All the things that used to annoy me... I had no idea how much I would later miss them. The biggest one was the way you would talk incessantly as soon as I got home. I didn’t have any time to decompress, think through my day, and think about what I would accomplish for the night. It was a barrage of things on your mind, questions you wanted to ask, and ideas you wanted feedback on. You would talk until, exasperated, I would ask you to just stop talking for a while and give me some quiet time.

I had no idea how soon I would have more quiet than I could possibly imagine. What I wouldn’t give to have those conversations now. How I regret every time I stopped you from talking to me and from asking me questions. How I would love to fill up my days with those conversations…especially those nights when I sit here by myself, wanting nothing more than some conversation. To talk about what my day was like, mistakes I made, things I didn’t get done, and what the rest of my life will look like. Where do I go? What do I do? So much of my life for the last 30 years was joint decisions on what was best for the both of us and for our family. I suddenly went from being a Pastor’s wife, with the plethora of responsibilities (real or imagined) and a “to-do” list a mile long, to facing an empty apartment that needs to have the symbols of my entire life sorted through and boxed up. I face this with the conversationless breadth of minutes haunting me every day. And without the long to-do list and the barrage of people and things I needed to connect, or arrange, or initiate. Now I just sit in the silence and wait for that motivation that will propel me forward with the rest of my life.

It would be easier for me to answer the question, “How was your day?” than to answer, “How are you?” I WANT to tell someone about my day, I do NOT want to think about how I am. That’s just way too hard right now.

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