Now that you are sleeping.

It was quarter to ten in the morning, seven days ago.
I didn’t get to hear the words. All I saw were the faint black letters framing the reality that, this time, you weren’t going to wake up.

I think that’s the first time I ever truly registered the fragility of life; the fact that one day someone is there, and the next their whole existence is vanished. That each person carries their own little light, and one day it’s snuffed out.
There are people out there, everywhere, living and breathing; their cheeks flushed with the warmth of life passing through each arteriole. They’re here. But the colours ran from your face. You got cold. You went somewhere, and I’m really not sure where it is.

Because losing someone through bereavement is not like a break up or your father leaving or your best friend moving across the world. There is no off-chance of bumping into them at the supermarket or seeing a picture of them on holiday with their new girlfriend. It’s the incomprehensible reality of realising that their presence will never touch your future. It’s realising that you can’t go and call them when you’ve had a bad day; it’s coming to realise that there will be a seat missing at Christmas.
It’s somehow turning someone who was once there, touching you, into a memory. It’s turning someone who once sang and loved and hoped into something that once was, and now no longer is.

Because you’re not going to see me go to university. You’re not going to hear how my exams are doing. You’re not going to be on the phone, reminding me to be careful and look after myself. You’re not going to see me fully grow up; you’re not going to see how I turn out.

But I know that you’re with him, and that you’ve been waiting for the day to once again be in his arms after this past decade. And I know that you are there, somewhere, still calling for me to keep going; to not use this as a reason to break down and give up, but to reach my dream: to just get these grades. And you’re smiling.
Because just like the pictures of us lined your bed, your memory and love and presence now lines each of our days.

I’m sorry that I can’t be there when they take you away. I’m sorry I can’t wave goodbye.
But I don’t need a church to give you my peace. I don’t need a eulogy to remember your spirit. I don’t need to wear black to remember how empty I feel that you are no longer in the world.

Instead, I’ll be making you proud in that exam room. Because you will be right there with me. Just like you always have been.

Sleep well beautiful. You finally deserve some rest.

 

Strength.

Promise me you’ll always remember: You’re braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.”

-Winnie The Pooh

Cascade.

I think that it was that freckle in the corner of your eye which started this.

This dawning of longing and realisation; this drowning cascade of suddenly awakening to the harsh reality of the words which I never thought I would say: that I miss you.

And the way that your chest formed some form of cavern when there seemed no escape; the deep and unending path your eyes led; the slight quiver in your voice in the curve of your lips; the faint smell of soap and washing powder cradling the dimples of your neck; the hushed urgency in the staccato of your words; the pink stained taste in the sweetness in ripple of your lips; the smouldering glow of your embrace and the great juxtaposition between the fair porcelain covered by the sweep of burning sienna.

But it is most definitely the tranquillity of your soul: the sombre lament harmonised with the humble note of benevolence; the beckoning promise of trust in your name.
And the heart-wrenching truth that it is too late; we are merely ships passing in the night.

Once more.

This is the letter that I should have written to you a long time ago.

I’m sorry that I am not one that excels themself in keeping in touch with others. I’m sorry that you called me the other week to congratulate me on passing my driving test and never returned it. I’m sorry that there once was a gap in which I didn’t see you for three years.

But as I sit here amongst the broken glass and damp photographs with the sand falling between us quicker than I dare to believe, all I muster is the dust gathered apology that I should have given you years ago.

Because I want you to know that I love you. I have loved you for as long as I can remember. I remember once spending Christmas at your house and remember you smiling down on me as I tore the paper off that stuffed rabbit you once gave me. I remember when you took me to the park and held my hand. I also vaguely remember the funeral, where you watched him slowly taken away from you.
Most of all, I remember the fact that you always smiled from a distance, because you never wanted to intrude; you never wanted to be a burden, or a hindrance or any form of convenience to anybody’s day. That’s why you never called, and that’s why you let all those months pass by: because you didn’t want anybody to feel as if you were a burden.

And that’s why I’m guilt stricken, sobbing and lying on the floor: because that’s why we have only just found out that this thing has been destroying you: that this devilish disease has crippled you from the inside out, unnoticed by all of us.
And I’m so sorry that I let you feel this way.
I’m so sorry that I left you fade into the background.
I’m so sorry that I didn’t make you carry on speaking on the phone.
I’m so sorry that I never visited.
I’m so sorry for not returning that phone call.

I’m so sorry for not being the granddaughter that you deserved.

A simple prayer.

Lord,

Let my sleep be deep;
My work be driven;
And my love be filled with You.

Today, and everyday.

Amen.

How to be a happier (and healthier) human being.

