She married a 'dog' but did that mean she should not mourn his death?

“My friend’s husband was a very wealthy man who was very generous to his family, friends, plethora of mistresses and hangers on. He travelled often for business and usually with little notice. Well, one day, his travelling caught up with him.

It was almost evening one day when my friend called me. With her husband’s cousin, they’d just identified her husband’s body at the mortuary. According to her, someone called from a hotel in their neighborhood to come identify a man who turned out to be her husband.

He was supposed to be out of town but obviously, he’d never left. He had lodged at the hotel with one of his many random girlfriends and that unfortunate night, or maybe early morning hours, he’d died – just like that. There were no signs of the girl who must have fled once she noticed something was wrong.

When I went to see her that night, it was a strange thing to watch her. I was used to people crying over the loss of loved ones but she was different. Her tears were more of anger than grief and after a few days, when I tried to talk to her about it, she exploded, screaming that she was glad he was dead so she didn’t have to suffer the humiliation anymore. She said she was tired to being one of countless other women who regularly saw her husband’s penis. The hotel where he died was not far from their home so she would forever be haunted by such useless memories of his shameful passing.

It was a terrible thing to be part of. When people came to commiserate with her, we (her sister and I) would beg her to look the part of the grieving widow because it felt strange to look at the emotionless face of a young woman who just lost her husband. Honestly, I felt uncomfortable and I’m sure many of her visitors felt the same but she would not budge. She’d simply sit quietly with a blank face and nod at their words. It was very disturbing.

It was about a year after his death that she really spoke about what she was going through. She talked of how she just could not bring herself to cry for a man who did his best to shame her all through their marriage, who made her a regular at her gynecologist’s, who willingly showed his penis to every walking vagina in the neighborhood. As far as she was concerned, his death had served some good by ridding her of a long held shame, many trips to her priest and doctor and the pitiful greetings from people who knew she was living with a ‘dog’. It also left her with more than enough money to live life without ever working if she wanted.

Yes, I know she married a dog but I wondered – did that make him undeserving of having real tears shed for him in mourning? Somehow, I think she should have done more than go through the rituals of cutting her hair and wearing white.”