Tag Archives: Kathy Anne

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Another ‘first’ sneaks up

When you lose someone with whom you do everything — and I mean that in virtually every sense of the word — then the smallest things one does take on an added emotional significance.

Those who have lost a loved one know about which I am referring.

I took a dip in our community swimming pool this evening; I had to cool off from the 98-degree heat that blanketed Princeton, Texas, today.

This was something I did routinely with Kathy Anne, my bride of 51 years and the girl of my dreams who passed away in February after a brief, but savage, battle with cancer.

I won’t go on and on about it with this blog post. It’s just one of those lessons one learns about mourning that I have just encountered. I’m quite certain the next time I decide to get wet in the pool won’t hit me quite the same way … or any other time after that.

My journey, though, continues. Yes, it’s getting a little better.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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That was some storm, sweetheart!

My dear Kathy Anne …

Several friends of ours have suggested I write to you personally. They say I should put pen to paper. But as you know, my penmanship has gone straight to hell, thanks in no small part to the journalism career that ruined my once-graceful hand.

I hope you’ll settle for a typewritten note, sweetheart.

Know for starters that I miss you every waking hour of every day. We all miss you. It’s been a struggle since you left us. That damn cancer was brutal beyond anything I could imagine.

It’s been a dark journey so far, but I have been able to write about it on my blog and it has given me some comfort along the way.

But … I have some good news. I am able to smile a bit when I think of you. Take what happened here last night. We had a whale of a thunderstorm roar through Collin County. Tornado sirens were blasting. I saw some walnut-sized hail on the yard.

I thought of the many times we talked about missing the Gulf Coast storms we witnessed when we first moved to Beaumont in the spring of 1984. Remember how they boasted in the Panhandle about the thunderstorms there? Well, we always joked between ourselves that the coastal storms had the Caprock storms beat all to hell.

We lost power twice during the night. Not to worry, though. Peter and I had flashlights ready. Toby the Puppy got a bit anxious, as did the kitties that came with Peter. Just so you know, Macy and Marlowe are acclimating nicely in their new digs here. They have reached a sort of an accommodation with Puppy: It’s his house, but they are free to roam about.

We are adjusting to life without you, my darling bride. Indeed, I don’t believe I’ll achieve that level of normality as I once defined it.

When life was “good” for me, it was because of you. I cannot claim to be “good” these days. I am getting better. I get rocked back occasionally, but I understand now that it’s to be expected.

I’m just trudging along. I’ll write you again. I promise. Just know that I miss you beyond all humanly measure.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Better, but not ‘good’

Four months into this dark journey on which I have embarked has revealed — I believe — a difficult truth about where I am likely going to end up.

My bride passed away on Feb. 3 after a brief, but savage bout with glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer. I have chronicled already much of what I have been feeling since Kathy Anne’s passing.

We were together for 52 years, 51 of those years as husband and wife. Yes, it’s been tough. It will continue to be a difficult trek for well past the foreseeable future.

The difficult truth?

It is that “good” as I once defined term is likely an unattainable goal for me. Friends and family ask me constantly, “How are you doing?” I cannot say “good,” because that term meant something vastly different from what I am experiencing today. I don’t intend to redefine the term; I prefer to remember what “good” used to mean for my bride and me.

I shrug and say “better.” I am better than I was yesterday — most of the time. Thus, the term “better” remains the description du jour for me as I continue on the path that will lead me eventually to the end of my own time on Earth.

For those who might wonder, though, about my emotional state, please know that I intend to stay as positive as possible. I am able to laugh loudly. My emotions run the full gambit.

I just have learned to understand something about mourning the loss of a beloved life partner, someone with whom I did everything. It is that I will never stop missing Kathy Anne. That I will have to wipe tears from my eyes at seemingly little or no provocation.

I will, though, function as a normal adult human being.

“Good” is beyond my reach. I will strive to get “better” each day … and that is a worthy goal to attain.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Loss reveals tough lesson

This prolonged period of mourning I am enduring is teaching me many things, one of which is the unintended cruelty of others.

