SAYING GOODBYE

Sometimes the sands of time just slip right on through the hourglass until one day when you least want it, someone dies. 
Their spirit probably leaves their body nanoseconds or hours (who really knows) before the medical world even records death. Saying goodbye to a dead body is difficult. Saying goodbye to your whole life--your past, your present and your hope for the future--is harder.
Saying goodbye to yourself, is the most difficult of all. 
That's what happened to me: I had to say "Goodbye dear old friend" to Old Me. The strong, confident and smart lady who was a wife. A mother. A daughter. A sister, A friend. That person died when my true love, Rob, passed away. 
So who was this new, vulnerable, crying person, hanging out in my familiar body? She definitely wasn't familiar in her ways. She was afraid of noises in the dark, so she slept with the lights on. She still does but not out of fear (because she often just falls asleep two seconds after her head hits the pillow without even time to turn the lights off! Oh, yeah. She's hilarious that way). She goes for weeks not talking to anyone. Oh, big deal. Lots of people do that. Do they? Do they, really? It's a lonely life, if you let it. She has grit, though. She managed to pass her motorcycle license at the age most people are heading into a happy retirement. So...she can pull bravery out of the hat when she needs to. But still, she's the girl who is afraid to take her car through a car wash. No bravery there, I'm sorry to say. Old Me would have told you that her middle name was "Miss Independent" but New Me has to ask the next door neighbour where the water shutoff valve is located and then needs that person to help turn it off because she's too short to reach it. 
I mentioned being comfortable in Old Me's body. This new person turned out to be vegan, of all things. Sheesh. Old Me never saw THAT coming, either. So New Me is thin and almost unrecognizable. Healthier. More active. Less social. Less musical. New Me really has to scratch around to hear music on a daily basis and by "scratch around" I mean in the recesses of her mind. Music is readily available but you kind of need to WANT to hear it. You need to make it a priority. New Me seems to have more outdoorsy-physical priorities and less indoor, reading, playing music type of priorities. Old Me would have disapproved. Creatives are like that: very disapproving. 
Saying goodbye is never easy. When you lose a loved one, your heart shatters and your world falls apart. Saying goodbye to the person you were in relation to the one who died, now that's the kicker. I said "Goodbye" to being a wife, lover, girlfriend, half in a couple. 
Saying goodbye to myself was hardest of all. And, by the way, I will never say "Goodbye" to being his soulmate.