorrow is the 41 month anniversary of Jane’s death and–as is so often the case around the tenth of the month–the weight of that day was dragging me down some. Now, walking back to the car, my mind was shattering. I was back at Day One without the numbness to protect me from the searing pain of loss.

My marriage really was over now…

I checked the front seat and, finding nothing, decided I would empty the trunk completely before giving up completely.

Married to false dawns

I had started the morning thinking about what I would write about today. The corms and bulbs I had put in the new garden bed I built early last month have finally begun sending up their shoots in the last few days. It seemed the perfect metaphor for how I was beginning to feel after 41 months of mourning and loss.

…my mind was shattering.

Now it was clear, as I moved toward the back of the car, this was simply another false dawn in this ongoing night without end. There would always be something waiting to destroy whatever progress I thought I had made. Rather than the emerging sprouts of new life, the metaphor was the failed seeds I planted six weeks ago that had not come up and sent me off to the greenhouse to begin with.

Married joy

I opened the trunk and pulled out the single four-pack of zucchini that had been the last thing I put in–and there it was, gleaming like a new-found lost soul. I can’t describe my delight in that moment, nor the joy that etches across my face as I recall it. I only know that I have not felt that same peculiar happiness in a very long time. I went back to the greenhouse, told them they could call off the search–that it had fallen into the trunk as I packed away the plants.

…the metaphor was the failed seeds I planted six weeks ago…

Tomorrow and Sunday, I will work in the garden. I’ll churn the composted cow manure and my own compost into the raised beds. I’ll put in the tomatoes, the lettuce, the sweet and hot peppers, the potatoes, the first of the beans, the onions and carrots. I’ll plant flower seeds and finish making up the baskets for the deck and the yard. I will do all the things that Jane and I would do at this time in May.

Married grief

And at some point, I will make up a pot of her favorite flowers and take it to the cemetery and place it on her grave. I will stand there and shed the tears that come every tenth of the month. I will mourn losing her and try to make sense out of her death.

I will do all the things that Jane and I would do at this time in May.

But I don’t think I will mourn the death of our marriage any more. Today, I discovered it is still there–alive and growing still–despite having reached “’til death do us part.”