My dear bride passed away four months ago from a savage form of cancer. I miss Kathy Anne every waking minute of every day. Yes, I have written a lot about that already and I don’t mean to belabor the point, as my grief is getting easier to manage.

What is maddening, though, in the extreme are the phone calls and text messages that keep coming at me from those interested in buying my property in Princeton, Texas.

It’s a modest, but nice home. I am making payments each month, just as we did when we purchased it in early 2019.

OK, I know what’s going on. I had to file some paperwork with the Collin County Clerk’s Office, in its probate department. It’s public record. The word has made its way to the real estate buzzards circling overhead. They want to make me a “cash offer” on the house.

I tell them all essentially same thing. I might hang up on them or tell them, simply, “I am not selling. Goodbye.”

On occasion I might ask the caller, “What prompts you to make this call? Does it have anything to do with my wife’s passing?”

They hang up.

It’s no surprise to anyone, I am sure, that losing a beloved spouse is new to me. I have not traveled down this road before. My sadness is tough to shake, even without the assortment of messages and “outreach” from those seeking to do business with me.

They likely won’t read this blog, but this forum does give me a chance to vent my frustration during this still-difficult time in my life.

So … I just did. Thanks for hearing me out.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Prepare for ‘firsts’ posts

Spoiler alert: Your friendly blogger — that’s me — is likely to subject readers to a series of blog posts commemorating a series of “firsts” that my family and I will endure during the coming year.

My precious bride, Kathy Anne, passed away in February. I have spoken already on this blog about the “firsts” that will arrive during the course of the year.

Mothers’ Day came and went and I didn’t post anything specific about that. But there will be more of them to come. First Fourth of July (which KA loved to celebrate), first Fathers’ Day (which she honored my role in becoming a dad), first wedding anniversary, first Thanksgiving, first Christmas (when she became the equivalent of the Looney Tunes Tasmanian Devil decorating for the holiday).

I am just advising you of what’s to come. I have to make note of these events. It’s part of my journey out of the darkness. Be patient. I hope you glean something constructive and affirming from them.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Trouble with that ‘d’ word

I never in a million years envisioned having trouble with a certain word after losing someone so dear to me.

But I am … having trouble saying a certain word out loud when I discuss the loss of Kathy Anne to cancer. I won’t even write it. Not here on the blog. Nowhere, man!

You know the word. The word and its variations all start with the letter “d.”

Maybe this isn’t new to anyone who has undergone this level of loss, followed by grief and mourning. You know about which I am writing this brief post.

When I was writing for newspapers for all those decades, I was told by my editors to use the “d” word when describing someone who has left this Earth. No “passing away” allowed when writing hard copy for news stories or even for opinion pieces. Can’t have euphemisms, editors would tell me. Got it!

That’s all changed for me now. I am in control of this blog and I am the boss of what appears on it. Therefore, as I comment on Kathy Anne’s life with me and my family, I will refrain — for the foreseeable future and maybe even beyond — from using that word. We spent 52 years together. Her illness was brief, but so very savage.

I am acutely aware of the finality of what has transpired. I just am not ready to say or write the word or words that tell me what I already know.

I believe you will understand. Maybe even cut me a bit of slack.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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The journey continues

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Well, gang, I have made another command decision from my North Texas man cave, which is that Toby the Puppy and I are going to hit the road again soon.

I returned in mid-April from a monthlong sojourn out west to clear my head and begin to mend my heart shattered by the loss of my dear bride, Kathy Anne, to glioblastoma … as savage a form of cancer as one can imagine.

I’ve had time to collect myself. One of my sons has moved in with me into my Princeton home. He brought his two kitties and they have done well getting acclimated to their new surroundings — not to mention to the presence of the king of our house, Toby the Puppy.

But I have decided I need more time away from my digs. This time, it’s points east where we’ll go. Unlike the westward trek, which took us to the Pacific Ocean, this journey won’t allow us to look at the Atlantic. We’ll go as far as just south of Raleigh, N.C., where I’ll spend some time visiting my cousin and her two young sons.

