Right Where I Am: 3 years, 8 months, 27 days

Last year, I hesitated. Between her birthday and the day that she died. This year, I don't. Today, it seems to be the death that is the more significant date, the 29th of August 2008.

***

One of my colleagues left work yesterday. Off to pastures new. He had the traditional British leaving do, a night at the pub followed by a curry.

I would have gone. I have enjoyed working with this competent, cheerful young man. I wish him well.

I explain to my husband. That I would have gone.  If circumstances had been otherwise.

'Why didn't you?' he asks.

Because I would have had a couple of beers. And then, inevitably, I would have got maudlin and melancholy. To be honest, I often get that way even without the assistance of beer. So I'm better in my inverse. A relief in my absence. As I often am these days.

And he doesn't contradict or reassure me. That it's ok. That I'm still good fun.

Because we would both know that would be a lie.

Right where I am, I'm not good fun. I suspect I won't be again. Too sensitive, exposed nerve endings trailing from my finger tips. 

***

It has been a beautiful, sunny day here. The green, lush trees and grass of the UK contrasted again the unexpected blue of a cloudless sky. The children splashed in the paddling pool (filled via bucket because of the hose pipe ban. Before you all dob me in to the authorities and get me a £1,000 fine for using a hose pipe. Bucket. I promise. M'kay?) The air smells of the boys next door's cigarette smoke and long ago teenage music festivals and someone in our neighbourhood sings Happy Birthday over a megaphone. I wonder if that is ironic given my reading matter but decide that I'm not clever enough to make that call. One of those words that the ill-educated probably shouldn't use.

I've been dipping in and out of the other posts here over the course of the day. Amidst the heat and the pool and the sharp sunlight. Reapplications of sun screen. Requests for juice. The removal of stones from Reuben's gummy jaws. I disappear from the garden, becoming only an echo in the wires. Visiting with my first child. I emerge with reddened eyes.

Although, even as I read, I'm aware that I am doing all of you an injustice.
Reading your words but unable to give them the full appreciation they deserve, that your children deserve.
Because surely I should stop, over every post. I should pray.
Or make something. With golden wires and intricate turning parts. Or carved from plain stone and smooth driftwood.
Or perhaps I should destroy something. Burnt offerings, smashed crockery.
A ceremony, a ritual, a mark, to make a mark upon the earth. That vain human wish.

I try to absorb all the details, the stories, the photographs, the love. I raise a fist to the sky (not literally as I am overlooked in my back garden and I'm too English for fist waving under the possibly observing eyes of my neighbours) and I cry. But what I leave with, is the love. It is the love that reddens my eyes. It is the love that makes me feel that surely all of this cannot be contained, cannot be entirely in vain, that our love reaches them, that it finds them. Because it seems to stream out of my computer screen, into this garden in the English suburbs. Where the sun is shining and a woman is crying quietly, so as not to draw attention to herself. Some peculiar and sad magic, bringing all that love into this small patch of ground, to this nondescript woman sitting on her square of lawn.

I'm relatively old here, in this corner of blog world. It is the love that keeps me here. For those achingly brief children of ours. The love that at once rips at the skin over my heart and wraps me up in the embrace that should have been theirs.

The love I have for my own daughter. A love that has no doubts, no reservations, no fears. So unlike the rest of my life. I doubt everything now, from my choice of sandwich filling to these words on the screen. I doubt myself, the bundle of failings and guilt that I so often seem to be.

But not her. Never her. There is no room for doubt when love and death follow so hard upon the heels of one another. It's now or never. And today I am reminded. Of that fearless, strong love. It runs through my readings of this project like a strong, steel wire at the core.

I still seem to need to witness, to listen, to echo. To, as Sally wrote so perfectly in a recent comment, to pay my respects. So here I am. Right here. Reading blog posts in this corner of the internet. Today. 3 years, 8 months and 27 days later.

Join in here

I've posted this song before but it is where I am, again, today.
Watching the flares travelling down the wires.

Some moments last forever but some flare out with love, love, love

Wise old owl

He seems like a nice chap. Wiry with gold rimmed glasses.

This is a relief as I do not much like asking for help.

He leans forward.

"So this was . . . when? When did you say? 2008?"

He taps his pen against his teeth and I look out of the window. It's raining.

"Well," he says, "when something awful happens, we have two choices. When soldiers come back from a war, some of them need to talk about it, some of them need to not talk about it. They only need to forget. What you need to do is to figure out which one of those two types of people you are. Talking or forgetting."

He looks over in a kindly fashion, as though I am a child. And maybe I am.
Perplexed over a book with no pictures or conversations in it.
Being the writing type is not mentioned.

