Grief

*Beep*

"The person you're calling is..."

*click*

"Dead. The person I'm calling is dead."

I'm wearing grief like a shawl, pulling it tighter around myself to keep out the draft of normality. Who wants to go back to real life? Not I, I have busy things to do, I need to stare into space, wander aimlessly, shuffle around the house with a hot water bottle. 

I have played at normality a little, the laugher of children lifting my soul, but that's not the real world, not now, the real world is in that house, stagnant, with grief congealing on every surface, powdered with it like a layer of dust. Grief is in the very air we breath and I swallow down lungfuls of it as if they will be my last.

I sleep fitfully, my dreams give me no comfort as I am paraded from one image to the next. I wake and find myself sleepwalking through the day. I read and each page blurs into the next and I wonder if I'm just reading the same sentence over and over like a broken record. I eat and it's ashes in my mouth, I watch films that would once have been a secret escape, now it is like being locked in an empty room. The mornings race away from me and the evenings crawl by, the minutes tormenting me, I long to sleep, perchance to scream. 

"When you have a moment of happiness, does it make you feel guilty?"

"No"

Why? Should it? Was I such a bad granddaughter that I she would have wished me to stay in this deep pit of empty despair? I ponder this, I ponder everything. I know the answer but what more is there to do than ponder it all away?

I feel guilty telling people, I hate to hear them apologise, the sincerity, they have lost people, they can relate, but it is too small a gesture, I have to say it's fine, I have to placate them and my guilt at having brought it up is a small and awkward little feeling. How can I tell them how utterly tragic the truth is that the world has lost you, that a little piece of my perfect world has ceased to exist and a little part of me will have died with you? 

How can I tell them that it is not sad at all, that you haven't really gone anywhere, you are in everything I see and do, you are in me and I rejoice that you ever were at all?

How can I tell them that it doesn't matter that you're gone because my whole being has gone numb and I can't really remember who you are or what you meant or who I am or what I am meant to be doing?

So it's fine, I say and keep my desperate swell of emotions to myself with a tight little smile, I wish you wouldn't apologise, but thank you anyway. 

The children are great, they are heartfelt and when they go back to smiling and laughing I do not feel bitter that they can sweep you from their minds so easily, but a bitter little part of me feels that adults should know better, that your passing should rock the lives of every adult who hears, they should be falling apart at the news, the whole nation brought to it's knees in mourning. 

These words have become commonplace, mourning, grief, passing, bereavement. They are the new glossary that accompanies our everyday lives. Not an hour goes by that I do not speak them. What happened to words I used to use to define my life and my time? What was I before I was bereaved? How did I define myself if not as someone nanless? 

Am I nanless? Has your death changed who I am? There must have been a side of me only you knew, I was someone's granddaughter, now I am not, that died with you. I keep a piece of you with me, but you took a part of me with you and the world has changed as there is one less person who understands me, one less person who even wants to try. 

I am all analogies and metaphors, smilies and cliches. My grief is a shawl and my memories are a quilt and wonder when I will be ready to exchange one for the other. 

'Dear Nan'

Dear Nan, 

Your gift to us will be a quilt, that will be your legacy. A patchwork of memories that we ourselves will have to gather and with tender, meticulous care, stitch together into something we hold dear. It will keep us warm, bring us comfort and protect us when we feel the weight of the world is on our shoulders. 

Some patches may be worn, frayed and threadbare, we may have to turn to others to lend us their memories and a needle and thread, or share our own patches with others should their quilts need tending. 

And yet, no two quilts will be the same, each will be as unique as the individual who pieces them together, we each knew you in our own way, and while you were loved by us all, you were a different person to each of us.

Some patches will be plain, faded or dull, yet these we may treasure the most. Your smile, your laugh, the tissue crumpled in your hand, opening your letters with a miniature sword, the smell of cinnamon and spice in the air. 

