Expecting to fly

Friday I took off my wedding ring for the last time.

I'd only taken it off once before, about 23 years ago, to fix the sink. Felt strange to have it off, even for one hour.
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I was alone in the house. The late afternoon sun was warm and soft through the living room window. I put on "Expecting to fly" by Neil Young, a song Peg and I listened to over and over when we were first together in 1986.

There you stood
on the edge of your feather,
Expecting to fly.
While I laughed,
I wondered whether
I could wave goodbye,
Knowin' that you'd gone.
By the summer it was healing,
We had said goodbye.
All the years
we'd spent with feeling
Ended with a cry,
Babe, ended with a cry,
Babe, ended with a cry.

I sat on the couch for a long time, on the spot where I took off her ring just after she left this world.  I held the rings tightly and spoke to her before placing them on the little dragonfly shrine  on the mantle above the fireplace.

When I walked out into the sun and air, feeling the Delta breeze come up from the back yard, I looked at my hand again. I thought it would feel strange not to wear my ring-- like it did when I removed it the last time-- but this time it felt right.