kokomeau

A life-changing year!

Posted on May 14, 2025August 28, 2025 by kokomeau

^{(This post was written November of 2024)}

If someone had told me in 2022 that 2024 would bring me—not quite full circle, since I’ve never been here before, but here, to a place where happiness and contentment actually live—I wouldn’t have believed them for a second. Not a chance. That kind of thing is for storybooks or rom-coms that only exist on the big screen.

What began in the fall of 2023 as an e-Harmony connection with someone who lived two hours away has blossomed into a life with someone I could have only dreamed of—and often envied in others. Now that 2024 is drawing to a close, it feels like the perfect time to reflect and write it all down, if only to preserve these moments forever.

After being invited to move in with him, I packed up my beach life and embraced a new chapter with my new love in April. In May and June, I spent three wonderful weeks in Ireland on a pre-planned family trip. Then, in July, he and I set out together on an incredible two-month adventure visiting our family and friends from Florida to Michigan, including a big family reunion in Grand Rapids. It was an unforgettable journey of connections for both of us.

In September, we traveled to St. Simons Island, just south of Savannah, Georgia, for a week-long reunion with his siblings. It was a chance for me to get to know his family better and see the place where they had vacationed as kids.

October took us to Oklahoma, where we visited my son’s family and enjoyed the grandkids’ extracurricular activities. For Thanksgiving, we flew to Sacramento and drove to the charming town of Jackson, California, to celebrate with his daughter and her family. While there, we took advantage of our location with a visit to Lake Tahoe, the local wineries and the indescribable tall trees!

And now it’s December. With all the travel, we decided to stay closer to home for the holidays. We’ll be spending Christmas in the oldest city in the country, St. Augustine, Florida, probably THE best place to immerse yourself in the holiday spirit.

Not a bad year at all—and certainly not one I could have predicted for myself. But after reading The Secret, I suppose it shouldn’t have been such a surprise. If you take nothing else from this blog entry, take this: read that book. It truly can be life-changing.

It HAS been life-changing!

Family, Moving forward, Us

Chapters

Posted on November 9, 2024November 9, 2024 by kokomeau

I like to think of my life in chapters. The first chapter would obviously be my childhood where I grew up in a large Irish-Catholic family with all the challenges and joys inherent therein. While the teen years are still part of childhood, for me, looking back, it was a new chapter filled with insecurities, bad choices, a bit of fun, and some life-changing events. My third chapter, filled with college independence, learning to fly, and being on my own, while scary and challenging, would have to be high on my list of happy times.

Chapter four brought a new life with a young husband, lots of moves around the country, having children and raising them mostly alone. It entailed learning a new career, a new hobby, and finally struggling to find a way to survive a dysfunctional relationship while bringing up healthy adults. 30 years is a long time in the institution when it’s a good marriage. When it’s not, it’s a jail sentence. In chapter five, after a contentious divorce, I moved from Michigan to Florida. With my grown kids starting their own lives, I left behind a shuttered business, a foreclosed home, and a broken family in an attempt to pick up the pieces of what was left of my life and start fresh in the sunshine state.

Moving on isn’t easy. Change can be scary. A second failed relationship had me questioning my choices. I eventually found work in the healthcare field of home health, then found my niche in hospice. In chapter six I finally purchased my own place. Being totally independent gave me the faith in myself that I needed to really start fresh. I put my past behind me and learned to depend on ME, slowly regaining a confidence I thought was lost forever. With a move so far from home and being alone, I consoled myself with the somewhat hopeful thought that people like to visit warm places in the winter, and maybe, with time, that would happen. It eventually did, and I found I could relax and enjoy sharing this little slice of heaven with others without feeling like I had to explain any longer why I was there.

In chapter seven. I believed I’d met my last love. I (mostly) retired, moved into a 55+ community, and brought my wonderful 93-year-old mom into our home to live out her days with us. I had kids and grandkids just a few miles away. The future seemed so promising. But after the wretched COVID year of 2020, life with him changed forcing me into yet another failed relationship. My mom had to go back to Michigan where she died a month later. My kids moved back north. I went into a tailspin.

Chapter eight was one of healing, moving, trying to find my place after a very long and broken road. I ultimately landed in a lovely condo in the trees of Palm Coast, just a mile from the peace of the ocean. I was completely independent, slowly learning how to trust myself by giving it all to God, the Universe, whatever you want to call it. I started manifesting my future as I’d wished it would be. And as I grew closer to some of my siblings, I learned to be happy and content with my life.