Never touch anything with half of your heart; be present; be endlessly loving and compassionate towards others; confront anything situation first with a deep breath; wander; remember that your own happiness and comfort are also important; before reacting, understand.
Eat breakfast; find the faces in the flowers; remember what is important to you; treat your body kindly; be honest; get to know yourself; take thing at your own pace; don’t feel embarrassed to feel, to laugh, to cry, to sing or to love; remember what is right for someone else may not be what is right for you, and that is okay; never be ashamed or afraid to ask for help; do what you love; remember that you always have a choice; find joy in what life really is: living.

And never, ever forget that everything happens for a reason.
Because life is on your side.

Alone.

Living by yourself at seventeen is hard.
Playing both mother and child is hard.
Balancing work and daily routine is hard.

But none of it compares to the loneliness that I have to endure. Nothing compares to the nights that silently echo into the darkness of lying in bed, knowing that I’m alone. Nothing compares to knowing that everyone else at school, everyone else that I know, have mothers who will pick them up from school, make them dinner and say goodnight to them. They have comfort, they have love, and they have sustenance.
They are able to wake up everyday to the noise of a family getting ready for the day ahead. They have privilege of having overbearing and annoyingly encouraging parents when they are trying to have a break. They have the beauty of a loving family to make them tea and offer a warm shoulder when they have a bad day.
They have tangibility; they have face to face conversations; they have noise.

Many girls my age don’t even know the meaning of an empty house. They have never had to cook for themselves, or endure a night without seeing a member of their family. To them, the worst thing is not getting their straight As, or forgetting to do that maths homework.
They don’t know what it is like to go to sleep hearing deathly silence, and they don’t know what it is like to have to wake up to the same thing. They don’t know what it is like to have to continually strive to fulfill their future, whilst having to actively and daily run their life. They don’t know what it’s like to live as if you were years older than you actually are.

Because when I see these girls jump into their mother’s arms, I’m not angry. I don’t protest about the injustice of it all. Instead, I continue to feel alone. I continue to feel cold and empty and yearn to feel the warmth of my mother’s love that I did when I was younger. All I feel is the bitterness of being alone, and living alone and facing the cold, hard brutality that I cannot do anything but face it.

Because I know that there are people out there who have it much harder than me; people struggle even further, and feel so much bleaker. And I feel ever more guilty for feeling as if I’m the one that is suffering.
But sometimes it’s just too much. Sometimes the world is just too sad.
Sometimes it’s the feeling of missing something, and never knowing when you’re going to get it back.

Words.

Like bullets in the midst of shadows, words are cataclysmic and send you spinning.

Your mother tells you that ‘sticks and stones may break your bones, but words will never hurt you’, but you soon realise that they shatter everything that you once held dear; they penetrate deeper than any sword or spear and leave scars that may never heal. They make you question yourself, everyone else and anything else. Because under every word, is heartbreak. Under every last whisper is the crashing sound of torment.

Words make you lose faith. They shake you; they break you.

That is, if you let them.

You have the choice. You can let them burn you, or instead, you can let them burn. You can destroy every hushed syllable or streaked black letter and watch them emblazen in flames. Rather than succumb to their harsh criticism and deceit, you can use them as firewood in the inferno of your passions.

You can either become numb inside, or you can become numb to their appraisal.
You can either believe what they have to say, or you can believe yourself what you have instilled in yourself.
You can change their opinions of you, as long as you never change your opinion of yourself.

Because, you have what it takes.
You wouldn’t be where you are now if you didn’t.

Time.

Time is a strange thing. It doesn’t just distort and fade, but prospers and heals. Time withholds action, yet also blossoms and invigorates. Time mends friendships and shatters them. Time is deadly, and it is equally soothing. Time is both a constraint and a liberty.
Time holds the power to achieve anything.

Time only has one constant: it’s value. For there are few things which are more precious and unobtainable than time.

Tragedy.

Go and tell your mothers and your fathers; your sisters and brothers; your lovers and friends just how much they mean to you. Tell everyone you know just how profoundly they mean to you. Don’t go a day without showing them your love.

Because tragedy happens just as easily to people like us as it does to people on the news. Because at one point, those very people from across the world watched other people lose their loved ones via a television screen, oblivious that one day they would be in the same position.

So don’t leave without that goodbye. Don’t let your last words be to someone ‘please go and buy some milk.’ Don’t leave loose ends untied. And never take anyone’s presence for granted, for you never know when it will be the last time that you see them.

But equally, don’t let tragedy let you lose sight in the world. Tragedy is the sheer brutality of losing something without any form of warning or clarity. Tragedy happens to the best of us, the worst of us and the whole of us. Tragedy happens every day in the smallest scale to the masses. But we must know that the fundamental truth of tragedy is the fact that its very nature is uncontrollable. We are tiny specks in a great sea of higher knowledge and prophecy.
So live every day in the belief that it may be your last breath, and that way you will never waste a moment.

Smile through the beauty, and cry through the pain, but never hold yourself back for the evil and cowardliness of tragedy. Laugh in its cruel face and know that this speck of dust has had the power to make oceans roar.

Because there is beauty in tragedy. We just need to see beyond the hurt.