"When your son died, something awful happened. And then, of course, your daughter was gravely ill for a very long time. It must have been very difficult."

The room spins slightly as my son dies.
But I only manage a small, squeezed, "yes."

It wasn't only awful, I want to tell him. It isn't the awfulness alone that keeps me pinned there. Awfulness doesn't keep me awake at night. Everything does. Love and curiosity and bafflement and worry and wonder and the need to take a long hard stare at the blackness.

If it had been only awful, I'd be the first in line for forgetfulness, for muteness.

But I don't. Because it would take too long to explain.

I just don't know. I no longer have any idea how to help myself. I thought that I was helping myself. I write about joy and happiness and I'm not lying. They are back, where I never, ever thought that they would be. But the thing with writing is that I have a tendency to reach right around with my long wordy arm and stab myself in the back.

There's a reason I work with numbers. Less potential for knifing. Particularly for impaling yourself. Nobody ever took their own eye out with a number 8, no sharp edges you see. You'd think you could stab yourself in the heart with a 4, but you can't. I've tried, he's too blunt despite his pointy appearance. But words, words are a different and a far more slippery matter.

Is that all I've done? Is that all I've achieved? All these hours crying in front of this computer? Although it's been so long that 'this' computer is, in fact, two different pieces of hardware.
Trying to trap her here with words. Trying to reach her with words. Because, as far as I know, nobody has ever yet managed to reach the dead with words. Shakespeare? Nope. Dickens? Nope. Murdoch? Nope. Atwood? Nope. Updike? Nope. H.D.? Nope. Even my dear MacNeice? Nope. Every Booker Prize-Nobel-Pulitzer winning author ever? Nope. Although you feel certain that they could, that they should. If this world happened to make any sense whatsoever.

She does not answer for them, my dear Georgina. Not matter what I read with tears streaming down my face. So, let's face it, she is not going to answer to my stumbling fumblings.
But the stubbornness in me won't give up. I'm more stubborn about this writing than I ever was back in 2008, when they floated the idea of withdrawing intensive care. Because I crumbled then. Before he did. Is it any wonder I'm a little stuck back there? The weak point.

Am I holding her up for witnesses when she was meant to be private and quiet? Dignified. Small and dry. Not this gushing on and on and on and on of emotion. Not for my sea rose daughter. Sparse. Bony. Too early to be the pudgy, chubby baby that I dreamt of.
Words that came to mean too much to me, that made me believe that they were her.
When they aren't. They are less than nothing. Just dust. From dust, to pixels, to dust.

As a teenager I longed for Dick Diver-like repose, for grace, for self containment, self restraint.
To be someone less messy, less garrulous, less of an embarrassment.
So I try. I try to keep the corners neatly folded, to keep everything tidy and small.
Gracious. Kindly.

But give me a keyboard and I can't seem to shut up.
Splurging, binging on all that I can't say during working hours.
Or to my husband.
Or to a three year old and a one year old.
RRRAAAGGGHHH!
And BBLLLUUURRRGGHHH!
And the fact that I'm still, actually, very sad.

I'm very, very sad that Georgina died. But not only sad.
Really, I could delete all of this rambling and just replace this blog with the previous two sentences.
If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't be here.
I wouldn't be trying to do something that I am ill, ill-equipped to do.

Perhaps I am the forgetting kind.
It wouldn't surprise me to find that I've misunderstood myself all along.
Perhaps I am the kind that is supposed to just shut the hell up.
To make like an owl.
A wise old owl.

A wise old owl sat in an oak,
The more he heard, the less he spoke.
The less he spoke, the more he heard,
Why aren't we all like that wise old bird?

Good morning

Good morning son.

Today you are one.

Sometimes I am full of regrets when I look at your sweet face.
With your smile that seems to extend to the very tips of your hair.
With your four teeth boldly poking out.

I wish that I could remember being pregnant with you, that I could look back fondly on that time. Reading to you, singing to you, rubbing my belly with anticipation and hope. But I didn't. I look back to that time and try to remember how I felt when you were kicking around inside. But all I can come up with is a deep, black blank and a feeling of disbelief. I fear you were ignored. Surrounded by sugar and anxiety.

I wish that your birth had been different. That I hadn't been so frightened.
But it was only the start. A bit of screaming at the start never hurt anyone.

I think that the first word I ever said to you was, "hello."
I don't know. I can't remember. It has slipped away like your uncompleted baby book.
Because I couldn't start yours until I had finished your sister's.
And hers still sits there. With only one page filled out.
And yours is a blank.

