Memory Lane

Recently I found myself driving down a lane where a memory was so strong that I had to stop the car, get out and just stand there.

A little over six years ago it was unusual for me to leave the house alone. I’d become Tim’s carer and our weeks were punctuated by his many hospital visits and visitors to our home. My life was no longer my own and I ran on autopilot, on a timetable that was sometimes difficult to manoeuvre. Of course, the hospital appointments and the outreach health professionals took priority, but it was impossible to keep the volume of people happy who wanted to visit. Tim was exhausted. I was exhausted. I’m not sure that anyone understood how much time it took me to get Tim dressed and downstairs every day, and then back up again at night. How long it took to get him into the wheelchair, then into the car, fold up the wheelchair and put it in the boot, and finally drive an hour to his hospital appointment. And then, of course, the whole procedure in reverse.

There was a day – and I remember it very clearly – when we had no hospital appointments and no visitors. The children came to sit with Tim and I escaped to my own GP, for an appointment about my face which had erupted into a painful red rash. I was in perfect control. At least, I thought I was. But she asked me about Tim and then she asked me how I was coping. I glossed it over, as I was used to doing. But then she asked me again. It was at that moment that I realised that I wasn’t coping at all. Not with the hospital appointments, the endless phone calls, emails, texts, visitors. Not with the slow, unwavering march towards his death.

I drove away with a tube of ointment for my face. I remember the sky was that low, dark, brooding type of sky when it feels as if you could jump up and pierce the clouds. The air was heavy; I felt as if I was suffocating, waiting for, praying for rain.

I turned off along this particular lane and I parked the car, I got out and walked the length of it and then back. And then I did it again. I prayed for rain, I prayed for sleet, hail, wind, not this stillness, this watchfulness. I wanted the sky to stop holding its breath and hit me with everything it had.

I cried. Not the secret, silent weeping I’d become so good at, but huge, heaving sobs. I held my face up to the sky and begged for rain.

There was nothing.

Not a whisper of breeze or a movement of cloud.

Nothing.

I drove home to find my family cuddled up in front of the television. They all smiled at me. And I’ll never forget the look in Tim’s eyes – those beautiful, brown eyes. They were full of love. He could no longer speak, and yet somehow he didn’t need to. I made tea and sat with them, enjoying this rare, special time together.

So, the other day I walked a little along the lane. This time the sky was a pale blue and the budding trees danced slowly in the breeze. My heart beat a little louder but there was no urge to scream or sob, just the acknowledgement that everything since that time has been gilded by sorrow.

I got back in the car and set off home. The emptiness inside grew bigger and bigger, and in a little while I realised I am still the mistress of secret, silent weeping.