Bubby Annie’s candelabra, empty of candles, shone on my dining room table.

It was dark when I went to sleep and when I awoke. The winter trees outside my deck still displayed leaves this morning. Green, orange and purple all dripped with rain, as if they cried last night along with me.

My husband Adam’s first yahrtzeit (anniversary of passing) is in seven days. My brother Moishe’s yahrtzeit starts tonight.

I remember 13 years ago. An icy rain like death called to me from the west. I looked out the window in the darkness and shivered.

The next day, a call from Utah: “There was an emergency. Your brother passed away.”

“What do you mean passed away?”

“He didn’t pick up his mail, his pills. A policeman would like to speak with you.”

“Are you Mr. G’s sister? We need to exchange phone numbers.”

I called Adam. He said, “I’ll call the rabbi. He’ll know a Chabad rabbi in Utah.”

My husband took charge and helped the family through the red tape to bring Moishe home for his funeral.

The last time I talked with Moishe, he was having indigestion.

The last words he said to me were, “I am alone, but I am on new pills. I can sleep now. It is quiet.”

Adam arranged for the chevra kaddisha (burial society) to sing psalms.

In the office of the funeral director, Mom chose a casket.

“Drape the American flag over the casket so I won’t see it. We’ll use Hinda’s rabbi. They are planning everything. I cannot have the shivah in my house,” Mom said.

“It can be at my house,” I said.

“We will have a graveside service,” Mom said.

“I want to meet Moishe at the funeral home,” I said.

“Too much, following the casket,” Mom said.

“I’m going. You don’t have to come,” I said. “So he won’t be alone.”

Our rabbi came by the house to talk: “Think of the good he did. Everybody did good.”

Adam said, “He was a U.S. Marine. He lived in Yamit, Israel, before it was torn down. For peace.”

Snow fell on the canopy above the mourners at West Roxbury Cemetery. Moishe’s casket was lowered into his final resting place between our father and Bubby Annie. It was quiet. A good place to be. He was not alone.

My husband is now at peace not far from my parents, grandparents and brother.

In his last visit to the emergency room, I said, “He is dying. He is dying.”

I rubbed his face and said, “You are not alone. You are not alone.”

Even the nurse cried.

With help from the hospital staff, Adam passed away peacefully, with his family around him.

“Adam was a true chassid,” the rabbi said when he came to our house.

I explained that we were going to plan Adam’s funeral to comply with all of the Orthodox traditions, just as he had planned for my father, my mother and my brother.

There was snow on the icy ground the day Adam was buried.

“Adam is going up, where he will send down prayers for his family,” the rabbi said.

Now that the year of mourning for my husband is almost over, I can understand how the Jewish souls are bound up together.

My prayer is, how can I manage without my husband Adam?

Since he passed away, I have not lit the Shabbat candles.

Shabbat comes in early, comes in late. I am alone.

The first time I lit Shabbat candles was after we were married. Two small silver candlesticks given to us by his mother stood on the only table we owned in the small apartment.

I covered my hair with my white Shabbat scarf, circled my hands around the candles, then covered my eyes and prayed. Adam stood up to say the blessing over the wine. We ate roast chicken with potatoes and my special recipe of Bubby Annie’s apple cake.

Now I have a huge table in the dining room.

When Bubby Annie passed away, my Aunt Lee, the eldest, inherited the candelabra. Yesterday her son gave it to me, saying, “I know you will use it.”

Moishe’s yahrtzeit candle stood beside the candelabra.

I pictured Bubby Annie wearing her white scarf, folding her hands around the candles, then covering her eyes and praying.

Many times, she had a yahrtzeit candle lit beside her candelabra.

I went into my room and took the white Shabbat scarf out of my top drawer. I put five candles into their holders, then lit the yarhtzeit candle for my brother. I circled my hands around the five Shabbat candles, then covered my eyes and prayed.

I could feel blessings come down to me.

I was not alone.