At times I wish I had written more about you here. Your other sister's bizarre baby book disguised as a blog. If you ever find this place when you are older, will you count the words that are yours and feel slighted? But I don't have to love you in halting prose, full of insecurities and potential hurts.

I will never forget how happy I was to see you.
Your sweet face. Which is just as sweet now.
Although I did not yet know about the smile that would extend to the very tips of your hair.
Or how boldly your teeth would poke out.

And if wishes were horses, beggars would ride.
I could wish that I had enjoyed this first year more. I could wish for so many, many things.
Two big sisters instead of only one.
A better mother.
Riches.
A crown.
A pony.
Chocolate buttons that wouldn't give you rotten teeth.
Anything and everything.
I could wish that the world noted my wishes.

Now is not the time for wishes and regrets.
Some things are better left alone.
Now is the time for smiles and teeth and boldness and hair.
Hair that seems to smile.
Four bold teeth.

Good morning son.

Today you are one.

I love you.

Twenty years from now, maybe we'll both sit down and have a few beers.

I do hope so. Because I can't quite give up wishing altogether. Where would I be?

Still Standing

I'm very honoured to be contributing to an amazing new project, Still Standing, started by the wonderful Franchesca at Small Bird Studios.

Still Standing is an online magazine with contributors from around the world. Its aim is to inspire healing after the loss of a child, and for those facing infertility. I feel very lucky to be joining with so many amazing artists and writers as part of this venture. I hope that we will be able to bring some comfort and community to parents facing these difficult times.

I first 'met' Franchesca online back in 2009, through her blog. Her story spoke to me as she had also lost her eldest daughter, Jenna Belle, to premature birth. I have looked on in awe over the years as Franchesca's many wonderful creative ideas have unfolded, from her beautiful blog designs to the line of cards she has produced in collaboration with Carly Marie.

I lost one of my twin daughters, Georgina, to premature birth in August 2008. I will be writing about grieving for a child through the years, how it feels to be a little further down the road as I approach the fourth anniversary of my daughter's death, dealing with grief in the workplace and issues surrounding raising a surviving baby (or babies) from a multiple birth.

The magazine will be launched on the 5th of May, a very special date as it is Jenna's third birthday. In the mean time we have a facebook group and a newsletter to sign up to here.

Hope to see you there.

Your Cheating Heart

My heart.
It is not a faithful muscle.

It is also not, it would appear, particularly clever. Being heart and not brain, I suppose we can excuse it. Poor dumb heart. It misbehaves so.

"She died," I say. I shout the same. Dumb heart. Thump, thump, glub, glub.

I don't care, says heart. It contracts, it relaxes. It doesn't really speak and its supposed speech doesn't even warrant speech marks. Apparently. Dumb. Yet it talks to me.

Doesn't listen though. No ears you see.

Dub, dub. Love, love. Ever the optimist.

"There's no end point to that particular branch of blood. She's gone. You can beat until you burst. Dumb heart."

Beat, beat. Drum, drum. We will bring her back. We are magic, you and I. Heart and I. We will. Our will. Will bring her back.

Locked in an internal battle not considered since the Greeks. Odysseus, you know where I'm at.

"There is no point, generating left overs for a baby that does not exist. For a toddler that isn't here. For a woman who stopped. Stopped before she ever really started."

No left overs. Says heart. If heart could speak.

A full portion. For her.

"Shame there's nowhere to put it. Shame. Shame. Shame."

But I'm strong, says heart. For all your shame.

Weak

"The problem is that you are so weak," he spits at me.

Except he doesn't spit. The words are deemed undeserving of accompaniment.
They are served up dry, like little bundles of kindling.
For starting fires.

I want to argue. I want to agree.
Spineless. Toothless. Everything less.
Less than less.
A negative.
A cipher.
A void where a woman once stood.
The inverse of muscles and bone and brain.

Passion and thought in reverse.
Inwards and inwards.
Coiling back into myself.
Away from tinder and flint and spark.

Uncertain as to whether I have always been like this or if I became this way by increments.
If I have been this way since birth.
Or if it was her death that loosened my joints and slumped my shoulders.

But she isn't to be bandied about as an excuse.

And so I simply sit. Devoid of agreement or argument.
Hands open. Weakly.

Stasis

stasis (from Greek στάσις "a standing still") A state of stability in which all forces are equal and opposing, therefore they cancel out each other.

I have a tendency to gather moss. Unless forcefully pushed I like to stay where I am, static.

I live five minutes walk away from the hospital that I was born in, 1979.
My husband was born there too, same year.
The twins were born there.
Reuben was born there.

