January 2020

It's the last day of the first month of the new decade so I thought I would reflect on how it has gone. Looking back I know there have been days of despair, but the days when I just want to be with Tall are getting fewer and fewer. At the start of the month I blogged about my intentions for the new decade, my hopes and my vague plan to help people. I still have one hundred and nineteen months, so plenty of time. 

I have shared my days of despair, days, which in hindsight, had a cause. When something upsets me I want turn to the one person who always was on my side and by my side, it is then that his loss is felt so badly and grief is triggered once more. In acknowledging that I am allowing myself to grieve and at the same time that permission is like a hug from Tall. I can hear him saying "it's okay, you're allowed to be upset", something said so often during those last few months. 

Thirty days ago I had no immediate plans to visit Australia, the idea was one that was going to happen, but when was a mystery. It was Tall's birthday that was the final kick up the proverbial, I remembered how he kept saying how he would love to fly out to Melbourne, without telling anyone, and turn up on the doorstep. He loved being impulsive. He once took a flight just to give someone a birthday card, well that was the story he told. I decided I might as well follow his lead and so I just did it. I did check with my hosts that they weren't in the middle of something that meant my presence was a nuisance, unlike Tall, I don't have the skin of a rhino!  

So January has been a success, I feel stronger than I did at the start of it. The light at the end of the tunnel seems to be brighter, although I know there may be times when it seems night has fall and the light is temporarily extinguished.  I am better prepared mentally to cope with what life throws at me. Tall would be so proud of me.

No going back.

Or more precisely, there's no going back on my plan to visit Australia, the flights are booked and that's that. I have my visa, it only took an hour from application to approval, now that is efficiency. So now all I have to do is pack a suitcase, making sure it weighs less than 30 kg, but still has enough clothes to wear, well at least enough until I manage to wash some. 

I have read and re-read what I can carry into the country, what I can carry through airport security and what I can carry out of the UK, but not through Dubai, even if it is only being used as a connection airport (go figure.) I have bookmarked all the pages so I can check, double check and triple check. You can't be too careful when it comes to airport security. I even have plans to disinfect all my shoes, Australia doesn't like mud, with good reason I expect (okay I am exaggerating a bit.)

I have to find a 20cm x 20cm clear plastic bag that can be sealed, ziploc or the like. Fold over sandwich bags or bags that have been tied are not acceptable. Once I have one, I have to put all my jars, bottles, tubes or tubs, (that contain less than 100ml ) into it, making sure they aren't too cramped and the bag is sealed. I bet if I wait until the airport they will be selling them for a fiver! 

I have told my children I will bring them all a penguin back, they all seemed surprised that Australia has penguins (what do they teach them in school these days.) After the terrible bush-fires there certainly  won't be any spare kolas and the grey headed flying foxes are on the verge of extinction.  If push comes to shove I'll buy them a McVities Penguin.

On searching for a photo of  a Penguin biscuit I discovered they are similar to Australian Tim Tams!

I am seriously excited. I have a new suitcase to collect tomorrow and I can't wait to start filling it, not too sure about getting it to the airport though! :)
 

Unaccustomed traveller

I'm the Good Cheer Pixie and I am NOT a frequent flyer. The fact is that until I met Tall I didn't have a passport, I had never been on an aeroplane. Over the first five years we flew five times. Once Tall was told he was ill we flew no more.

It is over ten years since I last flew with Tall by my side and now I am about to plan the biggest journey of my life, a flight to Australia. I have to confess I am "scared" of so many things. I was scared of getting to Heathrow Airport until I found out I can travel from Birmingham and only have to wait an extra hour at Dubai to get the connecting flight, I am scared of getting lost at the stopover airport and missing that connecting flight though. 

All the things that we organised together, the sharing of the responsibility, the packing and checking and double checking, that all falls on my shoulders. I am researching what I can, I have applied for my visa and looked at a hotel for when I arrive, it would be unreasonable of me to expect my hosts to drive to collect me at the ungodly hour I arrive, I don't have a clue how long customs will take. But, then I worry about getting to the hotel, will I be ripped off by the taxi driver who will know instantly I'm a foreigner, or am I being unfair judging all taxi drivers the same way? I am trying my hardest to be logical and calm, I am actually really excited at the prospect of visiting Australia, even if it is a teeny weeny part of it. The fact is, I know if I can do this, I can do anything, go anywhere (well obviously there are places I wouldn't go as a lone female).  

