Ghosts and Angels

Dear Mummy

I'd like to start by telling you about a movie i saw today. it was made the year after you died and is called the 6th sense. it starts when a child psychiatrist gets shot by a former patient he failed to help - the patient then shoots himself. the rest of the movie is about this psychiatrist, malcolm, trying to improve the life of a boy with a similar case so that he doesnt make the same mistake twice. his marriage seemingly falls apart over it and his whole life is distracted by it.

the new patient is a boy called cole who lives in fear of the things he can see that other people only feel along the back of their neck or down their spine. cole can see ghosts. anyway malcolm helps him by believing in his story and convincing him to listen to these ghosts and help them. the boy is a lot better for it. in return cole tells malcolm how to communicate with his wife again - he tells him to talk to her in her sleep when she is listening, even if she doesnt know it.

malcolm goes home and finds her sleeping in the armchair. she stirs and asks why he left her. he tells her sleeping form he never left and he loves her. she drops from her hand his wedding ring.

i never saw it coming.

malcolm died the day he was shot. he spent 9/10ths of the movie as a ghost - hovering between this world and the next. i just sat there with silent tears pouring down my cheeks at the wonder of how alone he must have been never to realise that people never spoke to him on the street or in a shop. the only voice in his life was that of a small, frightened boy.

i was standing at the bus stop in Glasgow on Saturday. a man came up to me wheeling a small blue suitcase and wearing a rather untidy beard. he asked if i was alright. as a true British i answered with yes and hoped he would move on, which he did. but he had not reached the end of the pavement before turning around and heading back to me. he asked again if i was ok. he said he was not trying to pick me up or come on to me - he said that i looked so solemn and so sad. he explained that he had fucked up his life and said i should live mine. he told me to be happy.

it broke my heart to think people i see everyday do not notice how i am suffering at the moment - especially over missing you - and yet a complete stranger can see it so clearly, even from over the other side of the road.

he was right behind me when the bus came. i got on the bus, showed my ticket and sat down before looking out the window. the man was gone. i looked out the other side of the window and down the lengths of the long street and he was nowhere.

i always thought an angel would wear white and be very pretty. but i think i encountered one on Saturday. i sat on that bus and cried. i had been ready to slit my wrists and take my tablets til i never woke up again. but by the time that bus had pulled away i knew i wanted to live again; i wanted to live life to the full.

maybe i am blessed, maybe i was lucky. maybe i was so low and upset that i was hallucinating. but maybe, just maybe, this live is worth living after all

Happy Mothering Sunday Mum,
Your loving daughter,

Heather xoxoxox

Written in the Library

Dear Mummy,

I had jelly this morning. i don't like jelly, but it didn't stop me. then i rang daddy; he is off to Ireland for the week. if i hadn't have rung this morning i wouldn't have caught him.

if i hadn't have rung this morning i wouldn't have even known.


david was talking about you and gran last night. i had to excuse my self so that i could howl my eyes out without anyone there. i rang ruth though, i think i started her off.

we were too young. we all were. daddy was too young to raise two girls by himself

ruth was too young to lose you, i was too young to live without you

and you - you were too young to die. far, far too young

i cried yesterday like i hadn't cried in years. i cried until my chest was heaving and my throat was sore. i cried myself dry, until i was headachy and dehydrated

i cried for you like i probably should have done ten years ago. i'm not strong enough mummy; i am not strong enough to keep on going all by myself - i need somebody bigger and stronger than me to carry me through it

why you? why did my mummy have to die? didn't they know how much we needed you? why couldn't you have got better?

i want to blame someone. i want to blame you for dying - but you were in too much pain to live. i want to blame the doctors that couldn't save you, but they did all they could and fought right up to the last minute

sometimes i want to blame god

if god is all powerful, then he should be able to take away illness. if god is so merciful, he should not have left two children without a mother. if god is so wonderful, he should have raised you from the dead

it seems selfish that he raised his own child but cannot raise someone else's

why do some people live though cancer and some are consumed entirely by it? how can your own body fight against itself until it eventually kills you?

