Six and a half years ago I met and fell deeply, mutually and surprisingly in love with a man..a dying man although neither of us was aware of that yet. He happened to be a man I had occasionally crewed for {as a happily partnered lesbian with kids} over the years in my vocation as stylist and makeup artist. I hadnt given Greg much thought when I crewed for him, except to note he was an excellent and demanding producer and director with short temper and patience for those who didnt meet his standards. The two most remarkable things about us falling in love were this: A.he was a MAN. B. I was freshly sober recovering from a two year maelstrom of horrifyingly self destructive {and people-I-loved-destructive} behavior that had included a year long relapse into the cocaine addiction Id been in sobriety from for over two decades. Six years ago we had a sudden shocking surprise... he, a healthy active guy had an absolutely unsurvivable metastasized cancer, many cancers in fact., silently growing from the cured, easy cancer he had survived before. {just like I had survived breast cancer} He was a Viet Nam veteran and Agent Orange had silently been doing its deadly work on him for many decades. What happened next was an amazing, often joyful and..yes..devastating journey as we traveled through his last year and many treatments, our decision to marry, his choice to truly LIVE that final year. I midwifed and documented his transition through his last breath, August 7, 2009. What I may share over the next couple days is not me suffering, or living in the past, or being what I call widowy. I am not sad. I am keeping a promise I made. I am officially putting away my widows weeds and celebrating his passing, publicly, for the last time. He would have said Get ON with it, Dana! xox
Posted on: Tue, 05 Aug 2014 18:10:34 +0000