Scraping back the layers

Inspired by paintings...

If we didn't prize paintings for the colours,

Instead found the joy in scraping back the layers,

excavating deeper and deeper until we found bare canvas

would this be like preserving old buildings?

old ruins, old foundations?

where we have to scrape back, layer and layer until we reach rock or earth or bricks?

Each layer mines deeper and deeper into our souls,

Into each part of our culture,

incising away layer of our feeling of self.

Is this why old things and creating are so important?

Because without we'd have no way of recording that internal process

of building?

Without that would we know who we are?

Would that really matter?

When you died, then so did I.

Not all of me,

just a small significant part ,that I never noticed was there, never knew

But now it's gone it feels like oceans.

Feeling guilty about feeling guilty and then getting angry doesn't help anyone. Horrible day.

One day I will stop trying so hard,

I don't want to miss your childhood in feeling guilty,

Don't want to miss you growing, becoming you whilst I shout!

Don't want to miss your baby fat legs,

Don't want to miss your chubby fists, your love, your smiles,

Dont want to swap them for anger.

Dont want to eat ashes when I could be chasing for baby kisses,

delivered with an MMMMMMMM and a MWA!

Dont want to miss out

Bad days and guilt feel so final as if the earth has come crashing down. I wish the bit of me that was still grieving about Jason, could just let go. Maybe I have to just let all the happy in around it - I think that's probably the way. All been so ill over Christmas and all ill again a few times since, plus worry worry worry about the ASD thing (despite the fact that as D is actually ill again this week, she is doing really well) - yes I need some happy in.

Sometimes it's hard to remember how much time has passed

sometimes something happens to bring the past tumbling back

then I walk with my feet on two floors

the now and the then.

It's a very odd feeling and I feel I may be going slightly mad

but its ok, the madness of not being tied to the present being a single thing

but rather pregnant with possibilities, a million different things

and of course, just the single fact of it's existence.

So it is a single thing after all

and its folly to think otherwise

but it's useful to look down at my feet

and remember where they have been

and where they are going.

A door is open and shut, all at the same time

A wound is bleeding and healed. all at the same time,

The tree is growing, yet burns in the grate, all at the same time,

We are born and yet die, all at the same time.

After we die we shatter and scatter

Becoming the fragments of memories, snatched pictures, half forgotten conversations,

Floating in peoples minds.

We fade into their memories' DNA, shaping them and their children

In turn shaping the world.

This is our shining soul, our human imortality.

http://www.careers.brad.ac.uk/feature/jason/

This thing that should be about death and feeling distraught is changing.

Like walking under trees in rain and complaining about the wind and the rain and the noise

and forgetting that I'm there, under the wind and in the rain and listening to the noise

And that just being there, right there is enough.

Jason dying has changed so much but left it the same. It's lovely to be in touch with friends I've not had contact with for years though, his final gift in a way is love. Can't undo his karma but part of me would still like him back even though in the bigger picture it's sort of ok. Well it's beyond me saying it's ok.

Grumpy day today, but the kids were still loving. My double standards amaze me - I expect them to be calm and not cross yet what do I do when I'm tired and hungry? Have to work on that one. Probably important not to be too self-judgemental.

Reed bed rippling in the light,

is that the wind blowing

or a soul parting the leaves as they pass by?

Well today I found out Jason wasn't on his own when he died. That seems good. He phoned his folks on New Years Eve as he felt unwell, who took him to their house and called the emergency Dr. They then took Jason straight to hospital, where he either fell unconscious or was sedated. It became apparent he wasn't going to wake up, then his parents called friends of his to say goodbye. A mutual friend contacted one of these friends (Jason's ex) and kindly told me how he died. It seems terribly important to know how he died - and its a huge relief that he wasn't afraid and alone when he died.

People have been immensely kind today and I need to not overlook this in my grief. The gift of simply being here to feel this pain is quite something - I've been so overwhelmed with it all that I've quite forgotten that.

So, Louise was kind in immediately letting me know how Jason died. She phoned on her way back from meeting Steve. Greg was kind too - he owns a local coffee shop and is coffee intense! We'd been talking to a mutual friend about his autistic children, he mentioned this to us and his whole demeanour changed. We went to his shop on Christmas day, and he held my daughter's hands as she was cold and recovering from an awful bug. We've not had the easiest relationship in the past so this means a lot. It's not a tragedy to find out your child is autistic but it needs adjustments and he was talking about that. It's good to talk to someone who has trodden the same path. We also spoke to friends of ours - a gay couple as it turns out. For some reason, because Jason was gay, it was somehow healing and life affirming. Marc's mother died some time ago and I was talking about Jason. I don't seem to be able to stop, but Marc was saying some really poignant yet pragmatic things. Just that dying is inevitable and that for some, dying in their prime as opposed to lonely in old age might be preferable. Plus he urged me to do something on the day of the funeral. We've decided not to attend as it's a long way and I would be quite upset which wouldn't be great for the kids. Plus we can't afford the associated costs. I am sad about this but myself and Marc both came up with the idea of perhaps burning a photo or something.

