The First Day of Something.

I don't know what, but it's sure the first day of something.

Today, is Sunday, May 24th.

Yep, that means I’ve—we’ve— made it through Saturday the 23rd. I’ve been desperately dreading that date for more than a month—not just the date, but everything it symbolizes.

Now that we’re all past yesterday, I’m left trying to figure out what today means. I don’t have Kellie’s celebration of life in the distance (always hanging over me like the darkest of clouds).

The lightness of spirit I’m feeling today is a new sensation for me. I cried a whole bunch of times this morning. No, not because I wake up before 7am every day now, but because I cry in random intervals throughout every day. The burden of my grief (which I carry willingly, even eagerly) hasn’t gone anywhere. I might even be sadder today than I was the rest of the week. But the dread about everything that 5/23 represented in my mind is gone. The calling hours are done, the celebration of life is in the past, and that means something else, something I can embrace rather than fear, can take its place.

I want to thank everyone who took any kind of role yesterday, but beyond that, everyone who took any kind of role over the past month since Kellie’s death. Yesterday was a big deal, but it was a snapshot of a moment in time. Not everyone who was a huge part of Kellie’s life could be there yesterday, and I’m okay with that. If that had been the case, it might on some level have been easier to wall off all my grief and place it in a nice box that it doesn’t deserve. Everything could have been defined as “that day” and then moved on from and forgotten about.

I love you for reading these words, for texting me, for sitting with me while I cry, for bringing me coffee, for just being present for me in a hundred or a thousand different ways. Those things are more important than coming to the celebration of life, because they represent actually being the change, actually making a tangible impact in the midst of the hardest part of my life. Anybody can show up to calling hours for ten minutes, shake a hand, and sign a guest book and then never think about Kellie or I for the rest of their life. But those other things truly matter.

So thank you for anything you have done for me, for my family, for Kellie’s family, and for others in the world that Kellie would have wanted to help herself. You are appreciated, and my gratitude for these acts cannot be sufficiently defined.

But grief—my grief—is beyond messy. It knows no bounds and knows no sense of propriety. I’ve been powerless to put on a false front and to control much of anything over the last month. I can’t control my public image, I can’t control my household, I can’t control my emotions or display of them. I can’t control so many of the decisions I’ve had to make since Kellie died. And that complete powerlessness is a very new place for me to inhabit. I hate it beyond measure. It’s not teaching me some profound lesson that will help me. If I rage against anything, I rage against the fact that this is the worst thing that I have ever experienced—could ever experience, and I cannot control even the smallest facet of this. It is all happening to me, not because of any choices any of us have made. There’s nothing comfortable about it.

My time in the funeral home yesterday was chaotic, full of moments of peace and quiet as well as moments of the most intense grief I can imagine. I told many of you this at the time, but I could not safely look in any direction in those rooms. Anywhere my eyes rested, they ended up seeing a photograph or other artifact of who Kellie was and what she represents, and sometimes those glimpses made me smile. Sometimes they made me break down to a scary degree. Unpredictable, as usual. So staring at the floor was safer, but I kept forgetting to just stare at the floor.

For those who have asked, here’s my tattoo that was made using Kellie’s ashes (mixed into the black ink). As you heard several people say yesterday, Kellie was my Buttercup, so I have a part of her forever immortalized in my skin as exactly that.

I arrived an hour before the calling hours began, and was so overcome by emotion that I needed to go back outside after just a few minutes.

When other people started to show up, it was easier for me to manage because I had the distraction of shaking their hands and making small talk.

The calling hours were challenging, but I made it through them. I’m grateful for the huge number of people who came to pay their respects to Kellie and show kindness and love in that way.

The celebration of life itself was beautiful and perfect in every way. It was exactly what I envisioned, and even though I’ll never be faced with a more impossible series of decisions to make, I am more than content with how it turned out. I’m really happy to have gotten the chance to hear some of the ways that Kellie has changed us all for the better. A few special thank yous:

• Margot was the perfect officiant. The decisions I made would not have been made in time or as wisely without her guidance and compassion. She listened to me, she loved me, and she let me swear plenty of times.

