Widowish: A Memoir

by Melissa Gould

  Ellie took me to the post office and to the market so I wouldn’t have to go alone. She also, per my request, told the masses about Joel. My fear was that I’d be at the drugstore, or the dry cleaners, or somewhere with Sophie, and run into someone who didn’t know. I didn’t want to have to explain or say the words Joel died if someone were to ask me, How’s your husband doing?

  We had open invitations, no matter the day or hour, to our friends’ homes and family events. Our neighbor Roxanne would often ring the bell and simply sit with us and play with the dogs, just so our house had some life to it.

  Regardless of the love and support and care we were given, I was overwhelmed with what my life now was. Money was a concern. I had written a script before Joel was admitted to the hospital, but the thought of pursuing that now had me reeling. Even when I had been working steadily and had been nominated for prestigious awards, every meeting was a question of What have you written or worked on lately? For me, lately had been a long time.

  I hadn’t worked a “real job” in years. Ellie and I had dissolved our business, and I no longer had any kind of career or even a resume. As a longtime freelancer, I was accustomed to months of not working, but without Joel’s steady income I was worried how I would manage financially. So many widows and widowers have financial concerns. There may be mouths at home to feed and bills to pay. It’s the trickle-down effect of losing your partner. Financial worries only add to the stress of grief.

  As a writer and entrepreneur, I was underqualified and overqualified for most jobs. I had no experience in the retail or service industry, and yet I didn’t have the right kind of skills for an office job. Trying to get a writing job outside of TV and film was also challenging. I spoke screenwriting fluently, but I wasn’t up to speed on writing content for online platforms, where a background in marketing was a qualification I didn’t have or even understand. Not only were my options limited, but I wanted to be available for Sophie as much as possible. I wanted to take her to school, and I wanted to be there when she came home, have dinner together, help with homework (if she would let me).

  Joel had been the co-owner of a small music marketing company. His friend Ben was the other owner but was a silent partner who left Joel to run the day-to-day operations. Joel had two other full-time employees working underneath him.

  I remember calling Ben early one morning while Joel was still at the first hospital.

  “I think we’re going to transfer him,” I said. “His doctors think there’s a better chance at recovery if we get him to his MS doctors.”

  “OK.” Ben considered. “Well, I’m pretty sure the crew at the office can handle things this week until Joel gets back.”

  Tears poured out of my eyes. I shook my head. How can I convey what I need to?

  “Ben,” I said. “I don’t think you understand. I don’t know when Joel will be back. I don’t know if he’ll be back. Whatever this is, it’s serious.”

  “OK.” I could hear Ben’s mind spinning through the phone. He took a breath and said, “Let’s think positive. If anyone is determined to bounce back after a setback like this, it’s Joel.”

  Ben, like everyone else, couldn’t grasp the gravity of the situation. It was too surreal. Ben and Joel had known each other from the music industry long before they went into business together. Joel had been the best man at Ben’s wedding.

  With Joel now gone, Ben and I had to discuss the future of their business. With Ben’s time being spent on his other professional endeavors, could the company continue without Joel? Because the music industry had changed so much since they started the company, their once robust enterprise was now earning half of what it used to. Closing shop would mean Joel’s two employees—his close friends—would be out of a job.

  After much consideration, we decided to keep the business going. In large part this was to ensure that I could receive a stipend that would allow me to be as present in Sophie’s life as I wanted to be. It was the move of a true mensch, and provided me with a financial cushion that gave me room to breathe. Joel’s friends were determined to sustain the business, not just for their own benefit but for mine and Sophie’s as well. It was Joel’s legacy.

  Still, I put a tremendous amount of pressure on myself to continue living my life without Joel. He liked that I was a strong and independent woman. But his love and support are where I got so much of my strength from.

  “Hun,” Joel said one night. “I have an idea.”

  He had just arrived home from work and was planning to walk the dogs. Meanwhile, I was staring into the fridge, stressed out. I had no idea what to make for dinner.

