NOVEMBER 2020
I WAKE UP GROGGY THIS morning. To me, groggy is when I am out of bed and my eyes are open but I feel half-asleep. I still can’t see clearly. I need to walk with my arms extended and hands out, feeling the wall and holding on to the banister for dear life as if I were finding my way in the dark. Even the first cup of coffee doesn’t lift the fog immediately.
This is different than grumpy. Grumpy is when I turn on cable news while reading the newspaper and start drowning in a pool of disappointment and anger. What is so hard about helping people who need help?
We have a bunch of well-paid people with free lifetime health insurance causing more problems than they solve. Most of them are old men protecting the interests of corporations and their own personal power while talking about making America great as they obscure the facts and turn history into fiction. What does that mean—making America great?
To me, greatness recognizes the powerless and the poor. Greatness works for equity and against injustice. Greatness offers a helping hand and an open heart. Greatness inspires acts of hope, courage, and humanity.
But don’t get me started. Not while I am groggy.
Here is the rest of my morning.
Coffee.
Cats.
Dog walk.
Crossword.
Silence.
A nice, long, satisfying stretch in the sun.
There, that is better.
In the wake of Ed’s death, I am finding my way and working through the grogginess of grief. Wolfie’s song “Distance” goes to number one. Emotional triggers are heightened. I allow myself time and space. Words flash in my brain like signs on the highway: Exhale. Grace. Patience. Breathe. Baby Steps. Laughter. Gratitude.
On the morning “Distance” is released, Wolfie is interviewed by Howard Stern, who is one of the best if not the best interviewer in the media as long as you aren’t the one he’s interrogating, as I found out years ago when he focused on my rear end until I basically screamed at him to stop.
With Wolfie, he is respectful, sensitive, and supportive. My favorite part of their conversation is when Wolfie shows Howard the first guitar his dad gave him and confirms that Ed was the world’s worst guitar teacher. As Wolfie laughingly recalls, Ed would show him a riff, and say, “Do this,” and Wolfie, just a beginner then, would stare at his dad, and say, “I can’t do that. You’re Eddie Van Halen.”
As I listen to the interview, I remember the way Ed used to sit Wolfie on his lap and play the piano, his fingers dancing across the keys much to the delight of his toddler son. The piano was in our library. Ed loved playing in there. One day he thanked me for creating a room with perfect acoustics. I was surprised. I did? Well . . . cool.
As time moves forward, the tears ebb into a more manageable and familiar flow. The holidays are hard, especially when I have the urge to call or text Ed and realize I can’t even though his number is still in my phone along with years of texts. I work on recalibrating this change; Ed is gone but still so present. He is all over the Internet. With David. With Sammy. With Wolfie. His jaw-dropping solos. His underrated piano playing. That music will be around forever. Ed ain’t going anyplace.
He shows up in my head, too. Our wedding. His cars. The craziness. The way we hurt each other. The birthdays. The phone calls. The tours. The way he turned to me and smiled while I was watching from the side of the stage thirty-five years ago because we were a couple but more recently because we were amazed by our kid. The man who blew away so many people with his musical virtuosity was blown away by his son. And I loved it. The debate between past and present is endless and unresolved.
* * *
Love always wins.
That’s why it hurts so badly.
Grief is one of those things you have to wade into and expect to cry your way to shallower waters.
Talking and remembering helps. Pictures are stepping-stones. Nighttime isn’t as scary as those hours when you were accustomed to the phone ringing and hearing that familiar voice say hello or hey, what’s happening.
I am doing exactly what Angie Johnsey advised nearly a year earlier: acknowledge the voice in my head, address it, and put it where it belongs.
The sadness doesn’t go away as much as I get better at dealing with it. I recognize it, speak to it, and use it. The grief seems to hit hardest when my tank is low, but instead of letting it knock me down, I use it to fill me up again. Someone should make a T-shirt that says, EMOTIONS ARE A TERRIBLE THING TO AVOID.
* * *
I find myself wanting to cook—not to eat but to create, connect, and share with others. One day I make my four-cheese crab mac ’n’ cheese, a mouth-watering recipe that has two cups of cheddar cheese, a cup of Gruyère, a cup of fontina, some shredded Parmesan, and a pound of jumbo lump crabmeat topped by panko crumbs and scallions. A few weeks later, I have a yen for my kale Caesar salad with garlicky panko crunch. After finishing the dressing, with fresh garlic and anchovies, I declare it a punch to the tastebuds. All alone in the kitchen, I exclaim, “Yes!”
Later, I post a video of myself making this salad again on my Instagram. Faith Ford calls it a “yum explosion” in the comments section. It is, it is—and her reaction makes me feel lighter and brighter. This is more satisfying than the way I used to deal with my emotions. I am in the kitchen. The lights are on, there is no sneaking, no judgment, no labeling myself as bad. Where is Hoda? Savannah? Carson? I wish they were here to see me not crying for once but experiencing joy instead. And wanting seconds.
More, please.
Inspired, I go scrolling on my social media for more of what makes people happy. What are people’s recipes for joy? This is some of what I find.
So this is what I have learned the past year since going on the Today show and announcing that I want to experience joy. Joy is available to anyone who wants it without having to fix or change anything about yourself except your intention to make it a part of your life. It doesn’t depend on losing ten pounds. It doesn’t require luck. The pursuit of joy must be intentional and made a priority. There is no one path or recipe. In the end, there is just love. The search is like waking up groggy. You have to work through it. Feel your way, have your coffee, sit in the sun, and look around. Joy will not find you. But you can find it.
Somehow this has proved true during the strangest, saddest year of my adult life. I have discovered love in the midst of grief. I have found joy while crying a river of tears. Our lives are tapestries woven from various shades of joy and grief, happiness and pain, pleasure and disappointment, clarity and confusion, hope and fear, loneliness, longing, and love. You need all of it to understand any of it.