This is my first blog.  My first year as a widow.

Life has changed dramatically in the past year and I am picking my way through feeling dazed, despondent, and depleted to reach a new normal of living, learning, and loving.

Journaling just does not do it for me.  I enjoy writing with an outward intent.  Over the years I have written handbooks, benefit summaries, strategic visions, and even a few poems.  Just recently I began a web-based column on bicycling for a city.  So this is the logical next step.

In my opinion, anyone who blogs is searching for meaning in her own words – as well as offering viewpoints to the greater world of followers.  So many of the books and articles I have read about grief and widowhood seem off-base to me and I feel a need to push back against expectations.

• There is no way to make this journey in a prescribed fashion to a logical conclusion; the loss of my beloved husband will always be part of me.

• There is no way to move on that satisfies everyone around me; I simply have looked for opportunities to get back in the game of life.

• There are infinite ways to live my life.

I believe my blog can be helpful to others.  My target readers are in the second half of life, singles and/or life-long learners.  A wry appreciation for the incongruities of life is also helpful.