There were decisions which had to be made. Decisions about all manner of things none of which could be made singularly but each of which remained a decision of its own with its own right to be and its own particular timing. The decisions, which I present without question marks and allow you to make of that what you will, included such things as: where will the lads go to school next year; how much longer should we, would we, can we stay; where will we spend the summer; should we move from this apartment. These are the kinds of decisions which, once started, spiral into others (should we renew our gym membership or just buy a per-visit card, should we think about finding a different gym move to a different club) and if you aren’t very careful, you will soon be asking, Should I bother getting out of bed.
Except…huzzah! I am not as easy to confuse as I once was. I would not claim to be as Buddha, but such is the state of my current mental strength that truly through all of this month and the one before, I have not cried once. Well, maybe once, and possibly even twice but not, you know, every day. And when I have said, ‘Well, let’s just wait and see’ or ‘It’s no use worrying about things that haven’t even happened’ I have meant it. I really have.
On a related note, but not so related that I can think of an elegant segue, a lot of the thinking that I am doing at the moment is done with the understanding that I have just turned 42 and when my mother died, she had just turned 46 – an age to which I am now so close that I can smell its perfume. Woody, with a touch of something citrus if I’m not mistaken.
It is not a bad touchstone, not a bad point of reflection, but I’m glad that my mental health is as good as it is, and that I have been able to look at this in a polyanna way. Because reflecting on our decision to stay here one more year, I see that it was made by a mind and a spirit which are fuelled not by the spectre of just four more years, but by the optimism of many more. Because if I really thought I had just four years more, I would go home right now and spend them with my friends.
golly gosh!
Do you mean to the staying? If so, yes, agreed.
I go with Pollyanna, she got to live a happy life, looking at things from a positive frame of mind. I model myself on that, and It’s working well for me.
Oh yes, here’s to More Than Four Years. Lots and lots More. When I was 20, I would have thought 46 was old, but it really isn’t. And losing a 46-year-old friend has been just so much sadder than losing my 87 year-old step-father.