Yesterday was the 40-th Ann. of my Chuck's loss (Veteran's Day 1976)

I wanted to post here, then, but don't have home internet and besides, I make all the anniversaries Count, by doing something special to celebrate the life he gave back to me before he lost his own.

Here I am,... 40 years after the fact,... still reasonably healthy ( a LOT healthier than Chuck's son born Dec. 25, 1971,.... I'd been greatly pregnant with him at the time of Duane's accident)

Anyway,... I'm still around, and when I'm not being a slave at my place in the country (Blue Ridge Foothills) hauling around fieldstone, lumber and Concrete blocks and tree trunk sections,... (yeah,.. I'm a real 'Earth Mother' as they used to call it in the 70s ) I'm making 'art' as a woodcarver. I'm fairly well known for that in the South East,... I can Google the alias I do my work under and quite a bit of links pop up 😀

But yesterday was pretty special,... another milestone in a life.
This year I chose to spend 9 and a half hours typing a story of another life lost from mine,... an incredible woman who touched my life in the best possible ways,.. i.e. she loved me as a daughter she'd never had,... but she had wound up dying by her own hand when she was only a year older than I am now.
She died because she kept a terrible secret,... that her husband was an abusive alcoholic / drunk who on occasion hit her over the almost 50 years of their marriage. She kept his secret and in the end, made the decision that her life would Never get better, and she couldn't endure anymore.

So yesterday I started drafting her story to eventually post to Al-Anon,... to finally give her the voice she'd never had the courage to speak with,... I wrote out her story, and tried to make her 'Real' and not totally forgotten. She was a Grande lady,... as close to being a Saint as anyone I've ever met,..... and she loved me,... warts and all,..... because I had loved her son, my present husband.
For the last 26 years I have lived a shadow of her life,... but I will not take her path,... My voice has been used,... my friends are numerous and circle around me giving me strength to survive,... some of them are from here (Dave, Ron, someday we may meet,... if I'm not too old by then to remember 'who' you are () )

40 years later.
I head for Macon next week.
I'll be there a couple of 3 days or so, and then back to my mountainous greenwoods.

Anyway,... just touching bases 😀
~ Windsinger