not a diary

Is anyone else terrified of christmas? So much for the 'credit munch' the shops are already heaving and I'm starting to wander aimlessly around picking up things that sparkle, like some sort of magpie, and wonder what would 'suit' a particular friend or family member. it is relatively terrifying especially when people with double-buggies bash into your ankles or someone else believes it's their 'right' to scootch you along an aisle so you're not where you meant to stand.

I'm determined not to 'hide out' on the internet buying things on amazon.com but i do begin to feel like a total insignificant when i'm queueing up in hmv behind several 'yummy mummies' with nintendo DS-es or playstation-thingies.

why is christmas always so...
sweaty
sticky
tacky
argumentative
fattening

when it should be
festive
joyous
friendly
give-cuddles
warm

I think I'm going to try to have a christmas more like the below, so if anyone doesn't get a present, I'm sorry. I spent the money on mince pies and mulled wine. Oops.

x

I didn't write this, but I think sometimes it's the truest thing I've read in ages.

Many who say friend,
friend, clutch their balls like prayers
for fear something of themselves
may break loose and get away

many who mumble love,
love, keep an eye fixed for the fire
ladder, the exit hatch and at the first
sign of trouble do not hang around to chat.

many who talk of community
called the real estate agent last night
and the papers are drawn up to sell their land
to a nuclear power plant that shows dirty movies.

Don't count your friends by their buttons
until you have pushed them a few times.

My head is feeling about 5% better than it was. I am hoping that this points towards a daily 5% improvement rate, or maybe weekly. Here's hoping.

Losing someone is very difficult, even if I did know it was going to happen, and seeing the pain of people I love is also very difficult, because I can't control it at the same time as feeling really down about things myself.

Normally I use my job as a bit of an outlet for the home stresses I've had over the last year, but since September my working world has been turned on its head so that now, instead of saying my piece in a meeting and persuading others around to my way of thinking, i'm left in a situation where I have nothing to persuade about - i'm out of almost every loop going and I find myself in meetings with people hearing things for the first time which are going on in the office next door to me. but that's how this year is going to go, so i can either lie down and take it or continuously look for other work.

I recently found a job I could apply for which really leapt out of the computer screen at me as a viable option, but it means changing my life style a lot and going back to when I was a lot more reflective all the time about things and their meaning. a friend asked me when i'd last been totally happy the other day and i would say it was when i had no real commitments and was just studying and relaxing. but being a permanent student isn't what i want, i'd prefer to help others but not by doing a pgce and being a teacher, by helping people see different ways of understanding things. and through doing that, by making people think that words are beautiful. because they are. that's what my lecturers at uni did for me.

last night i picked up an essay in an anthology of essays i used to have to read weekly and talk about. i dreaded the seminars because the theory was so exhausting. I opened the page at Jacques Derrida, 'La Differance' and I read the first paragraph. and i still understood it. which, for someone like Derrida, is quite an achievement. so, maybe it is still what i want to do, somewhere along the line. i'm always so happy when i'm telling people about my favourite books and poems. i'm not sure whether that makes me a complete sad-case, or just an english graduate. who knows.

I suppose I'm one of those people who likes being good at things and avoids the things they are not good at. i'm not very good at managing people, so i avoid confrontations at work. i'm not very good at being honest about my feelings, so i'm not. and when i am, it's with a huge amount of fear that i'll lose something or someone precious. i'm also not good at seeing things from the outside in instead of the inside out. so when i don't get the reaction i was after i always think destructive things like 'but i would NEVER hurt that person, so why are they hurting me?' instead of something more constructive like 'maybe they are doing it totally unintentionally'. i suppose i've never been in a situation where i've really needed others as much as i do now. there's something quite scary about them not taking the bait.

i can't help thinking that at the moment, it's going to be a bit difficult for me to be almost 'saint-like' in my approach to things and people. a friend told me yesterday that i'm 'incredibly needy' and i should ask myself why. but i would say it is because i'm trying to find my place in the world. but aren't we all...

Thought I'd end the blog with a list of my favourite books/poems because it makes me happy to tell them to people. so, in no particular order then...

