Dear Diary

It Must Have Been Moonglow
by Phyllis Greene

(Page 2 of 2)

For me, the written word is the quintessential medium. From grocery lists to condolence messages to letters to friends or to the children at camp or for birthdays, it's the most effective way to express myself. Over the years, each time that Bob got sick, I would write a few words in the evening to remind me of how the day had gone. Each time he was in the hospital, I would come home and write. What was for me a tension release became, also, my medical log. By the time I had a computer, I had actual files of illnesses and operations, even one called Hive History, reporting when and how that chronic itch kept recurring. Bob got sick-really sick-the day after Labor Day, went to the hospital for tests and came home a bedridden, kidney-failing, medically complex, probably incurable, accepting good sport of a man. He died on December 12 after three horrible months that left us all heartbroken and devastated.

In the days after Bob's death, I gave no thought to writing anything other than thank-you notes for condolences. I was so busy, greeting visitors and talking to lawyers, talking to accountants, talking to the VA, being sure that we had someone to shovel snow. The mundane things were taking a lot of time.

As much as I enjoy writing, I would never have kept a daily journal after Bob died if I hadn't received my granddaughter Maggie's beautiful Christmas gift, a hardbacked journal, spiral-wire bound so that the lined pages lie flat for writing. On the cover there is the title One Day at a Time and a drawing of a lovely-looking older woman, in a big black hat, kneeling in her garden, tenderly holding a small plant in her hand, a not-so-subtle suggestion that she is probably a widow. The hat is the giveaway, that and the unmistakable sad expression. I got the message: Plant your small thoughts and they might help you heal and grow.

At first I thought it was a unique experience for me to find solace in writing my nightly entries. Once the tips-for-healing began arriving in the hospice mailings, it dawned on me that these journal jottings might be a comfort for others. Most of the published books I found about widowhood did not really speak to me; there were not many from a purely personal perspective. Thus, this book is just the journal, magnified. It is helping me even as I hope it helps those who might read it. We tackle our sorrow alone, but if we open ourselves with sympathy and empathy, it is a much less lonely road.

What started as a very private project began to take shape in my mind as something I could share, something for many of us, paddling away in the same small, sad boat.

Merchandise on State Street

Not that long ago, we, a couple, did what the funeral industry calls "preplanning." It required a weird combination of realism and common sense with a kind of denial that what we were doing was ever really going to be of any use. Die? Us? Of course we would-someday, someday-just not in our foreseeable future.

In November and December 1997 there was a promotion to plan and prepay your funeral, advertised by the Schoedinger Funeral organization, which has, for the last hundred years, buried almost everyone we know. If it didn't seem exactly a lark to go ahead and make these arrangements, it was not a depressing thing to do. In fact, everyone seemed to be doing it, saying at dinner get-togethers that they had been downtown to the State Street chapel to talk to Dave or Jay, the Schoedingers currently in charge. I had served on boards and committees with both of them, and Bob was a good friend and fellow Rotarian of the retired senior Schoedinger, John.

The rationale for doing this was to save our children some onerous decision making when they would be grieving. So down to State Street we went, and we filled out all the forms and even chose the "merchandise" (merchandise!): the casket, the urn, the cremation box. As we wandered around the second floor of the chapel, we thought it best not even to think of the implications, but just to get it done. And we did.

We chose a cemetery plot, too, and ordered headstones. And then it was all put in a file for what we hoped would be a long, long time. One year later, I pulled out the file for Bob, and his plan became operational.

We had assumed, I think, that there was a tax, as well as an emotional, advantage to all of this. There was, of course, neither. When it came time to list funeral expenses to be paid by the estate, we couldn't include the prepayment because it would have to be offset by the asset of owning the plan! If the prepayment was supposed to be a hedge against inflation, that didn't work for Bob, although it may for me. It came to be something that just was. Like the death itself.

I go to the cemetery now and am not sure I like the plot we chose, one of many that have belonged to my family for years. I know I do not like the headstone that bears both of our names. Somehow that macabre fact escaped me in the planning, but we have one grave, therefore one stone. At least my death date hasn't the inscription "19-," because 2001 is already here and, all things being equal, to have inscribed the wrong century for my death would have been bad planning indeed.

Copyright © 2001 by Phyllis Greene. Excerpted by permission of Villard, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

About the Author

Phyllis Greene is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Wellesley College. She has had a lifelong involvement in her community, having served as chairman of the board of trustees of Franklin University as well as chairman of the Columbus Metropolitan Airport and Aviation Commission. She is the mother of Bob Greene, the syndicated columnist and author; D. G. Fulford, author and journalist; and Tim Greene, a real estate executive. She lives in Columbus, Ohio.