Shadows and glimpses

We went away this weekend: the first time I’ve managed to travel that far ( a WHOLE 40 miles !!!) since the summer before last. It was great. Not without its difficulties ….because for someone with chemical sensitivities, staying in any accommodation is risky --- and this time the perfumed washing powder used to wash the duvet covers got to me big time, ---- but, nevertheless, it was lovely to go for some peace away from the builders and the everyday grind.

And today there is more peace because we have a 9 hour power cut in the village for ‘essential maintenance work’ so there is no phone, no heat, no internet. No one using their electric mower, no builders with their radio on all the time and no TV. Even in the countryside it is noisy these days and round these parts, my dearios, many people are retired and at home all day and they are hobbyists --- usually men and usually men who like machines: lawnmowers, tractors, , hedge trimmers, lathes, woodturning etc etc and they all make a noise: and you thought that Cusp Villa was situated in an ocean of solitude and quiet in the Suffolk countryside ----Hah !

Our weekend retreat was near to relatives’ homes. We visited this couple on the way back. One is a musician, the other a textile artist. I have known one of them longer than my own partner…nearly 30 years.

They have two children, like us, and a much more bohemian attitude to life than us: they’re not concerned about a tidy(ish) house, not concerned about set mealtimes. They’re concerned about their art and getting stuff done. The house is unconventional, chaotic and happy. They are not without their own health problems.

I wonder how their lives seem so different to ours.

What is it about me that prevents me from staying with my creativity? What is it that makes me put my all into the children, the house and trying to stay above the waterline with my health ? Why is it that this other couple are still relatively close to who they were 25 or even 30 years ago and I have drifted so far away from who I was all that time ago.

Some of it is sense of self and sense of responsibility.

They are both caring parents and caring individuals who will and have been there for other people in the family when needed…..but they still maintained their identity and their practice. I, on the other hand, have a much lesser sense of self, much lesser confidence in my ability to be creative than them…even though I know this is wrong of me. My identity is bound up in being the rescuer, the helper, the aid. Theirs is bound up in being creative. Their own children call them by their Christian names rather than Mum & Dad. Our children only do so as a joke: I am very much the parent. I am not seen as an artist or anything else other than a parent or as someone who’s not very well. That saddens me.

My sense of responsibility is huge, overwhelming. This may be a legacy of being an only child…and the only child of a parent who was often unwell and another parent who worked with disabled people and spent their life giving and encouraging.

If there is a choice between my creativity and the needs of my children --- even if that need is relatively insignificant (‘….will you help me put on my socks…’) I will go to them and put myself aside.

It is true that having a disabled child puts greater stress on one’s need to be there as a parent (the child who needs help with socks is 15….he can’t bend down that far and socks are difficult to put on at the best of times…never mind zips, buttons etc which are an impossibility) but even so, why do I put everything on hold for them ?

Am I too giving, too saintly [NOT !!! ;o) ] or am I just scared to put myself first and take the leap back to being an individual adult whose creativity matters ? Is helping with socks the easy option ?

In my last post I spoke about living on the cusp, on the edge. That holds still. I do live on the cusp because of my health, but, after that visit this weekend I am beginning to feel that there is something else going on that prevents me from being true to myself.

Maybe it is the natural order of things: that you give as much as possible to children when they are little and incapable of so much and then gradually they learn and become independent and begin to fly the nest, fly further, need you less …..and this point is during a period of adjustment: me adjusting to my children’s’ increasing independence and lack of need for me.

And if that is so, what does that mean for me ? Who am I ? What shall I do ?

When I first became so unwell that I could no longer go to work, there was a part of me that thought

‘Right, well, however ill I am, at least I’m here and I shall do whatever I can, when I can, for the children because they are the most important thing (at this point they were only 2 and 5 years old) and the rest (i.e. an career plans, creativity ) can go hang because I can’t do it all now like I used to (and boy did I do it all !!!) and so I must set priorities…and they are number one.’

Now I’m not so sure that holds true any more…even for my son who is more able and independent, despite everything. Maybe it’s time to try again and move out into the world no matter how unwell I might feel at times.

Maybe those shadows I keep sensing, maybe those glimpses of something else are beckoning….but it’s a very scary place to be.

Only but not alone

It's all anniversaries at the moment. Five years ago today my mother died. All those months of hospital appointments, hospice visits, arrangements for carers, nurses...all the conversations on the phone. All the times I cursed my own ill health for obstructing me from visiting, supporting as much as I wanted and needed to...and the suddenly it was all over. She had gone. I'd done my best and now it was time to tidy up. put things in order, say goodbye and move forward.

I'm not sad today...just recognising a passing. My mother spent much of her life in ill health but she always got back up and moved forward. She was gentle and kind. I give thanks that I was blessed with such loving parents. Being an only child makes you closer still and my mother was an 'only' too. Now she's gone there is no Cusp family from before...only the one here now --- me, my partner and our two children. I see my mother in my daughter...her eyes, her shyness, her sense of humour, her creativity and I know that, whatever the truth about life, death, God that we all live on in our children and our children's children.

