Friday it will be 6 months since Roger Hull left us…the kind of anniversary I have learned the grief stricken notice. His birthday has passed, the big winter holidays have passed, I have achieved 80…which he really really wanted but wasn’t able to make.
In some ways I’ve learned more in the last six months than in the last decade. I’ve had time to consider my life from every angle. I have a gratitude for family and friends greater than ever before. I realize that small messages keep people afloat.
I recently read a poem by Maxine Scates which had this phrase “…memory is a dwelling as singular as any place we have ever lived…” and I know this to be true ( photo by Jamey Stillings).
And yet Spring comes again
The moon waxes and wanes
Projects remain ahead.
Vivien (5) and I (80) have been making crayon drawings on newsprint…just on the table whenever we have a minute
and I just realized that mine has a sort of unintended symbolic meaning as I try to create my new life…
Wish me luck, friends.
On The Way 
Dear Bonnie—I have followed your blog for some years now and was so saddened to learn of your husband’s passing. I can’t quite find the words to express how today’s post has especially moved me, so full of bittersweet joys and hope.
I am caring for my own husband with cancer. This weekend he gave away his prized truck to our 16-year-old granddaughter. I thought of the post you made about Roger and his car. Then I thought of all the earlier posts about your outings with the grandchildren—how fast they grow! and our own outings with our grandchildren—and making art with them!?
What I have especially loved is the thread of art that runs through both our lives and what a balm it has always been—and may it always be so.
Sending you all kinds of love and light, including moonlight and magic lamps:)
??Leslie Stewart Pepin, Wisconsin ________________________________
Luck, Bonnie dear, and all it can be.
My, daughter-in-law celebrates poetry month each year by sending a poem each day in April to copiousrelatives and friends. Thought you might enjoy the first two. Hope your cake day was a pleasant one, mine is in a few days. I will be 76. Hummingbirds-Mary Oliver The female, and two chicks,each no bigger than my thumb,scattered,shimmering in their pale-green dresses;then they rose, tiny fireworks,into the leavesand hovered; then they sat down,each one with dainty, charcoal feet –each one on a slender branch –and looked at me. I had meant no harm,I had simplyclimbed the treefor something to do on a summer day,not knowing they were there,ready to burst the ledgesof their mossy nest and to fly, for the first time,in their sea-green helmets,with brisk, metallic tails –each tulled wing, with every dollop of flight,drawing a perfect wheelacross the air.Then, with a series of jerks, they paused in front of meand, dark-eyed, stared –as though I were a flower –and then, like three tosses of silvery water,they were gone.Alone,in the crown of the tree, I went to China,I went to Prague;I died, and was born in the spring;I found you, and loved you, again. Later the darkness felland the solid moonlike a white pond rose.But I wasn’t in any hurry. Likely I visited allthe shimmering, heart-stabbingquestions without answersbefore I climbed down.
Throwing Children – Load audio playe Ross GayIt is really something when a kid who has a hard time becomes a kid who’s having a good time
You are making your luck and have been always I’m sure.
I’m wishing you a bounty of blessings and joys, both large and small, as you continue along this road without Roger. You are strong! Belated wishes for a Happy Birthday.
Luck, Bonnie, always.
BJ
The B&W photo of you & Roger rounding along the gorgeous wood of the staircase… this is perfection. You each have a look of bliss. So good together, together forever.
I wish you luck and as always I love your posts!
80 becomes you. You’ve got this!
wishing you luck swimming through your new world. You have spotters.
Sending love, thanks, blessings – all those good things. I resonated with your testimony to your new life without the physical presence of our beloved Roger. I always love seeing the two of you and hearing your thoughts. I miss our visits1
Blessings,
Larry
wishing much luck Bonnie. Loved the photos. I think of you often. Love Jackie
wish you the best of luck. love the photos (cake, egg, rodger /you. happy birthday and my best wishes for you. Love Jackie
love to you Jackie
Luck a lob to you Bonnie! See you soon!💕
that would be love not lob😹
I saw a note about Roger’s death in the Northwestern Magazine. It brought back many memories of our times together in the art history department. You have my sympathy and admiration for your openness in the face of such a radical change. My husband died seven years ago and I have yet to be able to talk about my loss.