Coming up Roses

It was good to rub the last of the jelly off my right breast after the Ultra-sound scan. All clear, no sign of anything nasty, just a false alarm. The mammogram showed a cluster of cells which turned out to be normal. What a huge relief, yet only a few months' ago I wouldn't have cared too much, thinking that it would be not that bad if I were to die. No more grief, no more thinking about him and the good times, no more wondering what the three spinners of destiny have in store for me. My girls are self-sufficient and strong and would survive without me. So what's changed?

The only answer I can give is that perhaps: I have!

Now I want to live - don't know why! Nothing much has changed; I still don't have a job; no friends nearby; no social life; no idea of what I want to do with the rest of my life. But... I'm off to Tenby for a few days at half-term holiday with two daughters and three grandchildren in a caravan, and I'm really looking forward to it. We may all end up with cabin fever and short tempers by day four, but it doesn't matter... we are going somewhere, and together.

I am grateful that my scan showed normal cells, unlike the brave woman in the waiting room with me who had a negative result and was holding back the tears as she and her friend left quietly.

A reminder that Roses have thorns...

Light at the end of the tunnel

I used to think that it wasn't a light I saw at the end of the tunnel, but a train speeding toward me instead.

Five months after he died I though I was doing really well and conquering grief. One year after he died I felt as though it had only just happened and that I'd been in some sort of time warp.

Eighteen months after he died I began to think of finding work, hobbies, friends, but a couple of months later I was back in the depth of despair and just wanted to curl up and die. When was it going to end? Was this normal? Perhaps I was depressed as well as grieving.

I'd seen various doctors about my continued fainting episodes and had all sorts of tests done; all knew that I was recently widowed but all they said was "how're you doing?" To which I could only murmur, "Okay", not wishing to even begin talking about it for fear of collapsing in tears in front of them. I suggested to one GP when discussing more results that returned absolutely normal, that could it be some sort of anxiety attack that makes me faint? She shook her head and said "Not unless you're having palpitations as well." Which I didn't remember at the time, but later I realised that yes, I had felt palpitations as well as feeling faint - then promptly fainted; several times.

Mind you, I have fainted several times in my life-time, often hurting myself, smashing teeth, bruising and banging various bones and my head in the process. My blood pressure seems to dip abnormally low at odd times, hence the fainting. If only I could do it gracefully.

Now, two years and one month after he died, I do see light at the end of the tunnel, which some days is brighter than others. And, just when I'm feeling okay and positive about me, life and my future, I receive a phone call to go into hospital this afternoon for another breast scan.

Is a train speeding towards me after all?

California Dreamin

I first saw the Californian Poppies growing wild on the banks of roads while we drove along the Gold Route in California a few years' ago. I bought a packet of seeds from a small shop in the Nappa Valley and since then have enjoyed them in my garden each summer. Petals like smooth velvet turning their faces to the sun, then closing up on dull days and in the evening.

I've been up to my neck in pond weed, nettles and thorns trying to clear out the little stream that runs along the road edge and my garden. Although I don't own it, I am apparently required to keep it clear. Frogs, snails, insects of all types and smelly mud have tried to frighten me off, but did I falter? No. The last bag of ripped-out weed has been taken to the amenity site where a rugged man heaved them into the garden waste bin.

Just the remaining hanging baskets and summer pots to empty and put away for winter, and nearly forgot, the mammoth task of cutting back my neighbour's encroaching hedge that has now become a bramble hedge instead of Beech. A task I shall need help with unless I keep at it for the rest of the winter months. Some of my neighbours don't DO gardening; they hire a man for the day.

If he were still here, he would say, "get someone in and I'll pay." Ahh, those were the days. Where's a good man when you need one? That's what I say.

Instead, a good woman has to get on with the job.

Niagra in Time

Niagra Falls in early winter 2004 where the temperature was minus 21 (it said so on the car thermometer). This photo was taken by my lovely man just a couple of months before he suffered a stroke. He was on a business trip researching a new communications system for our Police and which came into use in the UK shortly after. He was a work-a-holic and the pressure and tension he was under, both imposed and self-imposed was tremendous. He decided to retire on the 30th December that year because the pressure was becoming too great and his request to go part-time had been refused. We had visited Niagra before while on holiday and visiting my brother in Ajax near Toronto. It was a different Niagra then, with sunshine, leafy trees and deep blue waters emerging from the pounding falls. He was relaxed then; no worries and the future looked bright.

Cold Mountain

A few years' ago I read a book called 'Cold Mountain' by Charles Frazier; I believe it was his first novel. It took me a little while to get into his drift of writing, but when I did, I couldn't put it down. Then, shortly after I'd finished reading his novel, I heard that the film was in production. The film was a hit with Nicole Kidman and Jude Law and when I saw it for the first time I cried and cried. The film came out after my lovely man had died and emphasized too, too much the power of love and devastating effects on those left behind. What else can we do, those of us left behind? We struggle on and try to make a life of what's left. In the film, Nicole Kidman says that there were 'clouds and clouds, then there was sunshine.' I'd like to know when my sunshine will come? Perhaps it won't...

As an Optimist am I always deluding myself? Or, am I one of the few fortunate ones that is looking forward instead of backwards? Perhaps my sunshine will come after all...

Holidays

Trying to book a week away for half-term holidays for two daughters, myself and three children is turning out to be a nightmare; it was so much easier back in the 60's when my young brother and I were carted off to a campsite in Cornwall.

I presume too much; how do I know it was easier. Who knows what complicated arrangements my parents had to make in order for me to think it all happened by clockwork. But then again, not everyone was going to Cornwall, unlike now when the world seems to have booked Center Parcs! All accommodation in all four sites are taken for the half-term week. I should have known!

Perhaps we could all go to a campsite in Cornwall instead?

More than Petal-deep

I'm always amazed at the beauty and perfection in a lone flower or petal, whether its shape is misformed, damaged by weather or dying. I have a huge number of photos of all kinds of flowers, berries, plants and leaves which the viewing of, cheers me up on dull days.

As I get older I view people this way too, something I should have done when I was younger, but probably too arrogant, immature and proud to do so.

I am no beauty, as someone pointed out to me a couple of years' ago, when comparing me with a photo of my mother in her twenties. She was indeed a striking woman with high cheekbones, full pouting lips and thick, dark hair; nothing like me at all.

When I look at my four daughters, I see four very striking, beautiful women, who, like my mother, are all much more attractive than me. I must be a throwback to a hard-working, work-weary ancestor; of the tall, fair, plain variety. Nevertheless, I have managed to turn a few heads in my time; probably in disbelief, rather than admiration. And when someone has told me how attractive I am, I just don't believe them. He told me often how lovely and attractive I was, and still I didn't believe him, saying that he was biased.

I now think that we are all like the flowers and plants in my photos; no matter how weather-beaten, stunted, broken, misformed, damaged or dying; we are all beautiful in one way or another.

More than petal-deep.