Tag Archives: Kathy Anne

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Anniversaries past …

I am going to be marking a significant date in my life without the presence — for the first time in 51 years — of the individual who made that date so important to me.

Kathy Anne is gone but I want to remember on this blog the way we celebrated our wedding anniversary. We didn’t do this throughout our entire married life together, but we did manage to squeeze in some memorable jaunts away from the hustle and bustle of daily life to just enjoy each other’s company.

We married on Sept. 4, 1971. That’s 52 years ago. Cancer took her from us in February and I have been telling you the story of this journey I have undertaken in search of a new life that I haven’t yet identified.

Well into our blissful life we made a pact that we would plan a brief trip away from “the house” to somewhere fun to celebrate the ceremony where our life together took root.

One of them occurred on our 30th anniversary, Sept. 4, 2001. We had moved from Beaumont to Amarillo a few years earlier. We decided to go to Branson, Mo., to take in some entertainment and enjoy the rides at Silver Dollar City. We booked a hotel room, and while doing so we told the reservation clerk we were celebrating year No. 30 together.

When we arrived, we saw the hotel marquee with the message: Happy 30th anniversary, John and Kathy Kanelis.

How cool is that?

Little did we know that precisely one week later, everyone’s life would change. We awoke the morning of 9/11 and then all hell broke loose when the jetliners crashed into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon.

Ten years later, we flew to Buffalo, N.Y., to take in Niagara Falls. Wedding anniversary No. 40 was equally memorable. For one thing, the plane we rode from Chicago to Buffalo contained one passenger of note: the actor Dennis Quaid. We got acquainted with Quaid while waiting for our luggage. He’s a nice guy.

We hiked to the base of the U.S. falls and then rode aboard the Maid of the Mist into the deafening roar of the horseshoe falls on the Canadian side of the attraction.

We spent many vacation jaunts like those during our life together. They make me smile, even as I prepare for what I expect will be a day that will tax my emotional strength to the core.

President Biden has told us that tears will be replaced by a smile when we think of those we mourn. He’s right. I am able to smile now. It feels damn good.

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If only I could tell her …

The more time that passes from the worst day of my life to the here and now, the fewer times I am tied up in emotional knots seeking to tell my bride something that I notice along the way.

That’s normal, I understand, as I progress along this journey without Kathy Anne by my side. But … I drive around Princeton, Texas, these days and I see things I know with absolute certainty she would want me to tell her.

I lost Kathy Anne to cancer on Feb. 3 and my life — to put it mildly — has been changed forever.

The city has completed a big street improvement project just south of the house we purchased in Arcadia Farms. Myrick Lane is now complete from Beauchamp Boulevard to Farm to Market Road 982. It’s a wide, divided thoroughfare and is much less rough of a ride than it was just six month ago. Kathy Anne would be pleased.

I keep seeing this new breakfast and lunch eatery on US 380, which Kathy Anne wished we had. I want to tell her that our son and I have eaten there several times and the chow is pretty good. That, too, would bring a smile to her face.

I notice construction continuing apace at the site of a proposed supermarket complex at the corner of Beauchamp and US 380. That would make her smile broadly.

And the city has built a park just south of our house on land donated to it by a local family. She wanted a fresh place to take Toby the Puppy for his walks. He’ll visit the park once it cools off enough for him to take it.

Hey, I get that the journey will continue to be difficult at times. There will be more of those commemorative dates I will mark without her presence by my side. However, I always have cherished the 52 years we had as a couple, 51 of them as husband and wife.

Time only will make those memories even more vivid. It also will enable me to experience the here and now with less pain at being unable to share it with her.

Then again … she knows.

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Blog performs priceless function

You know already that I love this gig of writing a blog, so much so that I have just crossed the 700-day mark.

Seven hundred consecutive days of posting a commentary on High Plains Blogger! I consider that a big … deal, if you get my drift.

I get a particular question from time to time, which goes like this: How are you able to write so frequently? My answer is that I do not know or why that it happens. I am prone to respond simply that “It’s what I do and it’s who I am.”

I’m not boasting about it. I merely want to call attention to this streak because, in a manner that many of you will understand, it has served as a form of therapy for me since I experienced the worst day of my life.

Feb. 3 came and went. The day began with my dear bride struggling to regain consciousness after suffering a grand mal seizure about six days earlier. The day ended with a phone call from the hospital telling me Kathy Anne had “just passed.” The glioblastoma lesion in her brain took her from us and it shattered many hearts.

