I didn't mean to come here, but apparently LJ wants me to write something.
Philosophising a bit. I am still 'working' on the great move, but we have
already decided that if it doesn't happen there is this and that and the other
to be done. It is a difficult one. Memories can be pretty ferocious. Forex I am
in the yard right now looking at a trash can. The trash can has rather large
holes in it. Hmms, the sons one day decided to paintball it. But would we move
it? of course not. And while the memory remains in the mind, the object of it
will not. There are many things I have already parted with, because, 'things'
don't hold the memories as such, but, still, it is hard to let them go. But they
would pile up like a pyramid. What do I seriously do with army shirts and socks
and a dress coat? I have no idea, but to let it go out of the door to someone
who won't care? That is a different matter. So you get left with this conundrum
that you don't 'need' objects.
In some ways it is like when Mak passed last
week. Do you want a paw print, do you want his ashes etc. I said, no, I just
want his leash. The same one which went through four other wolfhounds. I don't
*need* ashes or pawprints. Not to say I wouldn't have appreciated them but...
the best memory I have is a photo of Rich and Mak together. That is all I
need.
Spiritual folk have all said I need to let Rich go. I kinda laugh at
that. You don't let a child go. You hold him in your heart forever. Especially
when there are still those wretched questions. I ask, what do they mean exactly
and they can never tell me. Like I won't let my mum go, or Buster, or Everest,
or Bridie, or Faolan, or Tigger, or my dad. No, you never let them *go*. Because
you hold them in your heart and soul.
I refuse not to wear Rich's dogtags. I
refuse to take a picture down, but really, those things don't matter when you
think of them. But in some ways they do. Memory is a fickle thing and I *refuse*
to let any of those I have 'lost' leave my memory. They are all important and
will remain so. There isn't an hour I don't think of Rich in some shape or form.
Not obsessed, just, he won't leave me either. I think of that daft Canadian
horse I had so briefly, with love and exasperation. The cats, the dogs, the
people. I don't separate them in my mind. Not the same kinds of grief. I noticed
that with Mak. He (kindly) let us know when it was time and it was so different.
Hurtful, of course. There were many tears, but it wasn't the same as that
snatching away of a life too young, but an acceptance of, I am tired, I've had
enough. Much as my mum when she passed with cancer. She'd simply had enough. Or
my dad or G's dad. They'd reached their span. My mum was far too young but I
remember her saying, I am so tired of pain. I've had enough.
it is why,when I
try to explain to people, Rich was so different. I can't get my head around this
thing where our lives are mapped out and we have choices, because I don't
believe he had a choice. I could be innocent/naive/daft, but I don't think I am.
He never meant to go and the resonance of that lingers. It echoes ever day where
other grief's fade so much more quickly. And folk will say, well, he was your
child, of course. Yes. But I am tired of pain. The pain of that hurt. And Rich
and I were clones of a sort. We looked alike, we thought alike, and while I
hadn't had to scrape up the body parts of comrades, I know exactly what that
would do to me. I know nightmares of guilt and pain, and still I know that he
would no more than me have jumped. So that pain, is a different kind all
together.