WELCOME TO WIDOWED WORLD

12 APRIL 2010

Greetings,

There has been a considerable gap since my last Editorial during which time I’ve been actively involved in amateur film making and thinking long and hard about the future of Widowed World.

It’s now almost six years since my husband died and during that time I’ve written a book to help widowed people, set up dedicated clubs that, whilst now self managing, continue to thrive and also created and managed the Widowed World Website. Now, it seems, life really has moved on! I never cease to miss my husband but am no longer grieving and have now shared everything that I experienced for the benefit of club members and website visitors.

The information contained in the website will continue to be available to help more recently widowed people and I hope it will also serve as a source of reference for anyone seeking either personally or professionally to support widowed people. In the future I’ll continue to add to the website anything I discover that is new and particularly pertinent to widowhood but will only write Editorials and Blogs occasionally when there seems a good reason for doing so. I have to say the lack of participation in the Blogs and Forums has been very disappointing to date and it’s quite dispiriting to sit at the computer preparing articles etc. without feedback or interaction with the many people who we know visit the website.

What would have been our 50th wedding Anniversary on Boxing Day 2009 was marked in several ways but most poignantly by the making of a film drama based on my husband’s love of flying. I wrote the screenplay (my first attempt ever), produced the film and also played the lead role of ‘widow’, getting to fly a Microlight aircraft in the process. The experience was both deeply moving and joyful and my film crew hugely supportive, pulling out all the stops to make it a high quality product. The film will now go forward into local and national competitions and if successful, may even go international, but whatever the outcome, I have a unique record that I and my family will treasure. Joining the local video making club turned my life around, bring me new friends, a compelling and time consuming interest and social activity, for which I’m very grateful.

So to sign off what is likely to be my last editorial for some time, I do so on a very happy and positive note. I’m delighted to report three weddings in 2010. Our stalwart club member Anthony from SSBCs Angmering married his new Chinese sweetheart Quing in China just hours before the Chinese New Year this year. They plan to return to the UK this summer. Our second wedding was between Ritson & Jean who met at our very first Sunday Scene Breakfast Club (SSBCs) meeting at Runcton in November 2005 and still to come, the nuptials of Mike & Laura later this summer – they met at SSBCs Angmering. Romance was the very last thing on my mind when I set up the clubs but numerous weddings and new relationships have blossomed as a result and I’m truly delighted.

Wishing you future joyfulness,

Jacquie