Then we’ll head to Roanoke, Va., where we will see two of our dearest friends on Earth, a couple my bride and I have known for more than 30 years.

After that I will visit another friend in Charleston, W.Va., a fellow with whom I worked at the Amarillo Globe-News.

Then I’ll park for two nights in Louisville, Ky., where I will spend a day at the Muhammad Ali Museum. Oh, I do look forward to paying my respects to The Greatest.

My head is a whole lot clearer as I prepare to embark on this trip than it was when I headed west. My heart, though, remains a work in progress. I do believe what many have said, which is that my heart is likely permanently damaged. I’ll just have to cope.

I can do that. First things first. The open road awaits.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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‘New normal’ still out there

My search for the “new normal” life I intend to live remains an active endeavor. I haven’t found it just yet, but I am putting some pieces together that I hope will create the normal life I am seeking.

One piece fit nicely. I joined a gym. Actually, I have returned to a gym where my wife and I once belonged before we quit.

Why did I quit? I wasn’t achieving the results I wanted. It was my fault. I had no one else to blame. And I didn’t level any blame; I accepted it. So did Kathy Anne

My new normal is going to include making a commitment where I failed previously. The workout club in Princeton, Texas, has a wide array of equipment. My intention will be to use as much of as possible.

I long have had this problem with food. I adhere to what we all call a “see food diet.” You know the punchline.

The new normal also involves me forgoing some of my culinary guilty pleasures. I have done that. As it was more than 43 years ago when I quit smoking, it is imperative that I give up these food items cold turkey. I cannot snitch a little here, a little there, any more than I could sneak a drag on a cigarette after I quit.

So, that part of the new normal isn’t so new, right?

The rest of it remains new to me. I am an old man, so I am acutely aware that it will take some work to shed the weight I have gained.

My task now is to adopt this new normal as part of every-day living.

I can do this.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Poignancy added to this exhibit

FORT WORTH — I have visited this exhibit many times over the years, dating back to the time before my wife and I relocated to the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

You’ll find it across the street from the Fort Worth Convention Center and in front of the hotel where President and Mrs. Kennedy spent the president’s final night on Earth before flying to Love Field in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.

We all know what happened next.

My son and I went there this weekend to gander and gawk at downtown Fort Worth, just take in the sights of the place. I saw the pictures behind JFK’s statue and was struck immediately about their poignancy.

They were taken literally hours before a gunman killed the president. The president was smiling, as was his wife. One photo shows JFK standing in front of then-Texas Gov. John Connally, who also would be injured by a gunshot on that horrible day in downtown Dallas.

The poignancy was heightened, strange as it might seem, by the loss I have just suffered in my own life. A little more than three months ago, cancer took my bride, Kathy Anne, from me, robbing my sons of their mother, my daughter-in-law of her good friend and confidante and my granddaughter of Grandma, who loved her beyond measure.

Seeing pictures such as what my son and I saw reminded me as well of how precious life is and how we must treat it as a gift we should treasure.

Just a short time — a few weeks, actually — prior to the terrible diagnosis we got regarding Kathy Anne, we were returning from a lengthy RV trip out west and we were looking forward to spending the rest of our life charting new journeys and adventures.

My life without my beloved bride is taking an entirely different course. I don’t know where it will lead me. I am just intending to be ready to embark when the time comes.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Here come the ‘firsts’

We knew these days would arrive, yet I am unprepared emotionally to cope with them.

These are the “firsts” that accompany the passing of a loved one.

My bride, Kathy Anne, is gone. This weekend will be the first Mothers Day without her in, oh, 51 years.

She became a mother herself at a tender age when we welcomed the first of our two sons into this world. Our second son would arrive 18 months later and together the three of us celebrated their mother and my bride, usually with a nice dinner and, of course, lots of love and expressions of appreciation for her role as the pillar of our family.

This year will be different for my sons, my daughter-in-law and my granddaughter. I feel the need to speak out to readers of this blog, many of whom have followed my journey with understanding and compassion, which I appreciate more than I can express.

I am heartened by the knowledge that we will all take this journey together and that I am blessed with family members I love beyond all measure. We will be strong.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com