Happy With An Asterisk

Tears.  That is how I wake this morning.  I am missing Ray so much.  As I mentioned in an earlier blog, the pain is not so great now, I just really, really miss him.  Today, the pain is there. 

I was thinking of getting a haircut today.  I have been going to a "new" person since Ray died.  Ray and I went to the same girl for years.  The last time she cut our hair was two days before his surgery.  I was thinking of going to her today or tomorrow but everytime I think about it I shake inside and start to cry.  The last time I walked up the stairs to her salon Ray was alive.  As I left he was coming in for his haircut and I was leaving to go sub for kindergarden in Holland.  It was December 9th.  It was a terribly snowy day.  I drove the Cadillac to school and it was almost out of gas.  I stopped to get gas and the gas cap door was frozen shut.  Fortunately I made it to and from school without running out of gas.  That was the night Ray's brother and sister-in-law (Scott and Mary Ellen) came in.  It was also the day I started this blog.  Needless to say, I have some trepidation about going in to get a haircut from her.  Maybe it's the next step I need to do.  I can't guarantee that I won't cry if I do go.  If she has no appointments available, then I will know it's God's way of saying I'm not ready to take this step.  Who knew that getting a haircut would be such a traumatic experience for someone. 

Another step.  Yesterday Marguerite, Drew and I got the third floor rooms complete for "selling."  I met with my financial consultant in January and he told me that I had to sell those rooms if I wanted to try to survive this economy.  I need the revenue.  I would say "income" but I don't really make any income, at least not these days.  I am surviving.  Anyway, Marguerite got an apartment about a mile from me and I wanted to get the rooms available by June 1st, so I told Marguerite that I needed them available by May 1st so I could have a month to get them ready.  I had the house booked for June 22 and 23, so I HAD to get them ready by then.  I finally got the new bed, new mattress, lamps, etc., and the rooms are done.  It was a lot of work.  We did it though.  Another step.  With only having the six rooms to sell last year, it will be a lot busier with eight rooms booked. Sixteen (plus) people now at breakfast again. 

On Tuesday I got the air-conditioners put in the apartment.  I have an air-conditioner for the main rooms (kitchen and living room) and an air-conditioner for the bedroom.  Last year I didn't put the air-conditioner in for the main rooms.  It was so "friggin" hot and humid in there.  However, I didn't spend much time in those spaces, only in the bedroom.  It is nice to have the cool air in all the rooms this years.  Another step...living a normal life.

I move on.  But I move on with a lot of little steps and a hole that is still in my heart.  I can say that I am happy, but happy with an asterisk. - Jimmy