A month ago, I asked you what your mornings were made of these days… I received nearly 200 responses and what struck me was that several spoke of mourning in love.
You explained to me that for a long time, you two woke up. But now the dawn is lonely. He left, she died.
What you have built over the years is a memory. Your routine reminds you of this almost every day. Sometimes it’s sweet, sometimes it burns. You compose with what comes, with what is there.
A reader wrote to me that some Saturdays seem endless to her. “I have been struggling for nine months to find meaning in my life. My companion passed away last April. I accompanied him in his illness and when he died I thought I was ready for the rest… I read you, I listen to you, I train, I walk, I go to shows, to the cinema… I am going. The problem is that I who remembers the WE. »
Love like a stubborn ghost.
“My mornings have already been full of relationships,” Louise Pageau wrote to me. Raising the three children to get them ready for school, making lunch for my husband, kissing him on the doorstep and continuing with my daily life. Now I sip my black coffee while reading The Press and I end with the crossword puzzle. I would have liked so much that my husband was still there for the morning retreats, but he died. You are my first hello and sometimes my second when a friend texts me “Good day” or one of my children asks me “How are you?” I tamed this silence. »
The kiss, before work. The hoped-for retirement, but never known… These images moved me deeply.
I imagine many of us building a life by telling ourselves that we will enjoy it when we reach the golden age. Efforts, like beaks, become automatisms. We look forward, even if it means forgetting what fills our hearts at the moment.
Reading you makes me want conscious love.
I also retain Mireille Séguin’s advice: “Be happy and enjoy the tender moments with your lover. »
A few lines earlier, she explained to me that, “for 44 years, [s]our first hello was for [s]we love who [l]was still calling all asleep in [leur] bed. Since November 27, the day of his death, it has been The Press+ Who [l’]welcome”.
You went from a pair of arms to a screen. I wish I could make hugs out of my words.
You are also some to have written to me about a breakup. It comes to your mind as soon as you wake up. She left marks. I imagine them more lively, as Valentine’s Day approaches…
Perhaps you are looking for examples of resilience in grief?
Lysanne Pariseau accepted that I relay her words to you: “I have been living alone for nine years now, after a happy marriage of 43 years. For me anyway, because he is gone. […] I find myself today at peace and very proud to still love this man despite his evasion. He will always remain a great father and a beautiful person. Romain Rolland’s phrase helped me grow: “The one we love has every right against you, even to no longer love you.” »
I remember that mourning can be knitted with tenderness and that literature can be buoyed when your heart is in the fleet.
Besides, it may seem counter-intuitive to you, but I take refuge in romantic correspondence when I need comfort. I find something to reassure me, escape and identify what I want or not in my relationships.
Those around me are probably tired of hearing me talk about The vixen and the unkempt… My bible, the collection of correspondence held between Pauline Julien and Gérald Godin. There is passion, heartbreak and excellent nicknames. The poet called the singer his dear soul, his sister, his destiny, his core. (He also sometimes called her his little bitch, which, personally, I really like.)
But lately, the book that has touched me the most is The George Carlin Letters – The Permanent Courtship of Sally Wade (published by Gallery Books in 2011). A friend gave it to me, knowing my interest in pen pals… Screenwriter and author Sally Wade recounts her 10 years of union with comedian George Carlin. The artists met in a bookstore, both wearing sweatpants. According to Wade, it was his dog who introduced them to each other.
Their love was overwhelming.
There are sweet letters, comic postcards and touching poems in this book. We pass from a thunderbolt to death; from choosing to love to choosing to leave the loved one behind. To end it because the disease will end up getting us anyway.
In the words of the great Carlin, we feel all the tenderness in the world.
In Sally Wade’s story, we can imagine all the pain that comes with lonely everyday life and all the gratitude for a relationship that has given us so much.
Closing the book, we remember that nothing lasts forever, but we can decide to keep little bits of eternity.