i blame the cancer. i blame the evil within us. we need to fight against the cancer and find cures for this cancer

this week the Japanese have created a humanoid robot. how can people put so much effort into that when they could concentrate on saving lives and finding cures?

when you died we were offered anger therapy, but as dad quite rightly said, we weren't angry.

i'm angry now


heather xoxox

The Absence of Childhood

Dear Mummy

Hannah was out on a date today. i'm nearly 20 and i can't get a date, but my 7 yr old cousin has them queuing up round the corner.

anyway it was all very sweet and he gave her an 'i love you' card and took her to the cinema and for dinner and gave her a kiss in the car.......

but i wonder are we encouraging our children to grow up too fast? childhood is a wondrous gift that should not be thrown away so lightly. at the beginning of Stephenie Meyer's 'Breaking Dawn' there is the following quotation:

"Childhood is not from birth to a certain age and at a certain age
The child is grown, and puts away childish things.
Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies"
Edna St. Vincent Millay

in this world today there are too many children, who by this definition have lost their childhood. it is prominent in less economically developed counties where children lose parents to childbirth, HIV, meningitis, influenza. it is more common than we think, even here on our own streets.

we don't like to think of death even as adults, and we shun from the thought of a child living with bereavement.

illness and disability can give way to bereavement of childhood - too many young carers have lost their rights as children due to the daily struggles of caring for family members.

Comic relief is out to help many children in situations like these. its aim is to give children back some of that innocence and childhood that they deserve and have so cruelly lost.

according to Millay's definition of childhood, mine ended at nine years of age when i lost my Gran and you. i am glad to say that although i may have had to grow up, i have not grown old. for i am still safe in the arms of those who love me - my Daddy will always see me as his little girl

Heather xoxoxox

Who is God?

Dear Mummy

To our generation, God is probably best represented by Morgan Freeman. both Bruce and Evan Almighty are comedic movies and yet each shares a vital message about our God. sometimes i think God would be honoured to be played by such an actor

my friend recently posted the following link on their facebook page. it made me think about who my God is and what He means to me

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2z15FlTONVo

Heather x

Drowning

Dear Mummy

On Thursday Carrie left nursery. she had been working there for over ten years and was finally moving on. as she worked the other half of the week to me i have only met her 3 times, yet those times have been an imprint in my life

the headteacher gave a quick goodbye speech in which she highlighted the talents, creativity and memories that not only make Carrie so special, but also are the key components of why she will be missed

and i sat in that room, full of complete strangers, and cried my eyes out for the loss of a woman i hardly knew. if i grow up to be half the nursery 'officer' she is, i will be only too happy.


i sat up late last night and talked for ages to my auntie. i gave up on the laptop as i had a killer migraine and we sat downstairs and talked. we talked about love - and the lack of it. we talked about memories and their poignancy. and we talked about you

and i missed you with a fever, with a burning that started so deep inside of me like a crevice that can never never be filled. it's at times like this that i have to remember what happens to the dead.

they stay dead. stay dead. stay dead.

and sometimes the most dead of all are still breathing but not in our lives. the dead do not return. the dead to not think or remember.

we do not drown by falling into the water.

we drown only by staying there.



i think i need to learn how to move on and leave the past where it belongs

heather xox

Things I would like to say to him, but know I never will

Can't you see it?
Can't you see it when you look at me?
It's screaming out for the whole world to see -
That I love you
That you're every other part of me


the thing is, i'm never going to wake up and suddenly realise that i'm in love with him.

because i'm already in love with him; i've been in love with him all along

Falling

Dear Mummy

A little while back my friend posted the following on her blog "We succeed we fail, you win some you lose some, and some times we fly and sometimes we fall, that's just life!"

my sister has a 'flair' on her cork board which reads "sometimes the person you fall for is just not ready to catch you"

today i read in Terry Pratchett's 'Going Postal':