I worry that my hosts will get fed up of my endless silly questions about what to do before / during /after the flight, (they are far more experienced but as yet haven't emailed them a list of my silly questions).  Tall would have just known. I'm not sure whether he was:

           a) the font of all knowledge

           b) a good internet researcher

           c) blessed with the gift of the gab.

I just know he seemed to know EVERYTHING. How I miss that bravado and confidence. 

My answer to it all is lists. Endless lists of what I need to do, what I need to pack, a carefully orchestrated timetable with contingency plans. Well that's my plan, I just haven't started it yet!!

Happy birthday Tall.

Today is Tall's birthday or should that be was? I will be celebrating the day of his birth later with one of his favourite meals, a good steak and a good bottle of red. 

Whilst going through some of the stuff in the loft (there are still four boxes to go) I found a letter, more a diary entry, that Tall's mother wrote on his thirty-ninth birthday, I thought I would share it today.

It's Michael's birthday today. Fancy, it's thirty-nine years since that memorable day when he was born here at Thorncliffe Road. Dennis made the midwife a few cakes to take his mind off what was happening upstairs and oh, joy of joys we had a beautiful looking baby boy. 

The weather was very, very cold, icicles hanging down the outside of the windows and I felt sorry for John and Teresa going to school in such weather! 

We had a little dog and he got out during that week and ran across what was then a field across the road, with my mother chasing him. Poor mother, she had been struggling with the washing. We didn't have a washing machine then, I had to do all the washing in a Dean Boiler. I remember the doctor saying "why don't you get a machine?" I thought at the time he was silly, but I don't now. My machine is the best thing I possess.

It's a beautiful day today, the sun is shining and the snowdrops in the garden look lovely. I do hope Mike is having a happy day and that everything is looking better. 

Remember how the darkness is followed by the light.
How warm and sunny days come after each long night.
How springtime follows winter
And the rainbow cloaks the rain
In the same way life's sad moments
Soon turn to joy again. 

How fitting the little poem is at the end and she was right, he was beautiful.

 

Abandoned

That is exactly how I feel. Abandoned by Tall. Abandoned by friends. Abandoned by the world. I could live with the friends abandoning me if I had Tall, but he isn't here to give me his words of wisdom. How I miss those words. I wonder what I have said or done to offend people. What did I do to drive them away?

My grief magnifies my insecurities like a magnifying glass with sunlight, causing sudden flare-ups of anxiety. The chain reaction of anxiety and grief, the one causing the other, until I manage to get a grip on one of them once more.  

 All I can do is get up each morning and hope that things will be different.

The first three weeks.

Well we are already three weeks into the new year, so far not much has changed. Admittedly I had my daughter here for seventeen days, which I suppose, in its own way, fulfilled my aim to make a difference. I had a phone call from the volunteer coordinator at the Hope Centre yesterday saying she had received my one reference, but was still waiting for the other. I have sent them a gentle reminder, but it seems I might have to find another referee who isn't so self absorbed. It is just another hurdle that I have to find my way round, I'm not very good at jumping these days. 

I wonder how much good I can actually do, although that may just be a lack of self-confidence, something I have always struggled with. Self doubt has often been a feature in my life, although if I look back, I really shouldn't doubt myself. I have been through a fair few tough times and I'm still here to tell the tale. In fact, on the whole, I have actually done  quite well. The trick is to remind myself what I have achieved when I am doubting "me". 

Of course whilst all the stuff about making a difference is going round in my head I am also dealing with the good, the bad and the ugly of bereavement. Some days I can look at Tall's photo and chat to him, other days if I so much as catch a glance of him I will burst out crying, but worse of all are the moments when I forget he is gone. That tiny millisecond when I find myself thinking "I'll go and ask Tall...." only to remember a millisecond later that I can't. Those moments may be rare now, but they are ugly. 