  “So do I. Why don’t you do the cooking every night?” I was angry. I hated cooking. I made the same three things until we got sick of it. I’d find something new but Sophie wouldn’t want to eat it, Joel was always trying to eat healthier, and I couldn’t reconcile our different preferences. Cooking took time and effort, and it was always met with some disappointment.

  “I can’t take it!” I said.

  “Here’s my idea. I know you’re going to hate it, but hear me out.”

  I started to make a frozen pizza. “Sorry. It’s the best I can do,” I said as I put it in the oven.

  He put his hands on my shoulders. “Breathe,” Joel said.

  “What’s your idea?”

  “Let’s do something like Taco Tuesdays or Pasta Thursdays? Maybe Salmon Sundays every week. We can plan meals so you don’t get so stressed out about dinner all the time.”

  “Salmon Sundays?” I smirked.

  “I think a schedule will take some of the pressure off of you. Believe me, if we could afford to hire a personal chef, I would. Mostly for you.”

  I was good at being a wife and mother. I loved our little family. I just couldn’t stand the cooking part. I sighed and pulled Joel into a hug.

  “You’re delicious,” I told him. “I should make you for dinner every night.”

  “Trust me,” Joel said. “Taco Tuesday will make life easier. For all of us.”

  If I could barely manage dinner without him, how was I going to do anything?

  And more importantly, how was I supposed to raise Sophie on my own? I worried over my ability to give her the skills to be a well-adjusted, happy, and successful person. How was I going to be the one to guide her in choosing the right friends, the right kind of life partner, the right profession? Where was the guarantee that she would be able to function in the world and be fulfilled, productive, and again, happy?

  I was left with this precious being, who had lost the most important male figure of her entire life, who made her feel loved and special and important. And he was gone.

  Sophie was an only child. I was now an only parent.

  I did not have the luxury of co-parenting with my husband. I was a full-time parent, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. By myself. It all seemed daunting. After thirteen years with Joel by my side, I did not have the confidence that I would be able to raise our daughter alone and be good at it.

  Sophie and I traveled a lot that first year. It was easier to be away from home. One of Sophie’s best friend’s parents were divorced, and I was friendly with the mom. She and her daughter were heading to Hawaii for winter break, and I invited us to join them. Joel had only been gone for two months, but they didn’t seem fazed that they would be spending their vacation with a brand-new widow and half an orphan.

  We were perfect travel companions. The moms spent days by the pool while the girls went paddle boarding and swimming. We shared some dinners and sat on the beach while the girls took a surf lesson. We were busy but relaxed in a tropical paradise, and my friend never seemed to mind that throughout most of it, I was present but not really there. She didn’t seem to mind that sometimes I would stop mid-conversation and put on my sunglasses to hide my tears. She didn’t mind that dinner plans were cancelled last minute because Sophie and I were too sad to leave our room. She didn’t seem to mind that on the white sandy beaches o
f Oahu’s North Shore, Sophie and I were arguing.

  “This is a great place to sit and just think about Daddy and how much he loved the ocean.”

  “You don’t have to tell me when to think about Daddy,” Sophie said.

  But I couldn’t help myself. “I just would like you to spend some time reflecting on the time we all had together.”

  “God, Mom. Stop telling me how to feel!”

  I didn’t mean to.

  My brain had a hard time reconciling that Joel was missing. There were people all around us, everywhere we went, but none of them were my husband. Where is he?

  I would look to Sophie to commiserate, but she didn’t have a need to discuss Joel as much as I did. I kept trying to elicit a response from her, maybe even some emotion. She seemed to hold a lot inside, and this concerned me. My tears were plentiful and unpredictable. I rarely saw her cry.

  I thought if I just kept us busy, busy, busy and distracted—if we just keep moving—maybe we would forget for a few hours just how hard it was to move through life without Joel.