Loneliness of the long distance 'only'

Yesterday I received a letter from the wife of my father's work partner . My Dad died nearly 8 years ago although it seems like last week. I haven't seen his partner since my mother's funeral 3 years ago and yet the letter brought a sudden rush of unexpected sadness.

In many ways this feeling is inexplicable. I wasn't especially close to L (Dad's colleague) though I do have happy memories of big Xmas parties at his house with a big family gathering and being made to feel as if I was a part of it. As an only child, this annual celebration was a lovely thing for me and I really enjoyed seeing my parents enjoying themselves at such an occasion. We were a small, tight family unit (as families of only children often are) and such a crowd of people having fun in a domestic setting was a rare experience for me. My mother was also an only child too, with few other relatives, so our extended family was small anyway.

I suppose the sadness is about being an only child really. After the initial feeling, my next thought was 'I can't tell Mum & Dad'. It felt weird that they weren't there to share the news. Apart from working together for maybe 10 years, my father and L had been in the same 'work circles' for years, so my parents would have been sad to know of his death and there could have been some kind of conversation about L. and the parties and the holidays and the work etc.

As it is there's no one to talk to about it. (Well no-one who really knows about those experiences. As an only child with no cousins (no relatives apart from my partner and children) there's no one to talk to about it. When you're an only you really are alone for life. You can marry, have children, get on with and love your in-laws ( and I have and I do), have close friends, but you cannot share the memories of childhood, the funny family rituals in the same way because once your parents have gone, there's no one else who has quite the same connection.

This isn't meant to be maudlin but it can be a lonely road at poignant times like this and is a reminder of how much you miss the closeness of your own parents.

I thank the Lord that we were blessed and have two children who can share and support each other.

AN ONLY CHILD'S TEA-PARTY

When I go to tea with the little Smiths, there are eight of them there, but there's only one of me,

Which makes it not so easy to have a fancy tea-party as if there were two or three.

I had a tea-party on my birthday, but Joe Smith says it can't have been a regular one,

Because as to a tea-party with only one teacup and no teapot, sugar-basin, cream-jug, or slop-basin, he never heard of such a thing under the sun.

But it was a very big teacup, and quite full of milk and water, and, you see,

There wasn't anybody there who could really drink milk and water except Towser and me.

The dolls can only pretend, and then it washes the paint off their lips,

And what Charles the canary drinks isn't worth speaking of, for he takes such very small sips.

Joe says a kitchen-chair isn't a table; but it has got four legs and a top, so it would be if the back wasn't there;

And that does for Charles to perch on, and I have to put the Prince of Wales to lean against it, because his legs have no joints to sit on a chair.
That's the small doll. I call him the Prince of Wales because he's the eldest son, you see;

For I've taken him for my brother, and he was Mother's doll before I was born, so of course he is older than me.

Towser is my real live brother, but I don't think he's as old as the Prince of Wales;

He's a perfect darling, though he whisks everything over he comes near, and I tell him I don't know what we should do if we all had tails.

His hair curls like mine in front, and grows short like a lion behind, but no one need be frightened, for he's as good as good;

And as to roaring like a real menagerie lion, or eating people up, I don't believe he would if he could.

He has his tea out of the saucer after I've had mine out of the cup;

You see I am sure to leave some for him, but if I let him begin first he would drink it all up.

The big doll Godmamma gave me this birthday, and the chair she gave me the year before.

(I haven't many toys, but I take great care of them, and every birthday I shall have more and more.)

You've no idea what a beautiful doll she is, and when I pinch her in the middle, she can squeak;

It quite frightened Towser, for he didn't know that any of us but he and I and Charles were able to speak.

I've taken her for my only sister, for of course I may take anybody I choose;

I've called her Cinderella, because I'm so fond of the story, and because she's got real shoes.

don't feel so only now there are so many of us; for, counting Cinderella there are five,—She, and I, and Towser, and Charles, and the Prince of Wales—and three of us are really alive;

And four of us can speak, and I'm sure the Prince of Wales is wonderful for his size;

For his things (at least he's only got one thing) take off and on, and, though he's nothing but wood, he's got real glass eyes.

And perhaps in three birthdays more there may be as many of us as the Smiths, for five and three make eight;

I shall be seven years old then (as old as Joe), but I don't like to think too much of it, it's so long to wait.

And after all I don't know that I want any more of us: I think I'd rather my sister had a chairLike mine; and the next year I should like a collar for Towser if it wouldn't rub off his hair.

And it would be very nice if the Prince of Wales could be dressed like a Field-marshal, for he's got nothing on his legs;

And Cinderella's beautifully dressed, and Towser looks quite as if he'd got a fur coat on when he begs.

Joe says it's perfectly absurd, and that I can't take a Pomeranian in earnest for my brother;

But I don't think he really and truly knows how much Towser and I love each other.

I didn't like his saying, "Well, there's one thing about your lot,—you can always have your own way."

And then he says, "You can't possibly have fun with four people when you have to pretend what they say.

"But, whatever he says, I don't believe I shall ever enjoy a tea-party more than the one that we had on that day.