{mally powell}

Day 29 - Inglorious isolation diaries

21 April 2020

Yesterday was the second anniversary of Dad's death, but today is the anniversary of The Phonecall and it feels more like the ‘real’ one to me. That was early on a Saturday morning; it took until the Monday to be 100% sure that he was really dead and have any sort of proper - if still, forever, incomplete - idea what had happened.

I’ve found today hard. I did a short yoga flow this morning, which was lovely but made me weep. I struggled to concentrate on work all morning, and was ratty and irritable with Titch this afternoon (and then massively guilty for being so ratty and irritable...).

But there were also hugs, and laughs, and flourless orange cake.

*

I cut Himself's hair this evening; it doesn’t look awful.

I think we’re all having waves of finding the whole lockdown thing hard. Titch is missing school and his friends, and is struggling to find projects to lose himself in. 

It's interesting how many of us are simultaneously craving contact and hunkering down. Friends talk of wanting to ‘escape’ the familiar walls and same faces, to see friends and shoot the breeze, but by the evening the idea of a (yet another) zoom call feels overwhelming and exhausting. We shifted our mid-week lovely-friends evening call to a morning coffee at the weekend it worked much better, though inevitably came with a small side order of ‘should be wrangling’ guilt. 

It can be overwhelming just discussing Covid news the whole blasted time, because there is No Other News and no one is going anywhere, or doing anything that isn’t a blur of work-school-domestic juggling. 

Leaving the house feels essential, and at the same time worrying. I fret while out and am glad to get home safe, but I also ache for a change of scene. Shopping trips are anxiety inducing; I often develop a psychosomatic sore throat for a few hours after a weekly trip to a shop.

I’ve never baked so much. If we could guarantee a supply of self raising flour and eggs it would be the perfect time for my ‘1 cake:52 ways’ project. Instead, Titch and I are on the third iteration of a flapjack recipe - perfection still eludes us but the ideal balance of chewy/crumbly/crispy goodness is getting closer.

How odd that Dad knows nothing of all this.

I’m so thankful that we weren’t in lockdown 2 years ago, and were still in the EU (oh, my heart). And my heart aches for those facing similar trials now, it doesn’t bear imagining.

Grief is a funny bugger - 4 January 2020

I noticed I had an unopened text and opened my inbox, convinced for a second that it would be a new year note from Dad. 

Then realised that, of course, it couldn’t be.

 

But now I think maybe it was?

 

Perhaps those seconds where we forget and feel their presence so strongly are little bubbles of all that unspent love squeezing through time, or at least consciousness, to momentarily bring them back to us. 

Grief is a funny bugger - 16 April 2019

Yesterday evening the world watched as Notre Dame burned.

 

It is almost a year since my Daddy died.

 

Last night I dreamed of him. It was so real, I could feel him and hear him. We both knew he was dead but I got to hug him tight and tell him how much we all love and miss him. It was so visceral it woke me.

I wanted to catch that dream again so badly.

 

When I was young I asked my mum if she believed in ghosts. She told me she’d never seen one but that her late mum sometimes came to her in her dreams and she thought that perhaps that was sort of the same thing. 

 

I think so too.

Grief is a funny bugger - 9 December 2018

Absence is weighing heavy today. 

 

There have been many quiet tears.

 

Walking the dog along the front earlier I suddenly had a vivid memory of my dad in the mortuary. Of realising they were bringing him to us in the cold, marble chapel and that I would have no choice whether to go into a viewing room with Mum and his partner or, as I expected I would, to stay outside. Of the doors from the mortuary opening and of hearing myself gasp ‘My daddy’ as I saw him. 

 

His partner was confused why he was so cold, and so still. 

 

He looked so... Him. My daddy. I wanted to hold him, but feared the chill stillness where there had always been a warm hug.

 

A kind orderly in scrubs brought us wine glasses and a bottle of fizzy water, and nodded gently while I tearfully thanked him in a language that was not his own. 

 

I thought I was fine with it.

 

I’m not.

Grief is a funny bugger - 20 November 2018

I spoke to Dad's partners sister-in-law today, and asked if she ever talks about or remembers Dad.

I don’t think she does, not really. Apparently she doesn’t talk much about him and when they bring him up she says ‘he’s the one who drowned’. I don’t really want to think too much about what might have morphed into drowning in her mind.

It feels so immensely sad. Another erasure. Another repository of memories of Dad being eroded so soon - just six months for their 27 years of love and laughter to fade away.

 

I know it has shaped her. I know she holds it in her heart even if she can no longer remember quite who, or when, or why. I know it matters not whether she can recall it but that they shared all those years of mutual adoration. But it still hurts. 

 

I hadn’t realised how fond I was of her until we lost Dad. If I’m brutally - shamefully - honest I was often jealous of her in recent years and sometimes wanted her out of the way. Not for ever, not even for very long, just for a little while so I could spend some time with my Dad without her. Just us. I missed us, I still do.

 

Over recent years, there was barely a minute where they weren’t together. There were certainly no more gentle afternoons just me and Dad hanging out in the pub or pottering at home, chatting, or not chatting. Just being. Together. I missed those. I always will.

 

In hindsight I can see that this was not just their increasing and eccentric co-dependence and teenagerish giggly adoration, but a symptom of something deeper and much more sinister. She was the body, he was the brain, and together they made it through. Now he, and all that kept her anchored in the here and now, has gone. And very soon she will be lost to us to.

Grief is a funny bugger - 28 September 2018

Grief is a funny bugger isn’t it?

I was walking by the marina earlier and noticed a circle of ripples suggesting that a cormorant had just dived under. Sure enough, after watching for a few moments I saw one bob up between the next row of boats and paddle around for a moment before dipping back out of site beneath the water.

It was the sort of thing that would have delighted Dad, and I felt a warm glow of connection to him that put an extra bounce in my step.

Grief is a funny bugger - 27 September 2018

Grief is a funny bugger isn’t it?

 

As I walk through a packed St Pancras International I become aware of singing. Warm, rich voices in unison.

 

As I move through the station, closer to the sound, I realise that a large group in African dress - a family maybe - are gathered around the Eurostar international arrivals door as a train empties, waiting for someone to appear and singing what I assume is a song of welcome. 

 

The sound is joyous, their excitement and anticipation tangible even through a crowd. 

 

The wave of loss it provokes is immediate and so intense that inconvenient tears flow as I continue to my platform.

Grief is a funny bugger. 19 July 2018

Yesterday evening it struck me that this will be the first time ever that I won’t get a birthday card from my Dad. 

 

I was so busy worrying about how to reply to a tricky email I more or less dismissed the thought and concentrated on the note.

 

I woke up early this morning at about 05:30 it hit me again, and how much of the process of dealing with his loss has been squashed by things that are not about him, and I just felt overwhelmingly sad.