I've been expecting this to happen sooner or later. Flashbacks. Yes, you've guessed it, all back to when Laing died. They are happening with greater frequency now, but it's not like one a minute, still only every now and again, but I keep returning to the time of the struggle he was going through, then they took me away to tell me he was dying, when I returned he was calmer and barely alive.
Whether it was being on holiday in Washington or my upcoming Italian lessons that have triggered them I don't know, or it could just be the mundane boringness of work when we would exchange pointless e-mails. He also knew exactly how busy I was by the rapidity and length of my responses. He charmingly sent me James Naughtie’s spoonerism when he should have said coming up would be Jeremy Hunt, the (then) Culture Secretary. He struggled with what he called “a coughing fit” not to break down. It was a wonderful moment that live broadcasting offers. It belongs with the Brian Johnson and Jonathan Agnew moment following “getting his leg over”.
I am not going to worry unduly about this flashback. I will have to accept it was a traumatic time and it will be part of me until such time my memory ceases to function. It was both horrid and yet good. Horrid for me to have my first experience of a person dying being my best friend and partner and official husband of only a week. The man who had made my life so wonderful. I could not see how I could exist without him at that very moment. I still look around me and cannot see how I am going to get through all of this. There is not “world enough and time” for me to sort out our house and decide what to do, and yet I must find the time.
Blogging and playing patience on the computer is only putting it off, but it is also essential to blog to get my thoughts out there into the world where it used to be us talking to each other. We never really said much to each other. we knew each other enough that a sigh or cries of “please sir” when the Tories kept blaming Labour for all the ills we now have. We had cartooned the now Chancellor as the wimpy suck in a group of bullies at a public school, who is allowed to tag along on sufferance, for what reason, nobody ever knows. Listen to him. He sounds like a spoiled little brat, and when we found out what he really looked like our suspicions were confirmed (we were committed radio fans, a tradition I continue).
I look at myself and wonder if I am harder than I thought, or if I am more accepting of what had happened. I am an emotional person, you may have already gathered I wear my heart on my sleeve quite a lot, in fact, it is seldom to be found elsewhere. This grieving business is damned hard work.
Yes, I am doing well. Yes, I am coping better than anybody would believe possible. Yes, I still find time to hurt inside. I keep that to myself and to my reader. It’s our secret. If you’ve been there, you’ll know it, if you haven’t, be prepared. Here we go again. The wolf cub in me is coming out again, and here’s the photographic evidence I once was a wolf cub in the Sea Scouts run by the RAF at Steamer Point in Aden. Nothing is straightforward in my life. I thought you knew that by now!