Letting go - I've forgotten about this. In the past I've relied a lot more on this but it's been hard to do now. Another reason why is I feel guilty for being here now Jason is not. It's only fleeting but its there. Guess it's a version of survivors guilt - he was younger than me and I feel protective.

The world still turns after all. Wish I could go to the funeral. Thinking of releasing something down a stream or maybe going to the Priory although as Jason was a Christian not sure how that sits right now.

Living in the Past

Ok - today has been a good day. I have sniffed at a lot of people that " a very good friend of mine died etc etc" and not dissolved into a heap of tears. This has been a good thing. Plus I haveea actually started to feel slightly cheerful. The unadulterated wallowing although painful is obviously the right way to go.

Part of me is now back at being in my early 20's. This was of course when I saw Jason regularly, especially our tome together working in Manchesterl Museum. Its a slightly trippy experience - most of me is with the kids, arbitrating, feeding, nursing etc, just a little is wandering around, cataloguing stuff early 20 years ago. I loved that collection too! I loved sharing it with Jason as well. I also remember so many kindnesses he showed me, moving me up to Leicester, taking me shopping oce in Manchester when I'd just moved there (I've lived there several times, I don't remember which one) his general attitude that he was there to help. I remember walking into the main gate of the museum to the stores behind, him making coffee at break times, him charming the extremely wonderful Prof Rosalie Davids who I was too scared to talk to. It was a good time - and how much did I enjoy that work?! So much!

Not sure what's happened to all of that now. Not sure if it's lost underneath the pile of leaving job, being ill with ME, recovering and then children or if it's still there. Certainly the 20 year old me would be terribly surprised to be a full time mum, but the essence of me being me and carving out my path in my own style is still there. Not sure if it's even important or not.

Sunlight streams in my memories.

Somehow

this horrible horrible thing is going to be a blessing. I don't know how, I suspect it will be one of those things I don't get for years and years and look back and it will click. Jason was that sort of man.

I think this is so extremely hard for the following reasons:

1. Everyone else I've know whose died was either older than me and/or long term ill so there was't the same shock element.

2. Jason was a year younger than me (his actual birthday was 364 days after mine) so this is the first time that my entire life has encompassed someone else's.

3. This brings me back to being nearly 40 and feeling the need to seize the day.

4. This brings me to needing to see a professional about D.

5. When I was at university, it was the first time in my life that I was actually happy. I believe I spent the first term at university quite down simply because I wasn't expected to be caring for and being depressed about my mum. It was a huge learning curve to be happy.

6. The friends I formed there were in a way the bedrocks of my future life. The previous bedrock type friend was Sharon who died a few years ago (2003) - but she had muscular dystrophy so I was expecting her life to be shorter.

7. Jason was one of those bedrocks and he's suddenly and completely gone. We'd made contact over the summer and talked briefly on the phone since and it was just the same, just the same friendship.

8. We spent a lot of time together in Manchester Museum working on a project cataloguing the Egyptian collections. We got closer as friends.

9. The whole thing about Facebook is that it means you can suddenly keep in touch with people that you haven't for years - Jason was one of these. He was a prolific twitterer so he was very much there - even if he was so techy I couldn't understand half his posts!

10. He was a genuinely special person whose Christian faith and his ability for deeds to match his words was amazing. His faith alone and his way of interpreting it was inspiring.

Wish it didn't hurt so much. Such a wimp!

I turned my face to the sun,

I watched as you said goodbye.

I felt you leave this world,

and move onto the next.

The streaming sun,

knows no difference.

RIP Jason

One of my very best friends from university died from meningitis over the weekend. He would have been 38. We met up with him briefly over summer for tea but the kids were running wild as they'd been in the car all day so we didn't really have chance to talk.

Heatbroken, metta for Jason x

Back on the merry-go-round

D starts pre school on Thursday (should be Wednesday but she has a party on Wed afternoon so a day's grace is necessary). We were all very ill over Christmas so leaving the house was not really an option. When she starts back she will be too tired again to see anyone. So given that the socialising at pre school knocks her for 6 - well I'm glad I know she has at least one friend there. So hard for all of us.

Not really a point to this, feels dreadfully confused and narcissistic. Cabin fever.