There are times in my life when I remember being scared: parachuting from a plane, failing my first exam at university, watching a grizzly sow and her three cubs rip through my campsite.
But nothing prepared me for the news that my 41-year-old husband had been killed in an avalanche.
Why would I be prepared? I believed that with hard work I could achieve my goals. I followed the rules, had everything I was supposed to have: nice friends, good grades, a recession-proof job teaching high school, a loving husband, a beautiful mountain home in Whistler. In return I expected special exemption from the hand of fate. This was the deal I subconsciously concocted: civil obedience, loving kindness for no loss, no pain.
But the impossible happened.
Getting used to my husband’s death has taken me 10 years, 30 journals and this book, and it’s still a work in progress. At times in my life, fear has kept me alive. At other times, fear has made me feel alive. The intense fear I felt while grieving, however, paralyzed me.