One year ago . . .

A year ago today, we were just "winding down" from the phenomenal benefit that family and friends so lovingly organized and orchestrated for Bob. It was astounding in so many ways, and I'll just share the link to that blog entry from the Sofa King site, instead of going into too much detail, as it makes me sad . . . I've been thinking a lot about that day, how utterly astounding it was but my heart is so very heavy because a year ago, Bob was still with me. That is how my days are still measured: "A year ago, Bob was still here . . ."

Valentine's day tomorrow, a day that doesn't evoke really any dread or anything of the like. It was just another day in our world that came and went, like any other. Bob was unsentimental when it came to things like Valentine's day or Christmas or even anniversaries and birthdays, and was quite vocal in his distain for spoon-fed holidays, "I don't need Hallmark telling me when and how I should show I love my wife." A simple statement, not an impassioned declaration. I hesitate to even write such things because some may automatically peg him a scrooge or insensitive, or whatever, and that couldn't be farther from the truth. Bob marched to his own music, anyone who knew him at all knew at least that. He wasn't a crowd follower. Penny even said that as a teen, Bob had said once, that he didn't understand peer pressure,"If I don't want to do something, I just don't do it." Sage at sixteen . . .

Oh, I'll admit it, I was, in the first few years of our marriage, a bit miffed that Bob didn't "surprise" me with flowers and/or candy and/or jewelry—something—on Valentine's Day. (Seriously, how do you "surprise" someone on a day that's been heavily marketed since the day after Christmas?) In fact, there was one year that at the salon I was working at, that I was the only married/dating woman who didn't get a bouquet of flowers delivered to the salon—and I was newly married! Yes, a bit awkward, trying to explain the inner workings of my husband's mind to all my coworkers and to client after client after client after client: Yes, my husband really does love me and is really sentimental, but in his own special way, you have to know him . . .

But then I started to figure out that many of these were the same married/dating women who bitched endlessly throughout the rest of the year, about being football/hunting/baseball/bowling/poker/whatever widows, or complained that he never took out the garbage or didn't know how to use the washer and dryer, or couldn't he give up a night out with the boys just once and spend a weekend with her, or would it ever occur to him to just take the kids—without asking—so she could have a few hours' peace . . . conversations to which I could never contribute. What others didn't know about Bob were the random, out-of-the-blue days, I would come home to a sweet little bouquet of flowers (that didn't happen too often; just enough to make them insanely memorable), or when he'd call, unplanned and unexpected to my work, to take me to lunch because he "just happened" to be in the neighborhood . . . or the times he'd present me with a book he'd seen or heard about—not on my birthday, not any "specially designated day," just because he thought of me when he saw it and thought I'd enjoy it, or . . . or that he did know how to use the washer and dryer, and dishwasher and always took out the garbage without asking, and knew how to vacuum (and did it, again without me asking), and took my car in for oil changes, or washed it for me . . . endless gifts, throughout the year . . .

I recall having many conversations about such things with Bob and learned quickly that he didn't eschew v.d. (that became our little term for the holiday—does anyone even know what v.d. stands for any more? All day long, we'd greet each other, "Happy V.D.!" or "Happy Gonorrhea Day!" or, "Happy Syphilis Day!" mmmmm, yeah . . . guess you had to be there . . .) because he didn't want to or show his love for me. His very pragmatic, very Bob explanation was, "How about getting credit for being a good person every day of the year, not just one?" . . . He was lucky, I've never been a "flowers" kind of girl (I kind of have this strange an aversion to getting flowers from a guy—maybe because I feel it's so cliché, kind of an easy, mindless thing to do; that, and most guys in my past who gave me flowers were of the creepy, stalker-variety. . .), nor have I been big on jewelry either. In that respect (and probably only that respect), Bob got off easy . . .