Some patches will be bright, patterned and embroidered, embellished with appliqué, a photo of you wearing a christmas jumper and a batman mask, offering me the skin off your back, telling me "they're a bit special' with a cheeky smile and the way you could belt out any song from any musical with all the finesse of a seasoned pub singer. 

Some patches will be dark, for there is no light without the dark and you were a whole person. I feel lucky that we had our struggles, as it was only through knowing both your triumphs and your flaws, that I could come to love you for who you really are. 

But, at the heart of my quilt, I will remember your acceptance. I will remember your grace in acknowledging your mistakes, the way you protected me when others could not understand and the way you never stopped learning and growing. They are the threads that will run through my quilt, they are the stitches that will hold the rest together.

Nan, I will miss you with all my heart, you will leave a gap in my life; an empty chair, but I promise I will not forget and your quilt will keep me warm, 

With love always, 

Hannah xx

Failure

It's a heavy word isn't it. Failure weighs on us all. It weighs so hard on me that it creeps into every new thing before it has begun. I'm afraid that fear of failure might be a more powerful motivator than hope of success. I'm not scared of failing, I have already failed, failure is already branded across my interests, my education, ocupation, my body and mind. I am already trapped in a cage of failure and the shame of it, and when I try, I try because I need to escape it somehow. But taking risks, trying things, these are the surest way to more failure. I don't believe that if you don't try then you've already failed, but I do believe that trying is important, despite the risk of failure, I believe it is the better option. When I started writing I was doing so for myself, I made books for myself and I was happy doing it but I wanted to share them, I wanted to prove that I was worth something. Now I have been encouraged and bolstered, I have been told I could use what I have made, I have been told that it could become a career, an occupation, a small hoped that I might use it to drag myself out of this pit of failure I feel I am living in. People were kind, I am still glad of that. Then I went away, I don't know if it made a difference or whether the weight of all that hope and expectation put a spanner in the works but now I have been home weeks and I cannot draw, I have a traditional art block, it is like someone has frozen my hand and only words flow from it, never pictures. All those words waiting for their pictures, you know I would have to write a thousand of them just to break even. I am back to square one and the anxiety of not achieving what I had hoped I would, and the weight of the failure yet again has made me too heavy to drag myself in to school, yet more failure. I have become a ball of self loathing and pity, a tangled, knotted mess of contempt, a mocking, sneering bully. "Thought you'd amount to something eh? You're hopeless and you will always be broken, stay down, don't get back up, you're defective, you failed again". 

Each day goes by and I wish that what I've already got was enough for me to be one of those fuctional, worthy members of society, but we live in a Jeremy Kyle culture and I cannot unhear the things that define me, the way society sees my sort, the truths about who I am. 

So, these are my ponderings on failure, this is where I am post-travel, I don't want placation, I am venting, pouring out the reality I am living due to my perception, it cannot be changed but with time and perhaps validation. I'm sorry it's so negative, not for you, for me, I wish I was happer for me, not so I could write cheery blogs about birdsong and gardening and lemonade. 

The most useful thing anyone can do is hand me some knowledge that I might find my way out. 

Homeward bound

I woke up this morning and burst into tears. I am worn, I am frayed, I feel full of relief and hope and fear, I am on my way home. Yesterday left me an emotional wreck, I'm tired, I'm ready to go back to my routines, to be back with my people, to stop pushing myself to do all the time and just be for a while. If someone offered me more time in Wellington, I wouldn't have to think twice, I know I would take it, but with the choices I have, I want to be home. I'm not looking forward to the flights and I know when I return I'm going to feel so very strange, returning home is always difficult, especially when you have difficulties with object constancy, I have to prepare myself for the onslaught of mixed emotions I'll go through, as I know I will. 

I think that's all there is to say, this has been a real experience, but I think I'll have to let you know how I feel about it later. 

Ps. I saw a huntsman spider.

