mid-winter thinking
Entry posted by swilkinson
895 views
I had a week with one of the nasty winter viruses around this year - this one had a headache that lasted four days with fever and a really bad throat plus a cough. Everything but the cough seems to have gone but coughing keeps me waking up and waking up keeps me thinking. Not a good thing at 3am as we all know. And it is too cold to get up and wander around the house as I can in summer so I stay in bed under the covers and hope I will get back to sleep.
I have got back to the stage of wondering why I am here, what the purpose of this part of my life is. I am now a Granma but with none of my grandchildren close to me, none of my children living close to me, and it seems old friends are gone already or are sick and dying, I seem to be burying them month by month now, I have another funeral of a church buddy on Thursday. I know I can always make new friends or can I? I feel as if this is an uphill battle sometimes. I wish the friends I lost due to Ray's illness and my unavailability would come back. I know that is just wishful thinking. I have to move on from here by myself. I know I have to learn to accept that I am alone and be content with that. But sometimes that takes too much energy.
So do I need to start all over again rebuilding my life?. I know from studying other widows and I have been around a lot of those in my lifetime, that none of this sounds unusual. We are all subject to death, both the slow death of the long term invalid, and I would say both Ray and Mum were in that category, and the sudden death that I have experienced with friends. There is a pattern of life, death and regrowth that surrounds us. Our own grief probably blinded us to that for a time but once we live back in the real world we see all that as a pattern our life too will follow.
I think this opportunity for deep thinking is a part of the usual winter cycle, wet, cold and windy weather does not attract me out and about and so I spend a lot of time in my own company and as I keep saying - I think too much. I feel as if I need to run, out in the sun, along the beach, somewhere where there is blue sky and warmth and other people, it is like a recurring ache, that is what I want to do. I know I should have planned a holiday somewhere in northern Queensland but the budget got a bit shrunk by the trip to England last year so a trip to the Whitsunday Islands, although I would love to be there, is not on the shopping list.
So what shall I do? no idea, none at all. My capacity to plan seems to be one of the casualties of the grieving process. When Ray was alive and I was a full-time caregiver I so longed to have the freedom to just get up and go and was full of ideas of trips here, there and everywhere and now I have got the time, and maybe could do some of this but have no motivation. Although I could go away for long weekends or short trips I have no-one to go with and will anywhere really be fun on my own? The benefit of the England trip was that I stayed with cousins and old friends and did not spend a lot of time alone.
There are some happy days though. I love it when I have lunch out with a friend, there is pleasure in an unexpected phone call, a chat with a neighbour, a time spent in someone else's company. I may not be a part of a couple but I can still be a part of a group or a circle of friends. But logistically, in the middle of winter, with so many people sick and many of my old friends not so anxious to go out into the cold this is not the time of the year for reunions of any kind. So any plans will have to wait till summer. And summer still seems a long way off.
I have thought of volunteering somewhere where there are plenty of people to talk to and maybe some laughter and maybe that is what I need to investigate in Spring. I know we have Senior Citizens Centres locally and they might provide some courses or classes in something new I would like to learn. I do need to learn new things, particularly practical things. And maybe it can be something practical like Hydroponic gardening, something new to talk to others about. As long as it is something I can set up by myself. I know I have to take up some new interests. I can't rely on others to entertain me and I need to feed my mind too.
Lately I have been running out of things to tell my daughter during our weekly phone calls. "How was your week Mum?" she asks and I think it is just the usual boring stuff, just gray days, long cold nights. "What have you got planned Mum?" my daughter always asks me that. But at the moment there is really nothing to tell her. Maybe when the days get longer, lighter and warmer I can plan another trip down there. Maybe I can do all kinds of things. I should devote my thinking time to determining what they might be. But sometimes it is easier to sit here and remember the past than it is to plan for the future.
4 Comments
Recommended Comments