The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
East of Eden - John Steinbeck
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenedes
Fiesta - The Sun Also Rises - Hemingway
The Rainbow/Women in Love - DH Lawrence
Great Expectations - Dickens
Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
Nights at the Circus - Angela Carter
Anything shakespeare
Anything ts eliot
The woman in white - Wilkie Collins
Middlemarch - George Eliot
The 'staying alive' and 'being alive' poetry anthologies
Arthur and George - Julian Barnes
Things fall apart - Chinua Achebe
To the lighthouse - Virginia Woolf

These are all books that make me say 'wow'. But there are many more.
-x-

Hello all

The funeral was pretty much what I expected. I thought I'd hold it together initially, but I was in tears mainly at the poignancy of the whole thing. It was like I was watching a film, particularly when my Dad spoke towards the end. It's still hard to believe a piece has been taken out of my family.

Someone mentioned family to me today and it occurs to me that family can mean different things to different people. My extended family consists of the people who I have grown up with and refer to as family when biologically I'm no more linked to them as I'm linked to a stranger on the bus. I think my whole extended family feels like a huge part of us all has gone. Even at the wake someone turned to me and said 'am I the only one expecting him to walk in?'

This was read out at the funeral and I think I should put it here otherwise in a few weeks time I might be wondering about the words.

You can shed tears that he is gone,
or you can smile because he has lived.
You can close your eyes and pray that he’ll come back,
or you can open your eyes and see all he’s left.
Your heart can be empty because you can’t see him,
or you can be full of the love you shared.
You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday,
or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday.
You can remember him only that he is gone,
or you can cherish his memory and let it live on.
You can cry and close your mind,
be empty and turn your back.
Or you can do what he’d want:
smile, open your eyes, love and go on.

---
From my own point of view, he was one of those completely solid people. The first person you'd think of when you needed a 'favour' or practical help. He was one of those quiet stars that just simply gets on with things.

My whole family will miss him bitterly but I hope it won't be too long before it's not the first thing I think about when I wake up, and the last thing at night.

-x-

I'm spending an afternoon at home with my parents trying to take stock and re-evaluate. Recently we have all lost someone we were close to and death does do funny things to you even if you were expecting it.

i am now a week and one day into a phase of my life 'so far' that i wasn't looking forward to at all. now here it is and i'm on a really high alert for every minor detail and change happening around me as a result. i need my friends and the people i care about to put their wellies on and wade right into this mess with both feet, but ultimately this is what i've been petrified for the last 6 months: that i'll be upset about this departure from my family, and everyone will turn their backs on me.

maybe i do need a bit more analysis into why i think that will happen, but at the moment i don't have the energy at all to be analysed or judged by anyone who doesn't know me. and for those people who do know me, i'd prefer them just to understand how i'm feeling and cut me the slack i need.

I was saying to a friend the other day that it's almost as if something huge has changed in my life and the lives of my family, so i expect other things to change as a result. it's almost like i want something in the world to change in recognition. and of course, it hasn't. i almost want to scream when i get a 'there's a tiny issue we need you to deal with that we've decided is the size of a large mountain' email at work, because my world has changed and nobody else has even so much as flickered. possibly that's the 'angry' stage that grief is meant to take you through.

the stages of grief are also a huge lie. i bounce between them all the time. relief, anger, sorrow, sorrow, relief, anger... sometimes i can be angry and relieved at the same time. acceptance? nope, sorry... nowhere near.

i feel a bit like i've got a constant lump in my throat. i can be talking about something completely different and then get this overwhelming 'oh shit, i'm going to cry' feeling, so i swallow it and end up with this funny tingle in my left ear as a result. ear nose and throat, all related i suppose.

a friend is going away for a few days and was showing me his 'trip' on his i-phone the other day. i think i've lost absolutely all the energy i have to feel anything other than utter selfishness at the moment, because i almost want to run to heathrow airport and chop all the wings off the planes. or sabotage the luggage system. there is something in me saying 'nope, u actually can't contain all this grief and sadness in your head by yourself. u have to communicate with people or you won't be able to cope'.

i'm really not looking forward to next week.
i suppose i'll have to grit my teeth and hope it'll pass.

-x-