Why I thoroughly dislike Christmas

It isn't the over commercialization of the holiday. Or the fact that shops will try and beat you into submission by taking one day and throwing it at you in a barrage that lasts for six weeks before it arrives. It is because of an event that happened the day after it occurs.

My beloved maternal grandmother died on December 26th 2006. I adored her and she had lived with my parents and me for over 23 years. It was the first time I had ever lost someone in my family that I was close to, and that I loved deeply. It had, and still has, a profound effect on me. I've been in a state of mourning since that day and I probably always will be. The regrets of all the things I didn't ask or say haunt me and part of me cannot forgive myself for not being there when she died (Mum and I were on our way to collect more clothes and toiletries when we got a call telling us to come back to the hospital as soon as possible... by the time we got back she had slipped away).

The onset of the colder months fills me with dread. The rest of the year I'm ok, I can remember and not get weepy... but the closer it gets to December the more I can feel myself tensing up somehow. I know she wouldn't want me to be sad, but I just can't help it. Believe it or not the new year is the worst. We all used to stay up late to see it in together and a lady up the road always rings a bell to see the old year out and the new year in - Mum and I go outside to listen and when I wish Nana a happy new year I always cry, then I set Mum off and we end up hugging each other and listening to the bell, standing outside in the cold. I just can't seem to help it. It only lasts a minute or two, but losing her still hurts so much. When people say that time heals, it doesn't. Time just moves forward and carries you along with it. You can either allow it to push you forwards or you can fight it and try to cling on to the past for as long as you can... eventually it will sweep you forwards whether you like it or not. We never get over losing people... we just become more and more used to them not being there anymore :0(

As memories fade, the feelings seem to lessen as well and that allows us to cope with everyday life. But the loss is still there, it may be buried deep inside, but it is still there. Maybe not as raw, maybe not as shocking, but still there, waiting for something to trigger it off... a smell, a sound, a look, a time of year... one day it will happen and the grief washes over you again in massive choking waves of pain and heartbreak. Tears flow and nothing you can do will stop them, they have to come out or they will drown you and burst forth when you least expect them to. It makes you want to crawl into bed and squeeze yourself into a tiny ball and you wish for sleep so that for a few short hours you can forget. Upon waking you have a few seconds of exquisite happiness when you are not awake enough to remember... but then you do, and sorrow smashes down upon you like a ton weight and you drag yourself out of bed and try and face the day with a brain full of sadness and a heart full of misery.

I still cling to the few precious things I have that belong to Nana. I cannot let them go as then my final grasp on the physical her will be gone as well. I need them to remind me of happy times; reading her recipes and remembering her baking a cake, seeing her handwriting and recalling watching her write cards and notes to people she loved, wearing her jewellery and feeling as if I have a small piece of her against my skin. I had to dispose of her perfume as it just triggered too much, too often... I was inundated with memories from just one sniff, it was unbearable. I smelled it the other day, whilst packing up the weekly shop in a crowded supermarket and I was momentarily unable to move as I thought she was there, mad I know, but for a nanosecond I had hope that she was, even though I knew she wasn't.

Sometimes I have to marvel that I haven't gone insane. I wonder why I am not in a mental health unit when just typing this entry has me sat here with tears blinding me and loss threatening to overwhelm me again. Maybe it is because I cannot allow it to do that, I have people that depend on me and I can't let them down. My needs must be tempered by the fact they rely on me... if I fall apart who will be there for them then? I have to suck it up and only allow myself to let it out when everyone else is asleep... then I can put my needs first and just cry. Just release the pressure once in a while and allow myself to be sad and let my heart break again. Then I can fall into a hopefully restful sleep and maybe by morning my heart will have reassembled itself back together again... not perfect (like a broken vase, mended with glue, is never really the same as it was before it shattered) but passable to any but the most in depth of inspections.

All of this creeps towards me the nearer December comes.

That is why I dislike Christmas.

Sitting in a car park with time on my hands...

... and for some reason I bought a bible with me, in case I wanted something to read (don't ask me why). So I open it and start reading and I realise that the words mean nothing to me. I don't feel inspired in any way, even the parts that used to mean something to me (like Psalm 23 and 1 Corinthians 13.4-8)... they are just words on a page. I don't find them meaningful anymore. I wonder if I ever did.

As I sit here, in this car park in front of a clinic, I can see pyracanthus bushes, laden with berries - and a small holly, also smothered in berries. Until a short while ago there were dozens of tiny birds chirping and hopping about, flitting from branch to branch and seeming to be playing a game of chase. Just being birds. I felt my heart lighten at the sight of them, and a feeling of joy filled me, I felt so privileged to have been a witness to their lives, even for a few minutes.

And then the words of a dear friend of mine suddenly came back to me "why have a moon goddess when you have the moon?" And I finally understood, at a soul-level, what he meant. Why do I need a deity when I have nature. I'm unsure about the existence of gods, I cannot prove that they are here or not... but I have all the evidence I could ever need for the existence of nature. I can see it, touch it, prove that it's real. Why should I spend anymore time trying to prove the un-provable when I have all the proof for something undeniably real right in front of my eyes?!