Homeward bound

I woke up this morning and burst into tears. I am worn, I am frayed, I feel full of relief and hope and fear, I am on my way home. Yesterday left me an emotional wreck, I'm tired, I'm ready to go back to my routines, to be back with my people, to stop pushing myself to do all the time and just be for a while. If someone offered me more time in Wellington, I wouldn't have to think twice, I know I would take it, but with the choices I have, I want to be home. I'm not looking forward to the flights and I know when I return I'm going to feel so very strange, returning home is always difficult, especially when you have difficulties with object constancy, I have to prepare myself for the onslaught of mixed emotions I'll go through, as I know I will. 

I think that's all there is to say, this has been a real experience, but I think I'll have to let you know how I feel about it later. 

Ps. I saw a huntsman spider.

My time in Sydney.

The last few days I have done the following: 

- Taronga zoo

- Cinema to see Zootopia 

- Got very wet

- Walked quite a lot

- World's worst cat cafe

- N2 (liquid nitrogen) ice cream

- Met up with my friend Luke

- Bough my teaware (expect photos) 

I think that's it, I've not done everything I'd planned to, but it rained quite a lot and I sort of kept running out of time. 

I'm not happy, I'm surviving, that is my goal, just to get through it all. Sometimes something is nice, like the sun today, but I'm quite focused on getting home now and that's my right, to feel that way. I don't have to like everything, I can hate the whole holiday if I want and not learn a single lesson from it to boot. But that's not the case, I am growing a lot as this is a challenge and it takes a lot of skills to negotiate it emotionally, so it has great value, but I don't know if I'll return to Sydney, at least not for simple enjoyment.

I do have a day and a half left though and I'm certainly still open minded about enjoying myself.  

The nature of travel

I believe:

Travel is a careful balance of three really important elements; nourishment, survival and growth. 

Nourishment is the good stuff, walking in the sunshine, seeing things that make you laugh or smile, unexpectedly connecting with strangers, climbing really big hills and seeing the vastness of the cook strait etc, they're not hard times, though sometimes they're more nourishing than others, but like a really good salad with beetroot and goats cheese and quinoa, they just feel... Good. 

Survival is day to day living. Eating, sleeping, washing, keeping warm (and dry), attending to medical issues, attending to emotional issues. It's the things that keep you going, it's the auto pilot, it's integral because without it you wouldn't survive, it's life maintainance. 

Then there's growth. Think muscles, think trees, it's often trauma that leads to growth and strengthening, sometimes it's nourishment, but without trauma I don't believe we grow. So a healthy dose of challenge is required for travelling, and the ability to see the value in each experience so that we can turn them into growth and in turn do more, seek more nourishment, seek further growth. 

I believe that without these three elements, travel would be at best unfulfilling, at worse life threatening. (You need food and rest! Survival!)

There's one more thing that I think is really important, I'm going to call it Authenticity. 

I think when you travel, and yes it's cliche, you have to be true to your inner nature, it has to be for you, your own authentic self. I know people who I believe are outgoing, I believe they make many friends when they travel, I know people who are adventurous, I believe they see more, I have wanted to be those people, I don't particularly relish the thought of travelling 11,000 to sit alone in my room, and I don't believe it's nourishing, however, it's MY experience, it's what happens to me, and I can tell you one thing, when I can't leave the house, I'm certainly not trying to be someone else. (Usually there's some growth, I use the time to reflect, to some degree.) Anyway, I digress, it's really important that whatever you do, you do it as you. 

Travelling is an ongoing process, after you return, you reflect on what happened, you begin to shape your memories from the experiences you had and those memories replace what it was really like, they are an amalgamation of your experiences, and how you feel looking back, and they last a lot longer than the experiences themselves. Sometimes, people and places we didn't like get a rose tinted makeover when we make our lasting memories, and equally the things we might have liked get tainted by something that happened afterwards and our memories will tell us it was a negative experience, that's how life works. The processing part, when we return home is as important as the experiences themselves, because it's so far reaching, it stays with you a lifetime. 

And that, my friends, ends this evening's reflection.