Six Months

Six months ago today, I became a widow.

It still boggles my mind how quickly my life changed, "forever and not for better."

As far as legal and financial stuff--that is still plodding through the courts. I still don't have Jim's life insurance. The funeral home is still wanting money. There is still no executor. And no new roof.

Emotionally, I have my ups and downs. Occasionally (rarely), a day goes by when I don't cry.

I was thinking last night, on the way home from The Palace, and wondering why he chose the gun, and decided that it was logical for him, given the fact that he had owned guns since long before he was legally allowed to. He had medals from the NRA for target prowess from back in high school. He expected the shot to blow his head away--no EMS, no Emergency Room, no tubes; just dead instantly. I don't know why that didn't happen.

Sometimes I wonder if, in the nanosecond between squeezing the trigger and the loss of consciousness, he changed his mind and pulled back a little. Maybe he was just hard-headed, but I can't see how a .357 didn't propel the bullet out of the other side of his head.

I've followed enough murder investigations to know that exit wounds are horrendous. In a way, I'm glad I was spared that, and the trip to the ER, where I had to tell them to stop trying to save his life was probably better than seeing his head shattered and brains and bone all over the front yard.

I have decided to let the tree live, though my heart lurches often as I walk by it. Not every time, but often. It still has a gaping wound from the chunk the police hacked out of it to process (the spot where he braced the butt of the gun).

I am functioning, more or less, and even having fun, on occasion.

I will survive this.