I’m not usually one for trigger warnings because ~life is a trigger~, but I know a few people who read this have been through some shit recently, and in general a lot of people have been through a lot of shit, so if you don’t want to read about death, stop here.
This week was the six-year anniversary of my mum’s death. Anniversary is such a ridiculous word, but the English language is yet to provide us with an alternative, so here we are. I wasn’t even the one to realize, even though I literally wrote about it last week – a couple of friends texted me to say they were thinking of me, proving they are much better friends than I am a daughter. To be fair, I don’t think she would really care; she didn’t really go in for the maudlin. For the first few years I decided I would do something cool on the anniversary, not necessarily related to her death (nothing related to her death is cool), but just something I would remember, and I did; I went skiing, I flew to Mexico, I went for a fancy dinner. But this year when I got the texts, I messaged my sister in a panic like Oh shit! Want to get a drink?
I spend (waste) a lot of time thinking about sliding doors scenarios, which is something I think I’ve said on here before but can’t confirm as I have no means of searching past weeks’ newsletters as they are all unsaved Word files open on my desktop (this particular missive is entitled ‘Document 10’). But one of the scenarios that preoccupies me the most is: Who would I be if my mum hadn’t died?
It’s a dead-end (heh) question, as are all sliding doors scenarios. Does 24 still count as a formative age, where you’re influenced by your parents? Is 24 technically grown up? It didn’t feel grown up at the time, but then again, neither does 30. And I don’t feel like I need parental input at 30, but is that just because there’s none to be had?
There are a lot of things I maybe wouldn’t have done if she was still here, or if she’d been here for longer. I wouldn’t have done a masters in Creative Writing, where I wouldn’t have got the idea to go to New York, where I wouldn’t have moved, where I wouldn’t have got married… etc. As a general rule I think I wouldn’t have done as many stupid things. I have a wonderful support system of aunts and sister and friends, but none of them are quite as blunt as my mum was when I presented her with some madcap scheme. Which could maybe be considered a good thing? I don’t believe in regrets and don’t have any, but her input into some of my less-thought-out decisions would probably have given me pause. But at the same time, I don’t think I’ve done anything she wouldn’t have been proud of, although I’ve done many things that would have made her roll her eyes (things she rolled her eyes at while she was alive include my first tattoo and my tearful wish, in her last hours with us, that we hadn’t argued so much). But as most traumatic events do, her death made me grow up pretty fast, and become independent even faster. Which despite what it took to make that happen, I can’t help but see as a good thing. If she hadn’t died, would I still be that scared little bitch with a highly unrealistic five-year-plan who sat around and waited for it to happen?
Don’t misunderstand me. I would trade all my independence and rooftop Brooklyn parties and master’s degrees for five minutes with her. I’m not saying it’s a good thing. But I think one could arguably say that I did my best with the situation I was presented with. I think she’d be proud of me. I’m pretty proud of me, to be honest.
Below is a piece I wrote about her soon after her death, which made the one friend I showed it to cry (although she was depressed having just moved to London from California and spent most of her first few months in the country maniacally sweeping the house, so she probably would have cried at a dust bunny). It’s not exactly uplifting. But neither is death, so, give a shit.
I knew of course that today wasn’t going to be easy, but I wasn’t expecting such an instantaneous physical reaction upon setting foot in the house, in crossing the threshold back towards a life I can hardly remember now, a life where she was still around. It’s like when you get your nose pierced (which I can attest to, twice); the pain is so sharp and raw and surprising that you cry instantly, without even realising you’re doing it.
I think my sister and I were expecting it to feel cold and impersonal, like a museum, or a mausoleum, but it still felt warm and comfortable and indisputably like home. My sister said that made her feel better, but it made me feel worse, because it was our home we were gutting like a fish, harvesting what we wanted and leaving the rest of it consigned to a skip. Can you even imagine having to choose which of all your mother’s treasured possessions were worth keeping, which would look nice in your house, which ones reminded you of her but ultimately weren’t to your taste? As if you had the right to decide?
Strangely the easiest part was her bedroom, in a way, because so many of the things in there belonged to a life we’d never known she had; it felt almost invasive, like rifling through a stranger’s drawers, taking what you pleased. The whole room seemed like a collision of a life we’d never bothered to ask questions about and a life that, try as we might, was the only one we could remember; drawers of silk scarves and diamond rings stacked next to NHS emergency cards and blister packs of medicine, jeans and shirts and jumpers and jackets stuffed underneath piles of pyjamas that latterly had become the only thing she wore.
It was the most beautiful day when we went to see her plot, and I’d never before noticed how green everything was, like someone had turned up the brightness on the trees. When we got to her space all the other plots were in shadow but hers was glowing, like it was lit up from within, like the sun was throwing down a great spotlight to show everyone how important she was. I thought that just by being there I would be able to feel her presence, like the wind in the trees would sound like her voice or the birds chirping would sound like her laughter. But I felt nothing – the wind was just the wind, and the birds didn’t care who she was or had been. I wanted so badly to be in a place where I could feel her, but if it wasn’t there I don’t know where it would be.
As we were walking through the burial ground I thought that I was so glad she had been cremated. We walked past a field maybe a third-full of neat body-sized mounds of earth, and I thought I couldn’t stand the idea of her being lined up like that, like a conveyor belt of the dead. And then I thought that this whole vast field was just there to house the dead, that those ranks of bodies would grow and grow, places filled by people who didn’t know yet that they or their mothers or fathers or wives or sons or sisters were going to end up there. And I was glad she wasn’t part of their line.
But when we reached her plot I changed my mind. I thought about how it would be to lie down on the grass next to her in the sun, to curl up beside her body and just check out. I thought maybe there would be nothing in the whole world more peaceful than that.
One good thing:
After an evening spent whining about how difficult it is to have freelance pitches accepted by magazines, the next day I had one accepted. Manifest, people.
One bad thing:
Tomorrow (or yesterday, I suppose, by the time this comes out) I’m going on a hike on which for reasons I will not go into I really want to look attractive, and the weather forecast is 2 degrees and 90% chance of rain. RIP (heh).
I’m going to start a new feature which I’ve basically been doing anyway, which I will call ‘Contextless texts I’ve sent that are much funnier than the actual writing I’ve done above them’. I’m still working on the title. Maybe this should be a special feature for paying subscribers only? I doubt anyone would pay $/£5 a month for a Whatsapp screenshot. Although you never know. Until recently it seems I was paying $45 a year for a Musescore subscription which I used to download approximately one piece of music and promptly forgot about, until it merrily charged my card for another year’s subscription at a time where I really didn’t have $45 to spare.
Oh, I just thought of a better title while I was typing that! I present:
No con-texts
Also, sorry for two heavy ones in a row. I’ll make sure to have some bad sex this week and write about that.
GOD this is a long one. If you’re still here press the like button (heh).