  ELEVEN

  The Other Joel

  When Joel was in a coma, newly admitted to the second hospital, I came home one day to make a quick turnaround before picking Sophie up from school. I went inside, put down the ubiquitous medical paperwork from the day, splashed my face with water, and rushed outside to get back in the car for school pickup. In that short amount of time, a package had been delivered and was waiting for me on the front porch. I wasn’t expecting anything and didn’t even hear the dogs barking that someone had been out front. I picked it up, curious, and saw the Bravo TV logo on it. The package was in a soft wrapping, and as I started to open it, I remembered.

  “I know what I want for my birthday!” I had said to Joel over lunch in our kitchen a few weeks earlier.

  “You do?” he asked. I rarely wanted anything other than a meal at a nice restaurant.

  “A mazel sweatshirt,” I said.

  “OK, from where?” Then it registered. “Wait, what?”

  “From Bravo TV. Bravo-wear, it’s called.”

  Mazel is the Jewish word for luck or congratulations, and the sweatshirt I yearned for had the word mazel emblazoned on it.

  He shook his head, smiling. “Is that like a Real Housewives thing?”

  “Kind of?” I said, but it sounded more like a question.

  Joel laughed. “OK. Send me a link or something, and we’ll see.”

  I hugged him and said, “You.”

  He wasn’t doing great at the time. Just that morning, the nurse had given him his first round of steroid infusions. He thought he would try to get some work done that afternoon . . . which is when I slipped a note under the office door with the details.

  I didn’t know he had ordered it, and Joel would never know I received it. He would never know how happy it made me, even when I wore it to the hospital the next day to show him. I sobbed into the sweatshirt that afternoon.

  That was the last birthday gift I would ever receive from Joel. I decided it was a sign of Joel’s love for me. In his absence, I started looking for signs everywhere.

  I focused all of my attention on Sophie. She motivated me to keep going, because without Joel, I felt like half a person. I was only half paying attention. Half listening. Doing everything half-assed. Sophie had lost her father, and now only had half a mother.

  She was seeing her therapist once a week. Julie’s office was a twenty-minute drive away. So instead of taking Sophie to a soccer game or drama class, like Joel and I had done every Saturday for most of her childhood, our Saturday mornings were now spent going to therapy. Sometimes we’d pick up a smoothie or a coffee drink on the way. I would drop her off and park the car where I would stay for the next fifty minutes. I usually spent the time on the phone with my dad and Elisabeth. Sometimes I would visit Hal and Rita, who lived nearby. But more times than not, I would sit in the car and listen to satellite radio. I’d catch up on Howard Stern or the Oprah station.

  One Saturday morning, while perusing the channels, I heard a voice that made me stop turning the dial. It sounded happy, like he was smiling while talking. I caught the tail end of the program and could tell that this man’s eyes twinkled, much the way Joel’s did. Then an announcer interrupted the program.

  “Stay tuned, and Joel will be right back with another message of inspiration for an empowered and spirit-filled life!”

  Had I been driving, I would have crashed the car. My heart started racing and tears were pouring down my face.

  “Hun?!” I cried out. “Is that you? Oh my God, Joel?! I’m here, honey. I’m staying tuned. Oh my God, come back!”

  I rolled up the windows in the car, and I turned up the volume. I gripped the steering wheel, tap-tap-tapped my foot anxiously awaiting Joel’s return; I was careful to avoid the brake and gas pedals. My body couldn’t contain my excitement. I wanted to hear Joel’s message! It couldn’t have been more clear—Joel was trying to reach me!

  A million thoughts swirled in my mind. He was going to tell me something. Maybe that Sophie would be OK, that she was doing great. Or maybe it was about our dog Daisy, who was sick. Or maybe he wanted to tell me that he missed me, too. I wiped away my tears, waiting, waiting, waiting for Joel’s message.

  Finally, finally! Joel came back on air. “God bless you. It’s a joy to come into your home. Thanks so much for tuning in and coming out today.”

  Hmmmm, I thought. God bless you?

  The message continued. “I like to start with something funny.” Yup, that’s my Joel!

  And then Joel went on to tell a story about an old man who ran into his doctor at a park. The man was with an attractive young woman. He tells his doctor, “I did what you told me and got myself a hot mama.”

