Driving to work, Susan saw someone who resembled her husband. The closer she got the less he looked like her husband but it was too late, the seed was planted. She let go of all mental controls and allowed herself to remember, if only for an instant, what it was like to see the husband walking the earth again. She let her brain carry her back to that simple, ordinary, wonderful impossibility.

Susan is aware in her every conscious moment that the husband is gone. Even when she's engaged in things that have her total attention, she's aware. Even when she's reading or laughing or cursing a four minute traffic light with no turn arrow, she's aware.

The husband has been absent from her life for 488 days. That doesn't even seem so long, right? How about a year, four months and three days? Seventy weeks?
She accepts her current state without complaint although sometimes she likes to remind people Hey, I have a dead husband over here. She almost always regrets doing so, but it's a testament that she can't always keep everything held together.

There's a freedom to having a dead husband, Susan can do what she wants with only her children to consider, and they don't require much onsite interaction any more. She is available to accept any invitation offered no matter how drop of the hat it may be. She also observes the freedom to stay in all weekend, not answer the phone and not shower.

There's nothing worse than an old whiny bore, so Susan's gonna stop right here lest she turns into one. Check back tomorrow and she'll report on how the ants are back in her kitchen.