Warning: verbal diarrhoea incoming…
So I’d disappeared off for a while, angry at life but thrown in at the deep end by it all, hectic crazy days followed by mournful dark sleep-deprived nights where even the most agonising day’s work could not bring me sleep. (To be fair to life though, she did throw me the curve ball of me rapidly losing weight so that’s always a bonus…)
I watched the season end here in rural Ireland with a gladness and a sorrow as peace returned to our rugged coast but left us bereft of the happy cheerfulness that aggravates us locals in the busy times. A child’s laughter can bring such joy even on the darkest of days. Ive watched the cars leave, the caravans pull out, one by one the rental cars disappear from our roads leaving us free to plan our days instead of our time spent in our own cars trying to get from A to B. Ive watched children return to school, parents gleefully waving off their babies at the gates as they disappear off to have coffee and a catch-up, or head for work and routines only they know. Ive watched it all, and I’ve been stood still.
Throughout this pandemic, I’ve also watched everyone else stop while I ran a never ending race against the world (or at least that’s how it felt). I watched some families grow together, making joy out of nature for the first time, generational gaps pulled together through story-telling, zoom quizzes, children shoulder to shoulder with grandparents as they learned to sink fence posts and wrestle unwilling sheep. Ive also watched families fall apart, not being able to cope with being together all of the time, their patience incapable of getting them past who left the toilet seat up (or down) or whose turn it is to do the dishes or walk the dog. Through it all, I’ve ached for any or all of that.
My race has been with myself, with finding the holy trinity of Me Myself and I. It’s not over yet, so I still walk (I’ve actually managed to get back running too but that’s a blog for another day). I find my way along cliffs and coast, along hills and mountains, the undulating topography giving way for my aching body and mind.
Today was no different really, except I’ve come to realise something rather profound. Ive realised what it is that all this wandering is doing to me. Ive realised what all the cleaning and redecorating is doing to me. Ive realised what it is I’m searching the vastest depths of Mother Nature for but what she can never give to me. And finally I’ve made peace with it.
Ive come out of an absolute mindfuck of a summer (if you’ll excuse my French). But I’m still me. No person can take that away. A true friend of mine kept telling me “you can’t say someone has upset you - you can only say you’ve allowed yourself to be upset by them.” So I’m applying this everywhere I go.
Onwards and upwards people. Much love.
MLP