The next chapter is still hard for me to grasp. Chapter 9 has come with the fulfillment of all my dreams! In my gratitude to God, I was brought the most wonderful man who has shown me what real, grown-up, unselfish love is. I’ve moved to his home in The Villages. Daily I am grateful and thankful, and we both shake our heads at how lucky we are to have found each other.

I anticipate wonderful chapters ahead! I’m actually one of those people who will often read the end of a book first so I’m prepared for what’s coming. I can’t do that in this situation. I will simply have to expect the unexpected, make plans but not plan on them, and meet each new day with Irish optimism and the belief that in following God’s plan for me, I cannot go wrong. Would I go back and rewrite some chapters if I could? I don’t think so. They are what brought me to this place, and I, for one, wouldn’t change a thing.

Moving forward, Us

The Clubbing

Posted on October 9, 2024February 11, 2025 by kokomeau

In the summer of 2023, after enduring the most tumultuous period of my life, I surrendered my future to God. I expressed to Him that while I would try to listen and pay attention, there was a chance I might miss a subtle sign—a feather or a bird sent my way. I suggested that perhaps a more direct approach, like a club over the head, would be necessary for me to truly understand His message. I committed to following His path for me instead of my own.

Bobby and I had been visiting each other back and forth for a few months. While sitting with him in church one evening waiting for Mass to begin, I was again repeating my prayer request, asking for some sign that would tell me if this was the right man for me, the right place for me. Bobby leaned over and whispered to me that the priest performing Mass was from Michigan; his name was ‘John.’ I nodded and smiled.

Mass began. As we were singing the entrance hymn, the processional came up the aisle. I glanced over and, with a double-take, I realized, “I KNOW this priest!”

My heart started beating so fast I thought I might faint. I grabbed Bobby’s hand and whispered, “I know this man! He was my pastor back home in Michigan! He baptized my son and buried my dad!” I KNOW him!” I felt like I was in shock. I couldn’t take my eyes off him, and when he started to speak, my head shook in disbelief. I almost wept. I’d been truly clubbed.

Moving forward

Love, Laughter, and Late Nights: Online Dating After 60.

Posted on August 8, 2024November 10, 2024 by kokomeau

2022 was a difficult year for me. My mom died, I went through my second divorce, and my kids and grands moved back to Michigan from Florida. The following summer, I took the opportunity to go home to northern Michigan and to heal from that year.

After getting settled in for the summer, I gave myself over to God and started manifesting my future. I asked God to lead me down His path and to show me His way. Every day I thanked him for bringing me my ideal partner whom I could love and who would love me for who I am. I also reminded Him that I would not notice feathers or cardinals. No, he would have to club me over the head with my messages.

In the process of healing, I thought I’d give online dating another shot. I’d met a nice guy before I went north, but I realized early on that I was simply repeating old behaviors. I ended it. By the time I’d settled into my VRBO for my summer stay, I had only about five days left of my eHarmony membership.

eHarmony is a bit unlike the others. Match, Zoosk, Bumble, and most others have you write a profile, add photos, let you say what it is you’re looking for, etc. eHarmony actually has you complete an 80-question compatibility test designed to give deep insight into your character. It then scores your compatibility with another member. They say anything over 100 is worth pursuing.

Swiping left ad nauseum was the reason I was getting off online dating. eHarmony is not cheap, and I found they didn’t seem to have much to offer me. Until one evening when I heard the notification and checked my phone. It showed a compatibility score of 107 with Bobby, a gentleman in The Villages, a ‘mere’ 95 miles from my home. He had ‘liked’ just about all my information in my profile, which of course caused me to peruse his profile despite the distance. It would be just my luck to find a nice guy and have him live a two-hour drive away.

He was Irish Catholic. He was from a large family. He loved people and kids. He’d been divorced five years after a very long marriage. He was 5’8″ (my bare minimum height requirement). He had three daughters and four sisters. And in every photo of him, he was smiling! No photos of fish or dead animals, Harleys or Corvettes. Just a smiling man who had to know quite a lot about females who ‘liked’ everything on my profile. I ‘liked’ him back.

After several texts back and forth, he called. I explained I was in Michigan. He used to live there. I asked how he found me since my distance requirement was 30 miles. His was 100. We compared notes; lives, likes, and dislikes. Many times I thought he was kidding me just trying to match me. For instance, how many men love musicals? We talked nearly four hours that first time, then again the second, and the third…

When I finally returned to Florida, he drove over to meet for coffee in Flagler Beach. My first impression was, “He’s not 5’8”. But he was attractive. White-blonde hair with an athletic build, he had a great smile, and he was a terrific conversationalist. We spent several hours getting to know each other, and then he drove back home.

