Hello, there. Leo here.
Its been busy at Ellouise's house this week. She has had several house guests and she's back to work with storytelling and the t.v. show. That has all been good!
When there is a lot going on, Ellouise is distracted and its easier to keep up her "front" of being OK.
I heard Ellouise on the phone telling someone: " When we went to CA for Jim's father's funeral I remember sitting next to his mother and hearing her saying over and over, ' I am a widow. I am a widow. I am a widow.' I did not understand that she was trying to force herself to realize it. I get it now."
Listen, watching Ellouise, I am getting it that grief is tricky business. No one day is the same as the one before. Shifting ups and downs are the new normal. Other widows take Ellouise under their wings because she is the new kid on the block and they understand that she has a lot to learn. Her childhood friend in NC, a long time widow, told her, "You will think its getting better and then for seemingly no reason - out of nowhere - IT will hit you in the back of the head like a brick ... so watch out for yourself."
How can she watch out for herself? Big question. She watches where she goes alone - thinking it will help if the first time she goes to a place she and Jim had enjoyed together she asks someone she trusts to go with her. Often that does help - as it did last week when she and a friend saw the Snapshop exhibition at the Phillips Gallery - but there are no guarantees and its usually not easy.
She left the gallery telling her friend, "I am surprised it was not hard to be here. I know Jim would have really loved this show - - and we had planned to see it together.
See what I mean, grief is a tricky business.
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