My daughter and I were talking the other day about how we think we’re doing “fine” with the grief thing. And then wham! A crying spell washes over us.

Right now, it comes every three or four days.

“Afterwards,” I told her, “life feels so good that I’m apt to think, ‘Whew! Things are starting to look good.’”

“You can’t trust it,” she said. “It’s like a haircut. Just when you think it’s looking good, you need another one.”

I think she has a point.

There are many excellent books about grieving and grief.  Among them:

George A. Bonanno, The Other Side of Sadness: What the new Science of Bereavement Tells Us About Life After Loss (Basic Books 2009)

Allen Klein, The Courage to Laugh: Humor, Hope, and Healing in the Face of Death and Dying (Tarcher/Putnam 1998)

Judy Tatelbaum, The Courage to Grieve: The Classic Guide to Creative Living, Recovery, and Growth Through Grief (Harper 1994, 2008)

Brook Noel & Pamela D. Blair, PhD, I Wasn’t Ready to Say Goodbye: Surviving, Coping & Healing After the Sudden Death of a Loved One (Champion Press, Ltd. 2000; updated Sourcebooks, Inc. 2008)

Genevieve Davis Ginsburg, Widow to Widow: Thoughtful, Practical Ideas for Rebuilding Your Life (De Capo Press 1995)

Whatever happened to the advertised Sunday afternoon blog? The dog ate it, in the form of a sad and sudden intrusion. My husband Bob died unexpectedly May 9 – so unexpectedly that I feel compelled to retell the story to all who will listen. My way of making the surreal seem more real.

Sudden deaths, I now know, blare in on ordinariness. They occur when we’re not looking, while we’re taking out to the trash or throwing the last load in the dryer. Bob’s was no different. He announced he was going out to run an errand. I offered to go instead. Off I went, while he apparently took up residency on the couch to watch golf on TV. There I found him, lifeless when I returned. The victim, his doctor concluded, of a heart arrhythmia.

Life feels out of balance here, in need of the healing that comes over time through grief. If ever there was a time NOT to overbook, it’s now. So in the spirit of the Dog Journal, I’ll be sharing what works for me – and doesn’t – in getting through this time. If my missteps along the way bring a smile, I’ll be sure share that too, because laughter, the first-cousin of tears, is bound to muscle in a time or two.