A couple more back-and-forth visits took place until ultimately, while visiting me in Palm Coast, he told me he didn’t see this working; the distance was just too great. I totally agreed with him. As much as we were drawn to each other and our amazing similarities, the two hours between us seemed pretty insurmountable. We reluctantly said our goodbyes.

Several weeks later, after a visit to Michigan for a wedding and my return home, I received a text from him saying, “Can you chat?”

“Sure.”

He told me he couldn’t stop thinking about me and that he believed he’d made a hasty mistake. He wanted to try and make it work. I was rather hesitant because of the two-hour drive, but he was adamant saying we have so much in common, we’re so comfortable together, we owed it to ourselves to see if we could make it work. And so I agreed.

He was right. We are two peas in a pod. We complete each other in every way, and we are so comfortable together. In April of 2024 he asked me to move in, and I did. I left my precious northeast coast and my darling little condo in the trees and moved to The Villages to be with him, and I haven’t regretted it one bit. He is everything I never believed I would find. I am blessed daily with someone I can talk to who listens with compassion, speaks with integrity and honesty, and makes me laugh daily. God answered my prayer and then proceeded to club me over the head to make sure I knew it.

Randomness, Thoughts

“STAAAAAAHHHHHHP!” Ugh

Posted on July 9, 2024November 9, 2024 by kokomeau

I wrote this post in September of 2020. This was mid the COVID shutdowns, pre-election, and sometime after the George Floyd protests. I can’t remember why I didn’t post it, but I’m posting it now despite the months gone by because, frankly, not much has changed.

If we really want to bring about change, if we really want to bring peace back to society, as hokie as it sounds, it needs to start at home. And as nearly impossible as it would be to change things at this point, we need to think about the messages being sent and received via the movies, video games, and social media available to our kids and the rest of us. Have you heard about Evil Dead, RoboCop, Natural Born Killers, Kill Bill? Of course you have. And our kids have seen them. Have you ever played any of the violent and graphic video games? They have. I will concede that these types of media do not cause violence in young people. But I absolutely believe that it desensitizes them to violence by way of a reset button. If you think the ratings listed on the jackets of these games and movies prevent teens and pre-teens from being able to watch or play, think again. We didn’t have the vast quantity of these problems before these movies and games. And I’m not referring to racial tensions. I’m referring to the overt violence that’s out there and the overall disrespect, entitlement, and antipathy among so many of our young people across all races.

This isn’t going to be fixed overnight. We’ve a helluva long way to go before the pendulum even begins to swing back. I believe it’ll get worse before it gets better. They’re now calling for the dismantling of police departments. (Who will they call when help is needed?) There will be no more Aunt Jemima (sorry, Nancy Green) or Eskimo Pies. Hey, here’s an idea! How about we keep Eskimo Pies and get rid of excessive violence in movies and video games? Uh, no. Sorry. Too much dinero to be made there. Think of the Seven Deadly Sins, and we’re not far off.

The message is there if we can get back to it through the clutter of Antifa, COVID, hateful rhetoric from both the left and the right. Racial inequity needs to end, so how about we stop referring to people by their color or ethnicity. Refuse to select your ethnicity on all forms. Don’t allow our leaders to politicize ethnicity to get votes; they’ll only bail on you once elected. Look at history, and see who actually did something about change rather than who just talked about what they’d do ‘if elected!’

I’m so tired of it all. I’m not interested in debating one single thing. I don’t know it all, nor do you. I just know it has to stop.

Drew, Family, Randomness

2014 – A letter from son Andrew to his Grandma

Posted on May 17, 2024 by kokomeau

Drew would have been 34 at the time he wrote this:

Family & Friends, Lucky Eleven, Moving forward, Travel

Learning to listen

Posted on October 1, 2023 by kokomeau

I was fortunate enough to spend nearly two months of 2023 back home in Michigan escaping the brutal heat of the Florida summer. Through Air B&B I’d rented the downstairs of a beautiful home that just happened to be on Lake Two, directly across the street from Lake Three where I had lived prior to moving away. It seemed serendipitous, to say the least.