Most people probably don't know that I was the one who proposed to Bob . . . I'll tell you the "clean" version . . . we had been together for nearly three years, living in sin (gasp!) in an apartment in St. Paul. I had heard Bob talking to a friend one day, who asked him, "So, when are you and Jen getting married?" Bob jokingly replied, "When she asks me!" I tucked that little tidbit in the back of my mind . . . one weekend, we decided to head down to Red Wing, to stay at the St. James Hotel. I don't even know what the "reason" was. Likely no reason, other than to get out of the city for the weekend. I do know it was winter, and we got the cheapest room at the hotel, which was still very lovely, with a partially obstructed view of the river—I was so impressed with the chocolates perched on the pillows and the tiny bottle of champagne chilling in a bucket on the dresser. We wandered through endless antique shops, stopping at a little kiosk in a mall and tried on rings, just to be silly; I mad a mental note of his size and when he went off to the bathroom at one point, and I ran back to the little kiosk and bought the ring that had fit him. It was sterling silver, but tarnished . . . a flimsy, tarnished band, worn thin on one edge, a bit dinged up. I imagined the original owner of the ring had to be a laborer, maybe a farmer, with all the physical flaws, lots of history had to be encircled in this old band. But it was more for the symbolism . . . we went to dinner at a little bar and grill because after splurging on the room, we didn't feel we could blow any more money on the fancy-schmancy hotel restaurant . . . that evening, back in our room while we shared our tiny (cheap) bottle of champagne (I'm sure I had already eaten the chocolates upon arrival), I slipped the simple band on his finger and asked if he would please be my husband . . .

I have been working on a mindfulness state of being lately, as it seems to help with my still-ever-present anxiety, flashbacks, anger and other trauma. . . Mindfulness: living in the present, being conscious and attentive to time and events right now, as they happen, to live in the moment—actively pulling oneself into living here, in this space, to be conscious and acutely aware of everything right now, right in front of me. Not in the past. Not in the future. Here. Now. Helluva lot easier said than done, lemme tell you . . .

Through meditation (and I use that term loosely as "Jen" and "meditation" are two words not often used in a sentence together; I asked my therapist if it'd be okay to get a prescription for Ritalin, so I could meditate . . . counterproductive much, Jen?) and other techniques, I am trying to calm my mind, get a better "grip" on the events of the past two and a half years, so they don't have such a strangling stronghold on me . . . many thought have been unearthed to me as I've been working on mindfulness techniques . . . thoughts about Bob and who he was as a person, throughout his life, who we were together, who I was, who I am, who I am becoming (that last one is a tough one—I don't feel quite yet, like I'm becoming much of anything. . .)  I am still piecing together my "old" Bob, the Bob who is still so far away from me, so fuzzy, taken from me over two years ago, without warning, not knowing that that Bob would never return . . .

Bob was the most mindful person I have personally known. He lived his life for now. In the present. He didn't get too caught up in the future, he didn't obsess over past events. I know it is why he was so drawn to photography, to nature. One has to be right now in photography. To be at one with time and life. Acutely aware of details, senses, what was going on in this slice of time. . . He was zen and didn't even know it . . . or maybe he did. This mindfulness is what I've been thinking of when I think of him lately, but especially in the past few days or so, when I think of Valentine's day and what it meant (or didn't mean) to Bob. He bought/brought me little surprises when I least expected them, not when Hallmark told him he should. He'd present me with a book he had heard about, and thought I might like. When we lived in Winona, he bough me pens and writing paper and stamps, because we wrote to each other so much. I have four thick 3-ring binders of letters we'd written to each other over the years (and I found out, not that long ago, maybe a few years ago, that he had kept my letters to him, too). He'd take me to Landscape Alternatives and we'd buy native wildflowers and grasses for the backyard and rock garden. Together, we'd decide to do a house project, or take a trip, as our joint birthday/anniversary gift to one another.

Everything Bob did was done with careful thought and deliberation. Whether or not it was Valentine's day. Or Christmas. Or a birthday. Mindful.

I truly don't meant to disparage anyone who does celebrate the holiday, because I know it's meaningful to many people; I'm just trying to convey who Bob was, perhaps more for myself, than for anyone, part of my "piecing together" journey, what his personal beliefs were, who he was, before he was sick. And when I say that, I don't mean that Bob wasn't Bob when he was sick; it's just that the illness took so much from him, stripped him down to nearly nothing, literally and figuratively; physically, mentally, emotionally . . .

In my writing class, we had to write about a person who was the complete opposite of us. After much deliberation, I chose to write about Bob. A snippet in the life of Bob, before he got sick. It was an exercise of many things—torture, love, trauma, beautifully bittersweet memories. . . I have never written about my "well" Bob before, and it was a bizarrely easy-nearly impossible task to accomplish. I almost gave up and wrote about someone else. Maybe sometime in the not-so-distant future, I'll share the writing exercise here, to give you all a little snippet of who Bob was, before he got sick . . .