I have so many things I want to do, some of them very practical, others are dreams that I will need to try hard to make happen. If only I could buy that winning lottery ticket I'd be able to visit all those far-flung places on the holiday adverts AND help out all my children!

Say what you mean or mean what you say.

There are times when I doubt my own communication skills, I think we all do sometimes. A phrase that in my head sounds reasonable and inoffensive when read or heard by another suddenly becomes a point of argument. So it was on Friday. I said something to my youngest that was over heard by my daughter that has been staying, who was upstairs "packing" ready to leave. Said daughter came downstairs, said something angrily and then stomped back upstairs, not even giving me a chance to answer her accusations. In that moment I needed Tall so very badly. I needed someone to tell me I had done nothing wrong, instead of telling me to stop shouting at her for being rude. Like a wounded animal I lashed out in mental pain, my grief raw, red in tooth and claw. I sat on the sofa and sobbed. I rocked backwards and forwards, trying to get some relief from the moment I was in, a moment when all I wanted was to be with Tall, no matter where he is. 

My youngest went and spoke to her and explained what we had been saying. That her perceived "whispering" was probably due to me walking around the room. The truth is that if she hadn't been eavesdropping she wouldn't have misunderstood. She calmed down and I pretended everything was alright. It was only once I got home from dropping her off at the coach station that I allowed the grief loose once more. 

Today I wonder if what I have said to others might be misunderstood. Am I simply being over sensitive / paranoid / over thinking? I am always so careful to read and re-read my emails, my FB statuses and text messages, checking that the words cannot be misunderstood or cause offense, yet I still fall flat on my face. Is it me or is it others? Who knows. So to all those I might have upset unintentionally, or offended, something I would never do intentionally, I apologise. Like my school reports would often say about my handwriting "must try harder."
 

Sometimes.....

Tomorrow it will be thirty-five weeks to the day and exactly eight months since Tall died. May be it is because last month my mood was lifted by the promise of Christmas, may be December just was better, I don't know, but this month it is affecting me badly. 

Sometimes I wish I could just hold his hand again, have the chance to tell him just once more how I feel about him.

Sometimes I wish I could nuzzle into his shoulder and remember how he smelled, not his aftershave but him. 

Sometimes I wish he was here to just hold me in his arms, his head bent over resting on the top of mine. 

Sometimes I wish that the dip in the mattress was filled with him, his legs tucked up so his feet aren't over the end.

Sometimes I wish I could be with him........

I know I'm not alone in feeling the way I do. I know that in a few days the grief will pass once more and I will just get on with life. So for today and for tomorrow I will allow myself my tears, my uncontrollable sobbing and my anger at life.

January 1st 2020

Well it's here, a new decade, yet again I find myself at the start of a decade having to reinvent myself. At the start of the noughties I was pretty much a single mom to five children, husband having started work in London within days of them starting. The "teens" as I said yesterday began with Tall's ill health being diagnosed as cancer, something which defined the rest of the decade, there was only ever a few months between hospital appointments as his blood and kidney function was monitored. 

It seems there is a pattern to my life and today I feel as if I have been given another chance. I have been a mom and I have been a carer and wife. I don't know yet what I am going to be next, but I do know it has to be something that makes a difference. 

There are no resolutions, no dry January or Veganuary, no vowing to lose three stone in three months or run a marathon in six. I have made those resolutions before and inevitably fail, fueling self blame which leads to further failure. It seems one day of  eating cake / drinking / eating meat / not running causes me to just stop even trying, so no resolutions, no pressure. Instead I am going to try visualising where I want to be a year from now and for once it isn't about how I want to look on the outside, but how I want to feel on the inside. I will never ever stop loving Tall with every fibre of my being, I don't actually want to meet someone else, but I do want to love. I want to love life, I want to share my love with others, I want to help, I want to look back at the end of 2020 and say to myself "yes, you made a difference this year." It might be in the smallest way possible, but maybe, just maybe, at the end of the twenties I will have made a big difference to some people's lives. I have to have hope, faith in my ability and love for everyone.