No words on paper have ever made me happier than when I see the first flowers of spring, and no perfume is as sweet as that of real flowers - nothing can compare to a hyacinth or the scent of a rose that has been warmed by the sun.

Nature has a part of me that no god could ever possess, a huge part that is not for sale. I don't care how this planet came to be, it doesn't interest me. I just know it is here, and so am I, the rest is pure conjecture on both sides (be it big bang or god/s did it).

Today I feel...

... well, honestly, I don't really know how I feel. Part of me doesn't really feel anything much at all, and another part of me feels tired and another part feels kind of "numb" somehow and another part of me just feels like crying... it's hard to explain really.

I probably shouldn't have watched "Living with the Amish" last night... although I love the show it always seems to leave me in a deep funk the next day. Maybe because I kind of envy their simple yet rewarding lives, I also envy their sheer depth of faith and their strong work ethic... I'm such a lazy person, if I can do tomorrow what should be done today then I will without hesitation :o(

I wonder if my constantly feeling tired is the cause - regardless of when I go to sleep or how much I have I just always feel tired. I never feel refreshed when I wake and usually feel worse than when I went to sleep! I've had tests run by the doctor and they came back saying nothing was wrong... yet I certainly don't feel right. But I don't know what to do about it. I swear that Sissy and Pingu just think I'm doing it for attention and they seem to react every time I mention how I feel as if I'm just a huge hypochondriac! So these days it is yet another topic of conversation I avoid when they are around.

I seem to spend my days in pain, very tired or in a bad mood... and I can become intensely irritated in less time than it takes to blink! I just feel as if I'm losing myself somehow, like I'm here but not completely here. I can't really put it into words, but it leaves me feeling sort of hollow.

Thankfully it's Friday... I don't think I could have stood another day doing a job I loathe for people that don't appreciate anything I do!

So much for the early night!

I'm still sat in front of the laptop and the time is now 1.41am! I am over-tired and extremely bored, LOL!!

The house is all quiet and I am the only one awake now... even the cats are sound asleep (or as asleep as cats ever get, anyway).

It started to rain here again earlier and I was just stood there ironing listening to it... I really do love the sound of the rain, it calms me. On the plus side I think that my headache is finally going, on the minus side I have to get up early in the morning to take my Dad to the doctors **sigh**


The wind was so bad last night that it broke our gazebo legs (actually the plastic connector joints between the roof and the top of the legs)!! We seem to have bad luck with gazebo's... we lost one a few years back when it almost blew over next doors' fence and got all torn up, we lost one to the dreadful snow earlier this year (the sheer weight of it broke all of the legs) and the strong wind yesterday almost claimed another one, but we managed to fix it by using some of the parts from the one the snow killed, LOL!! So glad that we took in the expensive patio umbrella! Knowing our luck it would have been smashed to pieces or been blown away, never to be found again, hahaha.

Brain guano

It's times like this when my brain seems to go into overdrive and just starts pondering on all of the things that I normally try hard not to think about. Just because I know that once I start I invariably won't be able to stop.

The times when I'm alone and all is quiet... the times that I can think (whether I want to or not).

Sometimes it can be a totally trivial thing that will start the rusted cogs of my brain turning and before I can stop myself, the thoughts just descend upon me, like a flock of birds.

The question that popped up was "Who am I?" and the answer is "I don't really know".

I think that I have a vague idea, I know most things that there are to know about me, but that's not the question. Do I really know "Who I am?"... most of the time I seem to be afraid to be myself, for fear of either offending, annoying or being the laughing stock of other people. I sometimes wonder if the real me is the tough, abraisive woman with the hard exterior and a mouth like a docker... or whether I am the soft, caring woman, that always sees both sides and seems to give people unlimited mercy. Most of the time I seem to squash the two together, and most of the time they gel quite nicely... but sometimes they don't and one or the other seems to gain the upper hand for a short time - usually the unkind half.

I suppose that we all have two sides to our character, nice and nasty, hard and soft, polite and rude, tolerant and impatient... it just seems as if the nasty side of me gets the most opportunity to show itself these days. I seem to be becoming intolerant of stupid people, and the old saying "Doesn't suffer fools gladly" is certainly what I appear to be doing *sigh*

She's gone

Sissy is now in Brighton... she's phoned a couple of times to say that all is well and that her room is coming along nicely (which is good news). The only snag has been finding out that she can't have a padlock on the outside of her door (she's worried that if they have parties and stuff that her room will either be used as a place for others to have sex or that her stuff will get stolen... the only problem with having your bedroom on the ground floor!)

Me and Mum are sorting out her old room. We've cleared out the wardrobe in the corner and taken the clothes from the white wardrobe by the bathroom and put them in there instead... we've also sorted out a lot of clothes, bags and shoes to go to the charity shop (the amount of stuff we have got rid of lately isn't funny, but somehow it feels good to let go of the past - that and hopefully someone somewhere will get some use out of it all). I have come into contact with my worst enemy again... bloody dust!! We hate each other with a passion... and I have to go back in there soon and finish what I've started............. BOO!!!!! (LOL!)