just surviving

"Write SS after your name," says the DMV clerk.


"Social Security number?" I ask.


"Just SS."


She isn't one of the friendliest clerks at the local Department of Motor Vehicles.  I have reached the end of my list, made in the early days of November when I was a newly minted widow.  This I have been postponing, not because the task is difficult -- although it did take two trips to the DMV, plus the insurance office, plus several errors on inscrutable forms -- but because this is one more piece of Rich that will vanish.


I wait while she scrutinizes my work, crossing out one line, filling in another.


Today I am both the buyer and seller of the car, moving its registration from Rich to me.


"Sign here," she says, pointing the the buyer's line.


I begin, then start to add "SS," as I did for the line above.


"No," she says.


I get it.  "SS" = Surviving Spouse.  As seller, that is who I was.  As buyer, I am on my own.


Fresh registration in hand, I peel off the old, affix the new.  


No act, I'm learning, comes emotion-free.  Everything costs.   


Candace