  The doctor says, “No, what I told you is that you’ve got a heart murmur!” OK, not my husband’s best joke but . . .

  “Hold up your bible. Say it like you mean it: This is my bible. I am what it says I am. I have what it says I have . . . I boldly confess my heart is receptive . . .”

  Bible? I was so confused. This didn’t really sound like my Joel. “In Jesus’s name, God bless you.”

  Did Joel find Jesus?! I was intrigued. This couldn’t be my Joel, but I continued listening. I looked at my dashboard. The radio display had been blank, but now, possibly because of better reception or possibly because I was now receiving the sign I was so desperate for, the screen was lit up. And there he was, right in front of me. Joel Osteen.

  I had heard of him but never heard him. A few months before, my instinct would have been Ew, evangelical preacher-man. Change the channel. But I kept listening. I found Joel’s message of love soothing. He was saying something about the goodness of God.

  That we are strong, blessed. We are all God’s masterpiece.

  That we are all armed with strength for every battle, and that the forces that are for me are greater than those against me.

  I was in agreement with what he was saying. I found that his voice and disposition made me smile. He seemed like someone I would like.

  This “new” Joel and my Joel both had dark hair. Joel Osteen had a twinkle in his blue eyes, the way my Joel had a twinkle in his green eyes. He also had the same initials as my Joel, and they even had similar sounding last names. But the thing that I took as the biggest message was this: Both Joels had the same phone number. With the exception of the area code, they were exactly the same.

  “Guess what my new number is?” Joel had called to tell me many years earlier. Back when cell phones were newish. “555-JOEL. That makes it so easy to remember!” He was so excited by this. It was fun.

  Some people say they found God just walking down the street and boom! They are touched and converted and become born-again or Christ loving or true believers. They get on board with the Lord, no questions asked.

  That’s not what happened to me. I did not find God that day in my car, but I did find something. A connection. Just like when my Joel told
me something funny about John Cougar Mellencamp in the mail room so long ago, I was now smitten with a new Joel. I didn’t take his bible and Jesus speak as proselytizing (even though it was). I simply liked his energy. His enthusiasm. His message, which was one of trusting in something bigger than ourselves. Believing that we are loved, unconditionally. He preached an attitude of gratitude. These were things I could wrap my mind around. To me, Joel Osteen is a motivational speaker who uses God and Jesus as his point of reference. I didn’t mind one bit.

  When Sophie got in the car after therapy, she immediately changed the station.

  “Oh, I wanted you to hear that!” I said. “It’s a message from Daddy.”

  “It’s no fair!” she whined. “You always get messages, and I don’t.”

  “You get them, too!” I said. “You just don’t recognize them yet.”

  “So what’s the message?” she asked.

  “OK. I was listening to the radio, and it said that Joel had a message for me. It was Joel Osteen. He’s, like, a preacher, but he and Daddy have the same phone number! And he tells funny stories like Daddy—”

  “That’s not Dad, Mom,” she said.

  “Well, I’m going to listen to him all the time now. I feel connected.”

  Sophie rolled her eyes. “He’s a preacher? That’s just weird. You’re being weird.”

  I shrugged.

  What was I going to say? We were nice Jewish girls; she had just been bat mitzvahed less than a year ago. What did we know about Jesus? Or the bible? Maybe I was being weird. But I didn’t care. The Other Joel became my obsession. I listened to him all the time. I’d pick up Sophie from school extra early just so I could sit in the car and listen to Joel’s message before she got in. I’d drive extra slowly wherever I went, just so I could tune in. I signed up for daily email messages, which would thrill me every morning when I opened my mail.

  When I mentioned my new Joel to Ellie, she said, “Oh my God, WWJD. What would Joel do?”

  When I mentioned it to Jillian, she said, “OK, that’s weird. Not that you’re listening to him, well that’s a little weird, but the phone number, too? Actually, never mind, yes, the whole thing is weird.”