" I wonder if it's like this for mountain climbers, he thought. You climb bigger and bigger mountains and you know that one day one of them is going to be just that bit too steep. But you go on doing it, because it's so-o good when you breathe the air up there. And you know you'll die falling "

there are so many ways in which falling can be a metaphor for life. not only is there the thrill and the adrenaline as you feel the air slip past you, but there is the overwhelming knowledge that at some point you will hit the ground and may never get up again. as a species we throw ourselves into situations and all too often the fall itself is not what kills our hope.

for all too often we live for hope. hope is the drive that pulls us forward. we all know the things that will never happen, but we get up each day and go about our routines in case one day - today - is the day the impossible blesses us with a visit.

i have hopes. a hope that one day someone will ask me to stay in their life, instead of letting me walk out of it. a hope that i am someone worth fighting for. a hope that one day when i fall, someone will go out of their way to catch me.

heather xoxox

Dying Young

Dear Mummy

when i was talking to stuart last night he told me he was going to die young. he said he just 'knew'. i told him i just wanted to reach 37 - that would make me one year older than you.

i think there are hidden blessings in dying young. no one ever remembers you with wrinkles. you never have to forget peoples names or places you've been. no one has to take you to the toilet and lift you out of bed.

then again you miss out on lots too. years and years of memories. i finished watching skins yesterday. at the end of the second season chris died. he had a tumour in his brain or something. his girlfriend had chosen to abort their baby because it was hereditary, and then she was left with nothing.

earlier in the series chris tried his hand at a house agent - he sold houses by asking people if this was the house they wanted to make their memories in. was this the house they wanted to see when they looked back at the time their daughter first walked, or mad new years parties, or sex on the kitchen table. chris based his pitch on memories.

there were a lot of memories of chris, he was a druggie. abandoned by his parents, expelled from college. but his father didnt want to remember him that way so he banned chris's friends from attending the funeral in case they caused a riot. the 'christopher miles' he buried was not the chris who lived. who lived life to the full. he died young but he had lived fast and lived hard. at the end his friends set off fireworks.

they will always remember him as a young fun loving, party going, fuck-up of a guy! and he will live forever in those memories. dying young is not something i would wish on anyone, but i know that you left us with beautiful memories and wonderful times to look back on. i know that in dying, you lost all that pain that had been haunting you for years. and i know you didnt give in sooner because you loved us.

and even though you never saw us leave high school, never saw ruth in the school play, or heard her speak in church. even though you will never see us get married, or meet your grandchildren, i know that none of us will ever forget you or let you really leave us. because you're in here - i can feel you with every heartbeat. and i know that the life you led, and the memories you left, were those of the best kind.

those who are loved will never die. the loved will live forever.

heather xoxox

When I Close My Eyes

When I close my eyes for a while
I see the way you laugh and smile
The way you gave life that flair
The way that you were always there

And it breaks my heart to remember
The events of that December
To lose you in the cold and snow
To know the way you had to go

And the way you lay with hands like ice
And a beautiful face that still looked ‘nice’
And through my fears I hear your voice
As if my crying was not my choice

And I need you now to hold me close
It’s times like this I miss you most
When these words they echo in my head:

You’re dead.

You’re dead.
You're dead, you’re dead.

The Space That Is Left

I call your name on the wind
Certain that you might hear me
But a shiver trickles down my spine
And I know I am only alone

The years that passed have merged
And I can no longer count them
Off the top of my head –
My flooding, empty head

Would you judge me, begrudge me
For my hopeless, lonesome heart?