My little home away from home had a lovely large bedroom with a desk where I could continue to work remotely. There was a spacious living area, ample bathroom, and no real kitchen, save a microwave, toaster, coffee maker, and small fridge, certainly the only items I needed, as anyone who knows me knows my relationship with kitchens.

Looking out the French doors leading to the paver patio covered by the deck above, I often felt like I was in my own little gnome home. The view from those doors was beyond spectacular. Through the wild landscaping could be seen a bird bath and a curved path that led to Lake Two.

Many mornings I would wake just as dawn was breaking and look through the doors to see mist rising from the water obscuring the reflection of the trees across the lake. I would hear the loons already fishing, their calls blending with the sandhill cranes. Wild Kingdom had nothing on this place! If it was warm enough or I was bundled enough I would take my coffee and sit on the glider outside my door and soak up the sunrise, the view, and the peace.

It’s funny, in hindsight, how we are given what we need to heal. I’d had a tumultuous year filled with heartache, heartbreak, endings, and new beginnings. Maybe I wasn’t fully aware that I hadn’t given myself time to grieve, to heal, always simply pushing forward, filling my days with work, trying to stay positive, praying, praying . . .

But this place.

By myself in this place I was allowed the space and the serenity to recover not only who I was, but where I was going and what I wanted. Being surrounded by my family and friends in a place I called home, feeling their love, listening to their own stories, filling myself with my kids and my grandkids . . . that’s what I needed.

And God knew. Of course He did.

I just needed to listen.

Childhood, Family

Revisiting memory lane

Posted on September 13, 2023September 13, 2023 by kokomeau

When my sister Kathleen and I were young, we had a cousin near our age who lived close by. She was the daughter of our favorite aunt, my mother’s only sister, and we were as tight as sisters ourselves. She was a year younger than me, was mildly dramatic, and had a mad crush on our oldest cousin John. Oh, she was a dynamo!

While we were very tight growing up, once we entered the real world as adults married with children, as often happens, we drifted apart. Aside from the occasional get-together, we all lived our lives rather independently of one another. Eventually, after some tumultuous times, my cousin moved out east and made a wonderful life for herself with a wonderful man.

But here I must digress for a moment . . .

When my mom was about eight years old, her dad built a little white cottage on a bluff overlooking Lake Huron. It’s the white one in the gallery below. There’s not an inch of it that would pass code nowadays, but to a person, it was our happy place in the summer. We spent countless weekends at ‘The Lake,’ our large family sleeping in the makeshift bunkhouse that Grampa built upstairs in the garage at the rear of the property. DCF would have had a field day with it, but that’s a whole different story.

One ‘tradition,’ if you can call it that, from days of old driving up to The Lake was to be the first one to yell, ‘I see Grampa’s si-gn!’ in a sing-song voice where all the kids would join in until we turned onto the long dirt road leading down to the cottage. Then the entire family would begin singing in loud voices, windows down, to the tune of Auld Lang Syne, “We’re here because we’re here because we’re here because we’re heeeeeere! We’re here because we’re here because we’re here because we’re heeeeeere! ” It didn’t end there. It was repeated over and over until we came to a stop at the back yard of the cottage, all of us piling out with our brown paper bags of clothes, the bigger ones helping the littler ones while Gramma and Grampa and any other adults already there would begin the long walk from the cottage to the drive. Our cousins would race ahead of them to get to us, all of us excited to be there even though we might have seen each other just the weekend before!

The memories are sweet and never-ending.

Fast forward to 2022. After Mom’s burial last June, I was invited to spend some time with Julie at The Lake. She and her husband had purchased the place next door to the cottage and remodeled and refurbished it to be a haven for any and all visitors. And there were always visitors. During my long weekend there, we talked of our shared childhood and about how much fun we all used to have, recalling the later years when, with Molly, the four of us would take the train out of Sarnia to Toronto and see a show or two, ride the subway to the comedy clubs, and simply laugh ourselves silly over stories we’d never share otherwise. That’s when Julie came up with the idea of starting an annual Girls’ Weekend at her place in late August. Needless to say, we all jumped at the chance!

I was lucky enough to drive with Kathleen, and all the way there we reminisced about the days at The Lake. We shared similar stories from different perspectives, wondered repeatedly at the sleeping arrangements we’d all endured, and exclaimed whenever we saw something familiar along the route. Finally arriving at our turn onto the still-dirt road, we glanced at each other. Then we both started singing at the top of our lungs, tears running down our cheeks, as we retraced the memory lane of our youth to create new memories while reliving the old.