Today is the last day of my 58th year, and what a year it has proved to be. On my birthday we spent our last day in Rangoon/Yangon after an exhausting but wonderful taster introduction to the country. Part of the day was spent travelling from Rangoon to Penang via Bangkok. We spent a long weekend in Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City, then several days in Bangkok. Little did we realise this was to be our last long haul holiday together, but it was three weeks of indulgence and heaven.
Of course we also had Venice at Christmas, the same room as the year before. 12th January we finally got married, a day I had envisaged as merely a paper signing event, but which made me highly emotional. 15th we went to the hospital, expecting him to get his dose of radio, but it wasn't. Too long to explain. When they tried to get him off the table he was in agony and insisted I was there to help him back up. I had never seen him so agitated before in my life. The next day I cried off work, something wasn't quite right, then Thursday we went and got him radioed! Friday he stayed in bed and was not the same. He fell into his decline and died the next day in the local A&E, a week and a few hours after he made an honest man of me.
Somebody we hadn't seen in years e-mailed me. He got to know about Laing's death via a series of connections. So I just upped and went to Paris for the weekend to meet him and introduce him to rugby, while I lusted after Brian O'Driscoll for the nth time, and over Leigh Halfpenny, BOD's successor in my affections!
The cremation didn't take place until 11th February, a day when everything round the crematorium was carpeted in snow. It was a beautiful day to say goodbye.
The 14th, which would have been our 37th anniversary, I was off to Venice for the first of three trips there so far this year.
Easter was spent in Zurich with two of our oldest friends, now sadly separated. Mayday bank holiday I was in Berlin, where Laing wanted us to go for Easter. The next bank holiday I decided just two days before to go to Venice again.
In the interim I had struck up a friendship with a former work colleague of Laing's. We have met a few times for lunch, and each time has been an enjoyable event.
I went to Washington to visit a friend we had made back in 1989 when we went on our first trip to America. She is now well into her 90s, her mind still strong, though the body is showing its failings.
Life started to return to something resembling normal, whatever that may be, during this time as I ran headlong to places that meant a lot to us both, knowing full well the experiences would make or break me, and I was determined to let fate take its course, but to face up to whatever happened with as much courage as I could muster. In the event, courage was not needed, but a handy supply of tissues, as and when the need arose, was.
September I was back in Venice, attending the language school as planned in 2012, postponed due to the cancer and treatment until 2013, when it was postponed again following Laing's death.
I've met a few Macmillan widow(er)s, both virtually and in the flesh. Each time, I can honestly say it was good to meet people, who were in effect strangers, and to put the fuller person to the postings. I also quit the Bereaved Spouse group as I felt I had nothing I could give any more, a fact borne out by the way everybody is flourishing in their own ways. My need of peer support was no longer required and I was suffering from impatience at others' relative slowness, but I realised I was getting over it fasts than I thought possible.
Here I am painfully aware how much like my father I really am. He recovered rapidly following my mother's death, something I was not able to cope with at the time, plus there were other matters which didn't help.
So here I am, back in Singapore, the first long haul destination we went to together. I am openly admitting to myself I am friend/boyfriend/lover/partner/husband hunting among the Singaporean community, but with more of an emphasis on the Chinese element. Laing said I would have a younger Chinese lover after he was gone. I sincerely hope he was right.
I will never meet Mister Perfectly-Right as he is now dead. I hope will meet Mister ProbablyBut-Totally-Different-Right. What sort of life we will have remains to be seen.
