I get by with a little help from my friends

As I write this, hundreds of widows and widowers are meeting half a world away.

Finding others who don’t look at them with pity, but with knowing.

With love.

With friendship.

....and while part of me would love to have been able to go, the other part of me knows that it is just not logistically nor financially possible right now (and no, that’s not a hint- I just can’t leave my babies, nor my work to fly half-way around the world).

But as I sit here, living vicariously through the tweets and facebook updates from the wonderful organisers and beautiful attendees, I am reminded that I have my own little pool of friendship and love right here.

There are the five young widows who I know from my school days (as in we were in the same year at high school). ... we “get” each other in ways very few other people understand. We meet irregularly and informally but when we do, the humour is dark, the advice well thought out, the tears accepted as normal and the friendship real. Oh ... and the wine is cold!!

Then there is my BFF who is not a widow, but who “gets” this stuff. She spent the first six months of my widowhood writing daily e-mails for me to find late at night when my spirits were low.
Not pitiful, emotional piffle, but truly funny stuff that had me splitting my sides with laughter.
...and love so real and present that you could carve it.

...and above even that, there is my Mum. My angel. My army of love. Fixer of things, maker of meals, babysitter of grandchildren. ...and guiding light. Mum makes me keep living because I didn’t’ die.

...and I feel so lucky to have such resounding love and support right here at home and from all of you, online.

So I sit here, half a world away from Camp Widow and raise a glass to all the widows, widowers, BFFs and Mums who help us all get through each day.

We get by with a little help from our friends.....