Au Revoir April

If I let it affect everything, it's gonna own everything. I don't deny or pretend it's not there, but if I don't allow it to be bigger than it is, I can do everything else.

Michael J. Fox

After Cindy died and I was on sabbatical from work, I spent most of my days in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC. Walking into the various rooms with the multitude of paintings and photographs of people, I felt simultaneously alone and crowded.

I must have visited the "American Presidents" collection at least a dozen times (each time trying to guess the President in the portrait without reading the adjacent signage). One photograph in particular resonated with me even though I have seen this photo many times before. This iconic photo was the one of Jackie O at the swearing in of Lyndon Baines Johnson on the Presidential airplane. Anyone who has witnessed the death of a loved one can sympathize with the expression on Jackie O' face. Her face reveals at once complete shock and resignation.


I know that when I was alone with Cindy witnessing her body and mind succumb to the aneurysm, I was an utter mess. I kept begging her to respond to her name. I said I love you over and over. I touched her hand and told her that it was going to be okay and to just "hold on." The thoughts in my mind were traveling at supersonic speeds and my eyes darted left and right. My shaking hands were barely able to operate a cell phone.

I wrote in my last blog entry how Liz had to punch me across the face to calm me down. I now know that had Liz not done that, I would never have been able to resign myself to doing what needed to be done. When I look at that photo of Jackie O, I wonder who slapped her across the face so that she could do what she needed to do at that moment.

In addition to the Presidential photos, I also always made sure to walk through the "Twentieth-Century Americans" collection. I received hope and comfort from the faces and stories of some of the strongest and most courageous people in my lifetime. Interestingly, out of all the portraits in this collection, the photograph that I spent the most time absorbing was the one of Michael J. Fox (shown above).

I think what amazed me was how the quote that appeared to the left of the photo neatly summed up my philosophy on widowhood. I re-read this quote when I visited the Portrait Gallery on Cindy's birthday on March 29th. I expected this quote to serve as my mantra for the coming month.

However, April has been my worst month this year. On April 4th, I moved out of the old house entirely (I packed up almost 8 years worth of possessions in 48 minutes). On April 14th was the 6-month anniversary of Cindy's death. At midnight on Tax Day, I remembered all the years of watching Cindy start her taxes at 11:30pm the day they were due and then racing to the post office to get them in on time. One year Cindy even sweet-talked a grumpy postal clerk to "turn back" the date on his postmark stamp since the time was 12:03am and her taxes were technically late. Then came Easter and Passover--holidays that I vividly remember celebrating with Cindy. On April 26th, I did my first race without Cindy cheering me on at the end and taking pictures.

April has been a particularly wet month with bouts of crying in the car, in the shower, at work, before meetings, during meetings, on my runs, and even once during a meditation class. I was bawling yesterday just five minutes before entering a party for one my clients, a candy association. Cindy would have loved the mounds of candy and chocolate given to us at this party. I felt as if I were in "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" (one of Cindy's all-time favorite movies).

The problem is that I never know when these crying spasms are going to occur. Recently, I compared my widowhood to being afflicted with a chronic condition like colitis or irritable bowel. You just never know when your body is going to need to give itself over to it. And I accept it. I accept that this is now a part of my life. Like Michael J. Fox and his Parkinson's, I don't pretend it's not there. And like Jackie O, I resign myself to doing what I need to do.