Mother, you knew me
Mummy, you mothered me
And now you are gone
I feel the loss; the space that is left

I try to fill it – I fail
I try to leave it – I fall
I miss you
Love you
Need you
Mummy? Hold me tonight

Dream

Dear Mummy

I had this dream last night where a bomb went off. we were in school, or somewhere that was supposed to be school, and some people were running away from it before it blew and some people didn't know what was happening so they curiously crept forward for a closer look.

they were buried in this mass grave on a hill with a big plaque. in this dream half the people i know died. people i went to school with, had lunch with, did lessons alongside for 4 years. and i didn't give a shit. i was running through the screaming, and the mass of bodies looking for stuart. just stuart. i didn't care in the rest of the population had been blown to smithereens, as long as he had lived through it.

there wasn't even enough of him left to bury. just charcoal and ash. and i sat in the rubble and the blood and was angry. just angry, no tears, not upset - just angry. then i woke up.

i always wonder what those sorts of dreams mean.

heather xoxoxox

Going Bananas

Dear Mummy,

you really missed out on all the fun on friday. our nursery class was taking part in the big fairtrade banana friday where we were helping to break the world record for the most people eating a fairtrade banana in one day. i don't know if we managed.

so anyway, there we are with bananas stuck all over us, playing banana games and singing banana songs. in fact i taught all 80 children our banana song from brownies. everything was fine in the gym hall until suddenly miss wilson says everyone look at miss houlden and all these eyes just stare at me, the moment was topped off of course by the fact i had to sing. a dangerous thing in the first place.

so im going bananas here. missing my family but not wanting to go home. wanting to pass this course but too lazy to do the work. heather always gives up, right? that's what you'll remember - that i never stuck at anything. well im trying. i sat writing up some of my spontaneous activities yesterday at grandpas so have got some work done.

am gonna try and make pancakes now, had to hunt fro the frying pan mind, and it appears we have no whisk. i am beginning to really miss my step-mother's organisation

love you lots and lots
your eldest
heather xoxoxox

memories and hugs

Dear Mummy

My trainer was off today so i was running our area all by myself. it's hard, dealing with children. they have no sense of authority or obedience. i was so close to losing my temper today which of course i couldnt do. but maybe this career just isnt for me.....

anyway. was thinking about memories today. mainly the good times i had in high school when all my friends were boys. in particular the moment when kyle went from a massive crush to me actually loving him. it was on a stairwell, it was science. whatever. anyway the point i was making is that i deal better now, i used to really get mad when i did something wrong or got embarrassed and then i would scream and lash out, hit people and swear. i realised today just how much better i am. i can stand back now, look at those times and laugh at myself. i wish i had been this person in high school.

ruth is upset because she's fallen out with her friends again, and corinne is upset because i dont want to go down for Easter.

what do i want? i want a man hug. there i said it. i want some guy friends in my life so i can get a lynx scented hug.

love you

heather xoxoxoxox

p.s.

it's all okay - i woke up this morning without any changes to my emotional system!

a worrying thought

Dear Mummy

i received some exam results today. i passed both of them. i've been writing a bit too, trying to make my story make sense to the rest of this crazy world.

i miss gavin, mum. i miss him so much. what if he was the love of my life and i never knew? what if he is everything i want and i never get? what if i wake up one day and realise i dont just love and adore him, but that im in love with him? what if its not enough? right now i just miss my best friend and the comfort he brings me when my life seems empty and my path seems overgrown.

shit - i hope i never wake up in love with him. ew.

heather xoxoxox

writing

Dear Mummy

Sometimes i fear i will never be able to finish this book. on days like today i can come up with an excellent extract that says just what i want it to convey and then after that i go blank. everything else ive written suddenly pales in comparison and i feel i have to start all over again.

i finished breaking dawn. i was so worried i wouldnt like it as she ends up edward rather than jacob, but i was pleasantly satisfied with the ending presented, not to mention the opportunities for a sequel.

i wish i had my letters to stuart up here with me, i think i would blog them for the whole world to see, knowing i would be quite safe in the assumption that he would still never read them.

i spoke to my friend brian the other day, it was nice to hear from home. or at least someone from that end. i dont want to go back though. leaving was one of the best decisions iv ever made.

i love you

heather xoxox