Another Wet Sunday
It is a wet Sunday afternoon (very wet) and I have just seen my dear friend off at the station, after a beautiful few days together. The dog and I are moping. My friend and I ran a day of songs for peace here where I live, walked said dog on long and previously unexplored walks (despite the rain), made good food and sat in front of a glowing fire. Now that she is gone, will I light the fire, make a good dinner or explore a different walk? No, probably not. Why? Is it the “it’s not worth it just for me” syndrome, as if I’m a ‘just’ who doesn’t count for much? Or is it that the joy of those things is in the sharing? Probably a bit of both.
Ultimate absences
My friend is not gone for ever, just a few months, but her absence has made me reflect on those ultimate absences, on those who are never coming back, and how I do or don’t befriend myself. I imagine we all miss different things when someone we love dies: putting a new king size duvet on my bed last night, I remembered how much easier it was with two of us; looking at the boxes of Christmas decorations still sitting on the landing, because I promised my daughter I wouldn’t go into the attic on my own (and I forgot when my friend was here), I remember my vulnerability. Silly things, really and yet they speak to a shared life with a partner that is gone.
I think it is the sharing I miss the most. The absence of a person with whom to share my successes and my failures, my worries and dreams, as well as the cakes I make and the warm hearth I create, hurts. There may be some lone wolves amongst us, but though I need a good amount of alone time, I also very much need connection.
The who and the what
I think when we lose someone very dear, we not only lose who they were but what they were for us. To lose a partner is to lose the one we companioned and cherished; to lose a child is to lose someone we nurtured and wondered with; to lose a sibling is to lose an ally, a joint holder of our childhood; to lose a friend is to lose someone we trusted, someone with whom we could laugh and cry, let it all hang out and still be loved. It matters who they were but the role they played in our lives matters too. I think that role includes the opportunity to connect with certain part of ourselves and that without those opportunities we can become a smaller, poorer, less colourful version of ourselves; and I think this is one of the many challenges of grief – can we use it to explore our depths and expand our humanity?
Perhaps we inhabit both our diminished self and our expanded self along the journey. I think it’s important that we treat ourselves with the utmost gentleness and understanding if there are times when the best we can do is tea and toast for dinner and a duvet on the sofa on a wet Sunday. And I think it’s important that we treat ourselves with the utmost gentleness and understanding when we have the courage to walk through glass shards of loss, speak our truth, risk loving, invite friendships and find the tremendous courage it takes to open again to Life.
The muscle of courage
All steps taken on that path to openness and connection, wherever they appear to lead in the moment – including seemingly dead ends and closed doors – are never wasted. Those steps help us to develop our muscle of courage, they help us discern what is not the right place/person/situation for us.
A couple of years after my son and husband died, I applied for and was offered a job. It looked like it was made for me, employing many of my skills – building human relationships, management, collaborative working, organisation – as well as my knowledge of retreats and hospitality, my lifelong experience of spirituality and my love of nature. It took every ounce of strength I had and spat me out two years later. Was it wasted? Not at all. I am proud I what I did there, grateful for opportunities to create community and a place of peace and left that job confident enough to set up my own business. Hard? Yes. Wasted? No.
Being lived
So, on a wet Sunday, I have a perspective that life has not stopped living me. Despite the losses and the pain, my life hasn’t ended. I have argued with reality and re-written my story in my imagination a hundred, a thousand times, but it makes no difference. This is what I have. And although there are mournful days, lonely, grey, listless days, there are also days which offer me invitations to dance a little with Life. I might kiss a few frogs – situations to which I say, “thanks, but no thanks” – but taken as a whole, life is not without its beauty.
The hearth of the heart
Tonight, I will light a fire “just for me” and have tea and toast for dinner. Tonight and tomorrow, I will forgive myself what I cannot manage and celebrate what I can; and I will remember that my own heart is the warm hearth I can sit beside and keep its fire alight for whoever might wish to sit beside me, if only for a little while.
With my love
Nickie
NEWS
Firstly thank you so much to everyone who came to our day of Songs for Peace and Hope. And thank you for the beautiful feedback we have received.
There will be more days – a little different, a little more contemplative perhaps, but the same inspiration and joy in being together and sending our heartfelt love and care into the world. Please write to me here if you are interested in coming to the next one.
Secondly, having become a CIC and widened my audience by coming onto Substack, I am planning out the rest of my year. I have been dreaming of creating a grief support network , beginning with an in-person group (more on that very soon, when I can ascertain if funding might be available) and Emma Capper and I would like to run another Walking With Loss, Together group in the autumn. However, I am aware that many of you live a long way from Dartmoor and I want to let you know that I am open to either travelling to you, if you have a group already wanting to do something together, or offering online work, not only one on one, but in groups. If there is something dying/grieving/preparing/loss themed, that you would like me to run, do please be in touch here and also check out some of the things I am already offering here
AND LASTLY, MY APOLOGIES IF YOU RECEIVED AN EMAIL FROM SUBSTACK RECOMMENDING CERTAIN POSTS. I DID NOT GIVE PERMISSION FOR ANY UNSOLICITED MAIL TO BE SENT TO YOU. I AM STILL LEARNING THE ROPES ON THAT PLATFORM AND I SINCERELY HOPE YOU RECIEVE NOTHING FURTHER BEYOND MY BLOG. THANK YOU FOR YOUR TOLERANCE AND UNDERSTANDING.