• To Carmen, JoAnna, Corey, Mike, Dan, Lindsay, and Kim: The most-perfect reading selections in the world (if I do say so myself) would have been fallen flat without the incredible bravery and poise you all displayed in going up there and sharing them with us. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

• For our special people to come from Ann Arbor, from Cincinnati, from Atlanta, Knoxville, NYC and everywhere in-between, was deeply meaningful to me. I appreciate everyone putting your lives on hold in order to show Kellie and I your love in that way.

I’ve written before that I usually hate to call out people by name due to my fear that I’ll leave someone out, but that’s okay in this instance. You are all too special to go un-mentioned.

The live stream recording of the celebration of life is on YouTube for anyone who wants to see it, and will remain there. Feel free to watch me absolutely lose it many times at this link (if that’s something that interests you):

I did want to mention something else that was interesting to me. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Quaker religious practices, something that we do in unprogrammed meetings for worship is to speak out of the silence if something has been placed on our hearts to share. We built that silence and time into the celebration of life as well, and I was really fascinated by how uncomfortable some of the attendees were with the silence.

I think it’s worth noting that our lives in 2026 are crammed full of noise and constant demands for our attention and focus, and that having the opportunity to relish and appreciate true moments of silence is a joy for me. People who aren’t used to having something always going on can tend to be uncomfortable with that, and that’s okay—being uncomfortable is a part of life.

If you thought a few minutes of silent reflection were too hard for you, I would encourage you to think about why that might be, and to try and discern whether you might want to build some silence into your everyday life at some point. Because there’s real value to it, and Kellie and I can attest to its worth in our lives. I just wanted to put that out there.

So now comes time for something else, and I honestly have no idea what that ‘something else’ looks like. Someone asked me yesterday whether I plan to keep living in Ashtabula, and I had to consciously avoid the urge to laugh at the question. Anyone who knows me well knows that I am here because I love this place. I came here for Kellie, and stayed here because this is where I’m meant to be. Yes, I’m staying. I’m from Ashtabula now.

I’ve been thinking about doing a little bit of solo travel. That’s a theme that comes up over and over for those of us who have lost someone—I keep hearing that it’s really valuable and really healing to get away from the everyday space you shared with your person and experience joy in new contexts on your own, even for a day or two.

In that vein, I plan to take a few short trips over the next few months. In June, I’m heading to the LEYM Annual Meeting, a gathering of around 20 local Quaker meetings that happens each year in Ashland, Ohio. Kellie and I have participated in that virtually several times, and I’m really looking forward to doing it in-person this year.

In July, I’ll be going to Pendle Hill, a Quaker study and retreat center outside Philadelphia, for a three-day Quaker writing retreat. I don’t know where this writing thing is leading me, but I’ve written many, many books and poems and short stories over the years that nobody but Kellie has ever read. I’m feeling pushed at this point in my life to maybe share my words with a few more people. We’ll see what happens.

I also started working on my passport application today, because I want to travel back up to some of our favorite places in Ontario at some point. That application caused me a great deal of sorrow and many, many tears because of two things:

1. It was one of the first times I have ever had to note on an official form that I was previously married, and am now a widower.

2. I had to give the State Department the name, address and phone number of my emergency contact, which is when I realized that I am now completely alone (at least in some aspects of my life). Everyone else, for the most part, has an emergency contact. Mine has been Kellie for 30 years. And it took me almost an hour to consider who to put on this form, because I have nobody who would need to be notified if I had an emergency. I finally gave up and put in my dad’s info.

   

I didn’t know how I was going to do this a month ago. I didn’t know how I was going to do this a week ago. And now that I’ve made it through yesterday, I don’t have any idea how I’m going to live my life or what that’s going to look like for me.

Thanks for being a part of this journey.

XOXO,

Matt