We live close to both my parents and my husband's parents, still married, residing in the homes that my husband and I grew up in. We went to those self same houses upon our returning from the hospital, 1979. On opposite sides of town.

An accumulation of memories, different heights and weights, doorways viewed from down low and suddenly, from high. As though on stilts. Or suddenly falling to the floor and straightening up, to find that you are not quite the height that you expected.

The years grow a thick, fuzzy patina over this small circular territory of ours. London overspill. Slops.

At times, this makes me feel like a failure. Adolescent-me slaps her open palm to her forehead and sighs. Really, you are still here. Oh. My. Days. Some kind of a loser you turned out to be.

And I wonder if it was her who, when the twins were born, hissed in my ear, "well, what did you expect?"

My mother says that sometimes, when she is out walking with Jessica, she looks down and is surprised to see that her hands are old. She feels displaced in time, my mother as me, me recast as Jessica.

She is not the only one travelling through time.

I take Jessica and Reuben to the park. This is a park I remember from my own childhood. We laze on the grass with cheese and bananas and fig rolls (they tasted better in my childhood memories although Reuben appeared to like them well enough.)

There is the pale brick wall that I used to walk along the top of when I was as old as Jessica is now.
There is the park where I used to slump on the swing at fourteen, listening to Metallica cassette tapes on my friend's stereo.

And I feel a strange sense of alignment. I look at my hands and feel mildly surprise to discover that I have hands at all.


I've been thinking about this post of Josh's a great deal this week.

When you have lived in the same town your entire life, it is rather hard not to think about time.
To envisage strange patterns and rhythms. Your child sits on that spot on the stairs opposite the hallway mirror where you used to sit. And the carpet wears.
Blink, you are a child.
Blink, you are your parents.
Blink, you are your grandparents (if you're lucky).
Blink again, you are gone.

I am all of a-withering, I have stood here too long. 1979 and cassette tapes seem an unimaginably long time ago. But yet, to me, they are still present.

Everything, everyone, they are all still with me. A vast plethora of items and memories and people strung to my ankles and wrists, trailing out on strings. My daughter, she is still with me. Slung around my neck on silver. Cold, dead weight on my heart. And in the beating of my blood pulsing around my body. She is as there as she ever was. Or perhaps she is as here as she ever was.

Life and death are an irrelevancy to my tiny, mighty daughter. I feel she is still here, right up against me, that I'm still holding her in my arms as I once did, our skins touching as they did touch. Once. Just minutes ago, just years ago.

Sitting there, in that same park, I feel as though I am simultaneous. I walk along the wall, my legs at once short and tall. I slump, I smoke, I cough, I'm drunk, I'm walking past this place to the shops, I'm walking past this place to catch the bus, I'm talking to my friend about the time she tried to kill herself, I'm running, I'm playing Manhunt around the Alleys, I'm pregnant and just starting to feel two sets of movements, I'm kissing that unsuitable boy over by the swings, I'm old, old and sitting here remembering. I don't think I will remember everything perhaps. But I will remember the wall walking, maybe I'll even try it again. If I'm still around and sure footed enough. And today it feels as though I already did. My old lady self has already walked that wall, her feet matching my four year old steps.

I'm here with Jessica and Reuben and I'm 32 years old and two of my children are solid, with muscles and bones. Displacing air and time in waves around them.

And Georgina seems to be there too. With the ghosts of myself as a child and my wall walking future old lady herself. With me, just separated by time. Or maybe not. Because we are all cut so very short, on a short fuse, time ticking, time a-wasting, we are going to the earth, we are going to the skies and into trees. Who knows where we will go?

Maybe everything that falls down, eventually rises.

We are so insignificant. Tiny specks of dust on a tiny speck in a tiny place. One brief blink and we are here and gone. But, in the park, I feel that this is what sets me free.

Because if you head out far enough, three days and thirty two years overlap perfectly. And I can stop searching and just be content in the knowledge that you aren't that far away. I can rest because you are here. One insignificance to another perhaps but my heart, my heart tells me otherwise.

Who wants to be burdened with significance when you could be light, your heels hardly making divots in the earth?

Who wants to drive their foot down and down into the soil. Attempting to stamp your significance upon things that are vastly indifferent.

You could try but you are here. Then gone. Before you've hardly woken up.

And to be all of those things, people, imaginings, ghosts, spirits, memories of size and movement, shallow dents in the earth. All of these things happening at once. Shadowy and solid.

And yet to mean nothing at all? Perhaps that is not so bad. It will do.

My dear girl, how I do miss you. Oh my heart.