There has certainly been a lot of silence in the past few
hours. I do wonder whether I will be
able to sustain this solitude for more than a day, such is my nature to
inevitably find myself among others more often than on my own.
Over the past three days I have been asked the question on
more than one occasion whether coming away for some days of quiet and self
reflection would actually be a wise or good thing for me. Even I hesitated when first asked the
question as it had not crossed my mind that perhaps coming away for a few days
on my own may perhaps not be a good thing to do or one that I could very well
regret.
Until being asked the question it had been something I felt
the need to do. The only difficulty I
seemed to be having was being able to extricate myself from an already over
loading diary of activities and actions that keep me from bird and butterfly
watching.
It almost did not happen, I almost turned down my own
invitation to come away by myself, such was the lack of anticipation I really
had for my own company.
However instinctive (or in plainer terms, “gut”) reaction
was that I had to, I needed to get away.
It has been an almost overwhelming need to get away. There has been an inner feeling of oppression
that seems impossible to shake or remove at home and everywhere around
home. I feel as it has been wrapping
around me like a tightly fitting blanket and squeezing the hell out of me.
The blanket of oppression.
It’s the grief. It’s a blanket of
grief that I cannot shake off my shoulders. Its weight won’t drop off my shoulders and
it’s causing a great smouldering heavily inside. It is smouldering inside me like my own
tumour that is growing and growling and not receding with time as so many
people tell me it would.
I cannot remove or dislodge this tumour. No matter how much of a brave and positive
air or face I can put on; no matter how many firsts I am ticking myself
through; no matter how many runs or
races or bike rides or swims or walks I do, no matter how many places I go, the
tumour is not going away. It is just
sitting there, still, and getting heavier and heavier and burdening me down.
I know it is still early since Tony passed away. I am typing this exactly nine weeks, one day
and a few hours since Tony passed. I am
more than aware of the fact that nine weeks is but a blink of time. I also know that I cannot possibly hope to
pass through the tunnel of grief in a mere month or two and that for me it will
take an inordinately long time, no matter what the future holds.
And my love for Tony was such that I may even end up
wallowing permanently in a mire of grief and never really come out the other
end of that tunnel, no matter what the future holds. I actually do hope that will not be the
case. He would not want that.
But I do know I have had a real need to get away and to get
away now. Not later in the year or next
year. I need to have come away now. Ideally I would like to have made it months,
but a few days to a week is still a bonus. And it needed to be somewhere where there is
no one. No one I know and no one I want
to get to know. I felt the very strong
need to travel somewhere where no one can see me, no one can hear me. Because I need scream. I need to really, really cry. To really, really howl. To
bawl my heart out. Something I have not been able to do since
Tony died.
Can’t do that at home.
It would scare the neighbours.
And anyone passing by. Could
cause quite a stir. Getting carried off
to the funny farm isn’t even an option nowadays. There are no such things as funny farms
anymore – so whilst men in little white coats may carry me off, due to
government cost cutting all funny farm inmates are now sent back home to live
in the community, so the neighbours would only end up with me howling from my
hallways again.
And true to form, my instinctive need was so very
correct. Didn’t make it far past
Auckland before the waves of loss broke over me.
I was in my own little world, driving ever so carefully,
humming along to one of the nostalgia CDs I had grabbed as I left the house,
when I was suddenly aware that I could not glance casually to my left and see
my darling Tony sitting there in the passenger seat. The seat he sat in for so many of our fun or
sporting journeys was no longer filled.
It was empty. Nor would he be
ever sitting behind the wheel of the vehicle again, driving me off to yet
another mini adventure of our own. He is
gone. Forever. Never to be sitting with me, never to be with
me again. I cannot just reach out and
touch him. Feel his hands, his face, his hair and remind him
as I so often did at these times that he is my ‘beautiful man’. He would look back at me with that soft
smile, gently shake his head, and love hearing it. He was a beautiful man to me. I always told him so when we were together in
our quite times. He loved hearing it, I loved the smile I got back or the arm
reaching over to gently squeeze my hand.
The over powering and deep emotion of loss was dreadful. It
was pull over time on the main highway. The
loss, it really is physically painful.
It really reaches deep into the deepest part of the stomach and twists
and turns and hurts like hell. And as it
twists and turns the achingly heart twists with it and the flood of tears begin
all over again.
It is that which will not go away. That’s my own tumour.
It is that which I cannot move or budge. It is that which I feel needs to be
purged.
I cannot do that at home.
Someone will ring the doorbell.
And be bringing more cake.
And I am still 67.6 kgs.
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