I have sought in the months since then to tell the story of my personal journey through this darkness. My family and I are going through it together, but as a form of therapy, writing about this passage has given me strength. It helps clear my head … along with the road trips I have been able to take with my trusted companion, Toby the Puppy.

I likely would have continued this streak without the tragedy that befell us but since we have been dealt this hand, I am continuing to play it for as long as it is reasonable.

I want to thank you for reading it and sharing it when the spirit moves you.

Seven hundred consecutive days of blogging means a great deal to me. It happens to mean even more as I am able to continue to use this forum as a guide path that leads me toward the light.

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Working through hangups

I am working my way through a couple of lingering hangups that I cannot release … seven months since cancer took my bride, Kathy Anne, away from me.

One of them deals with what I call the “d” word. You know what it is. It rhymes with “bread.” I am not sure if I am ever going to be able to say the word in describing Kathy Anne’s condition. I am acutely aware of the finality of her passing. I am made aware of it whenever I want to tell her something, only to realize that I cannot do so.

I don’t need to repeat certain words to remind me of what I already know to be true.

The other hangup deals with the “w” word. I am going to stick with “husband” to describe myself. I will be Kathy Anne’s “husband” for as long as I walk this good Earth. Before you get all bothered over the obvious, which is how that might work were I to develop another relationship, I will concede my intention to rethink that commitment should circumstances ever require it.

Kathy Anne once told me in clear and concise terms that she wanted me to find someone in the event of her passing; I believe I said the same thing to her. She insisted that I deserved to be happy. I can recall that conversation clearly even as I grapple with the hangups I have mentioned here … but I’m not there.

I am in the here and now, still trying to navigate my way through my new life. The journey is getting easier all the time. Some days are better than others, but all told, I am doing far better today than I was a week ago. Hangups be damned!

Friends and family have told me to take it all “one day at a time.” I am following their advice. It works.

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Flaw appears in emotional armor

Readers of this blog have been informed of the progress I am making as I walk through the darkness of grief and intense pain over the loss of my dear bride, Kathy Anne.

The progress is real and for that I am glad to report I am doing better each day. However …

I have discovered a flaw in the emotional armor I have developed. It presented itself to me while Toby the Puppy and I were taking a quick stroll around our Princeton, Texas, block. It came in the form of having to tell someone who didn’t know about the loss my family and I have suffered.

A couple lives about six houses west of us. Puppy and I approached them as they worked in their driveway. Husband asked, “Where’s your better half? All I have seen is you lately.” I gulped, caught my breath and collected myself before telling him and his wife and daughter, “I lost her in February to cancer.”

I have been able to keep my emotions more or less in check for the past week or so. It’s getting easier … until I have to tell someone who doesn’t know the story. 

I walked through the quick version of the events that started this past autumn, then through the brain cancer diagnosis Kathy Anne received the day after Christmas, her post-surgery rehab stint and then the seizure that ultimately took her from us.

Telling that story — even in its abbreviated form — proved to be a difficult task this evening.

You know what? I got through even that struggle with relative ease compared to what I likely would have experienced, say, a month or two ago.

The journey continues.

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Getting relief from grief

Oh, how I enjoy writing this blog, particularly in recent months as I have sought to deal with my intense grief and heartache over the loss of my beloved bride.

Kathy Anne passed away from cancer in February. I have sought to tell my story without getting overly sappy. Sappiness might be part of my DNA, but I recognize that it isn’t for everyone. So I have sought to keep my blog posts about Kathy Anne relatively free of it.

I hope you’ll bear with me for the time being as I continue on this journey. Truth be told I am doing better today than I was a week ago. I thought I was regressing a bit, but it didn’t happen.

What do I credit for my continued recovery? I am going to give credit to this blog, which is my venue to tell you what is on my mind and in my heart.

Doing so has released much of the pain. Along the way I hope to have offered a lesson or two to those who are enduring similar tragedies.

I said at the outset that I am bolstered by the knowledge that I am far from the only human being ever to experience such a loss. Others have gone through it and come out OK on the other side.

I will too. Of that I am certain. Before I arrive, though, I will need to continue to express my thoughts on this blog.

Spoiler alert: There is more to come.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Trip over; journey continues

Pop quiz time: What can 2,783 miles on the road through part of the eastern United States of America accomplish for you?

