Carry on Castle: Living with Grief

So I did this thing once. I wrote a book. I’ve never considered myself a writer and I still don’t, not really. Nevertheless I wrote a book. I wrote it because I couldn’t not write it. It was just something I had to do. I don’t think I could have stopped myself if I tried.  My husband Dan was the writer, he wrote beautifully and eloquently. I remember I used to write things like our Christmas letters because I had the time. In them I would say something like "we went to Crater Lake this summer it was cool" then I would give it to Dan to edit and he would turn that into a whole paragraph about the beauty and majesty of God’s creation and the love of our family. I said it was cool, that was the extent of my writing.  Then he died. Out of no where in the middle of the night he died. My soulmate, my true love, the man I was happily going spend the next 70 years with was gone. My life as over at 34. I didn’t know what to do. I did know I needed therapy, lots and lots of thera...

One of Dan's and mine favorite T.V. shows was Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In the show is a character named Faith. Faith is a complicated character, she had a hard life, she's never sure if she's on the good side or the bad side, she kills a lot of demons. Faith is also terrible at showing emotions.  I think sh'e learned to hide them from the world because she learned that the world doesn't really care.The only thing Faith really knows about herself is that she's 5x5. When asked 'how's it going Faith?' she replies, "5x5." When asked if she's ok after having the crap beat out of her by a monster she replies "5x5." Faith is always 5x5. Everything is always 5x5. No one knows what that means. They talk about it several times in the show "What does 5x5 even mean?" I don't think Joss Weadon the creator of the show ever gives us an answer.  I took it to mean 'fine' like when someone asks you how your day is y...