We are…but I’m not defined by my relationship with my life partner Peter now deceased 14 years…I have a life independent of being a wife and mother, I am a person who can be happy and fulfilled by spending time with good friends old and new.

@Marionville Yes but as i posted this recently saying how much it had affected me, well it still does somewhat.But then I'm not yet 4-1/2 years,

@rogerbenham Without wanting to seem insensitive …I think 4 plus years is long enough to grieve…because we owe it to ourselves to live life to the fullest and also because I feel sure our late loved ones would hate to know that we are still moping about them and not getting on with our lives to the fullest possible. We owe it to their memory to be happy that they enriched our lives and will always be grateful for that, but we are the ones who are still alive and must continue life’s journey without them, and as optimistically and contentedly as we can.

@Marionville Well I've been hoping to find a partner for about 3 years. The older I get the less likely I will find one. A tear being drawn to my eye can be a sloppy story on Facebook. That song you posted at a critical period but I'm not dwelling on it. I have thrown out / given away masses of her stuff but I do live at profit in her home. It interests me that our sex life was ending with just mutual caring the last year or so and since her death I recognise that my libido has crashed and my ability has ceased. I am effectively neuter.
I would like someone in the evening and going for walks and sitting quietly beside which all would stop me watching so much stuff on youtube! TV I continue to avoid but youtube is pretty addictive.

We are all different in that respect…big music concerts are not for everyone if they feel uncomfortable in crowds. I love the buzz of enjoying the music of a band or artiste in the company of so many others who love and appreciate them too.

@Marionville I still vividly remember the Fall festival in the old city of Heidelberg. There were huge crowds and having a lot of narrow streets it got especially difficult. One time I got caught in such a crowd and one could literally die if the crowd were to panic. I swore, never again. One needed to go out early and leave when the mobs got too big and unruly.
Just for fun I looked this up. Here's a picture along the Haupt (main) Str.

Me too, Jack, I like my distance.

@jackjr I know Heidelberg I’ve been there on 4th July when it was teeming with American Servicemen and their families. There was a fireworks display above the castle overlooking the Neckar river….

@Marionville LOL I know alll about that as my home was located directly under that castle. Some 5 times a summer the house shook. Later, all the drunken GI's would walk down the street breaking beer bottles. I had a friend who had a place across the river on the Philosopher's way. We got a great view from there. Mark Twain walked along this path. The fireworks started with a pretend burning of the castle. This event is to commemorate the destruction of the city, turned Lutheran by the French catholics in 1690. Most of the city was destroyed including the one I lived in. I couldn't understand why no ever lived in my space. It started as a stables, and then a smokehouse and finally a storage spot for junk. I was able to remodel it into a nice apartment. Years later a historian came to visit and told me the reason no had lived there. When a city goes under siege people go into the basements (there was no basement when I started. More than likely a family was buried under the rubble under my living room floor. I'' attach a picture of what it was like when I found it.All this brings back some 16 years of memories.