Well, for me it helped clear my head and — most astonishingly — it mended my broken heart. Let me be clear: Saying my heart is “mended” does not mean it is reassembled. It still is broken, but I have managed on this most recent sojourn away from my North Texas home to pick up some of the pieces.

The brutal fight that cost me my dear bride, Kathy Anne on Feb. 3, inflicted deep wounds on me, my sons, my granddaughter, daughter-in-law, my brothers-in-law and their families and on my sisters.

I reached out to friends and family on a month-long trip out west shortly after Kathy Anne passed away. I reached out again on a two-week sprint back east to a family member and more friends.

They all said essentially the same thing: I did the right thing by taking time away and that I should take it all “one day at a time.” I am buoyed by the affirmation and am happy to report that I am following the one-day-at-a-time advice.

Joe Biden has told the nation while seeking to console us after national tragedies that “eventually you’ll smile rather than cry when you think of loved ones lost.” The president is right. I am beginning to smile a bit these days when I think of Kathy Anne. Fifty-two years of togetherness with this lovely woman gave me plenty of reason to smile today even as I continue to mourn her absence.

Yes, there will be some difficult days ahead. I’ll have to get through, say, the first wedding anniversary without her, along with her birthday, and all the requisite holidays that come at the end of the year. Kathy Anne was a whirling dervish at Christmas as she sought to decorate our home in all its holiday cheer.

I just want to report today that I my brief excursion away from my home has helped me in ways I did not expect when Toby the Puppy and I embarked two weeks ago.

But … my journey continues.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Declaring ‘victory’ … of a sort

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. — I should not declare victory prematurely, as there are more hurdles to overcome, more significant dates that lie ahead.

That said, I want to issue a cautious note of confidence as my latest mind-clearing, heart-mending sojourn is about to conclude.

I ventured back east to get away from the house I shared with my late bride, Kathy Anne. I had my share of spells visiting family and friends. I have written about them already. Fifty-two years of togetherness with my dream girl aren’t going to be diminished any time soon.

However, I appear to have cleared my head sufficiently to go through a few whole days without welling up. That is a positive development … don’t you think?

My heart? That’s another matter. It remains seriously damaged from the event that occurred on Feb. 3, when I lost my bride to a savage form of brain cancer. I accept that my heart will remain permanently damaged. I hear from friends and acquaintances who have lost the loves of their lives that they, too, sob without warning. I won’t bore you with reports on when that happens to me.

Just know — if you have been following this journey through the dark fog — that I am seeing the light.

I will return to my North Texas house sometime tomorrow. I’ll walk into the living room and will see evidence of Kathy Anne where I left it two weeks ago.

I don’t expect to cry, which — if I am able to finish this journey with dry eyes — might enable me to declare a form of victory.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Up, down … then up

My emotions are playing tricks on my heart, as they keep spiraling high before they head in the other direction.

This latest journey to mend my heart has taken me nearly to the Atlantic Coast. I have shed a few tears talking about my bride, Kathy Anne … whose story you know by now.

At this very moment, though, I am feeling far better than I was the other day. Indeed, I seem to be turning some sort of emotional corner. The heart-mending will be a forever project, of that I am certain. I am understanding better the need to give myself more time.

It’s only been not quite six months since I experienced the worst day of my life. It seems like about, oh, an hour ago when I got the call from the hospital that I had lost my bride to cancer. The emotions still run raw on occasion.

But the upward swings are lasting longer than the downward spirals.

Thus, I am looking forward to more of the same.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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Keeping the streak alive

CHARLESTON, W. Va. — This trek I am taking with Toby the Puppy is taxing me just a bit in this regard: I am having to look for opportunities to post items on High Plains Blogger to keep alive what I believe is an impressive streak.

I am at 672 consecutive days posting items on this blog. I am closing in on two straight years posting comments about this and that.

I do have 24 hours during a specific calendar day to get items posted on the blog, but I have been busy laughing hysterically in Charleston with my friend and former Amarillo Globe-News colleague Lee. We have been sharing remembrances of our exploits back in the day when daily journalism was fun; it’s no longer fun, near as either of us can tell.

I do have this blog. It began around 2009. I have gone through two lengthy streaks. The current one is the longest, by far! I have spent a good deal of time veering away from politics and reminiscing about my dear bride Kathy Anne and explaining to readers about the emotional struggle I continue to fight since losing her to cancer in early February.

My intention is to keep plugging away daily. Bear with me. Oh … and thanks in advance for continuing to read my musings.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com