Blog No. 333 - Stranded - 5 Oct 2025

 Stranded

- 5 October 2025 -

In the seconds before she died,

I promised Margaret I would be fine.

We had talked about what I should do after she died.

She needed reassurance I would survive and prosper.

I had made the promises we all would have made.

“I will keep going”

“I will not give up on life”

“If you insist, I will find someone else to love”

As we wandered through those terrible Shadow Lands,

I would have promised anything to ease her pain.

She had untreatable cancer.

Her body had dissolved before my eyes.

She had three broken bones in her back and more in her chest.

She could not move without my help.

We were both stranded on a train we could not leave.

Her destination was death.

My destination was to help her get there,

As painlessly and with as much love as I could find.

I found so much love because she gave so much love.

I made my promises.

I meant every word of every promise I made.

There are so many things no one ever tells you about death.

Why should I bore you with the details?

But one truth has hit me so heavily here in Bali.

Promises made to your dead wife do not have a use by date.

My promises did not end when death finally took Margaret from me.

When Margaret died, I was left stranded.

I could not just exist.

The promise to be fine had a meaning.

Either I did things that eventually made me fine,

Or I did not.

I cannot now ask her “Is it okay if I only learn how to sleep after 4.00 am?”

Although if I claimed that, I would be lying.

I cannot say to her “I had a good day yesterday, isn’t that enough?”

Although occasionally that is true.

Either I keep my promises and become genuinely okay,

Or I do not.

Margaret cannot now tell me a half kept promise is good enough.

A half kept promise is a broken promise.

The promise to be okay means I really must be okay most of the time.

Keeping that version of the promise is so very hard.

I have been in Bali for a week.

I have some more days to go.

I have attended my Social Selling Summit.

I have learned things I never knew.

I am trying to keep my promises.

I am not yet fine,

But I promised I would be.

I feel so completely stranded.

You are somewhere else.

I am stuck here in this world.

I cannot leave here until I have kept my promises.

I cannot bring you back here,

But I wish so much that I could.

I hate being stranded.