Memories and Anniversaries
They
come, some of them, unmarked, unrequested.
They are not on your calendar; your phone hasn’t reminded you. No presents have been bought or cheques, with
a ‘sorry, boring but…’ message, scribbled. There is no card; no celebration planned. You are not getting your hair and nails done
or choosing what dress to wear, what lipstick, shoes and bag will
accompany.
No fanfare of cards falls on the
mat; no calls from friends and family; no request and happy congrats on the
radio station, no flowers on the sideboard, jostling with the cards.
But they come. They come, unbidden,
unwarned; an alien invasion. At first, in bewilderment and disbelief, you carry
on regardless. Or try to. But they keep coming. Cropping up round every corner, at every turn.
They grow. They multiply. They encircle your being; inhabit every part
of you; sometimes for weeks on end. You
are absorbed and being absorbed by something you are trying not to mark. But it marks you. Your apple cart is well and truly upset, your
rhythm thrown out of any functional equilibrium you thought you were holding on
to. They are marked in so many ways.
In the weather; the heat and
humidity building, especially in the south. The uncomfortable, almost unbearable heat. In the infrequent storms in my part of the
world (counted on one hand in thirty years), like the one experienced here in
the Aberdeenshire, the one you chose to take your leave during; the one you
sent? The one you passed over in just last year. I felt it; it lifted the corners of my mouth.
Yes, I noted; maybe I marked it
In the songs on the radio – they
come tumbling, like petals from an overblown rose when you touch the bush – as if
someone is playing the Tracks of your Years. The woman who does the musicals show – ‘Oh What
a Beautiful Morning’, and a love song request.
Who the hell requested the love song to an otter ‘Val Doonican croons ‘Ring
of Bright Water’? and someone doing an
homage to TV and radio theme tunes – ‘White Horses’, AND ‘World Wide Family Favourites’. I am in floods – I am in Midge’s pool at
Camusfearna. It can’t all be because lockdown
has left them short of new material to broadcast. Maybe it’s something in the ether. Something the universe is trying micromanage.
God damn it, the radio is now playing Annie
Lennox’s, ‘No more I love you’ s!’
They’re in the flowers that are
blooming. I dare the rose we planted in
your honour, the Superstar, to burst, all velvety vermillion through her bud
casing, on my half-shaded patio in a large leaden pot today, in the cool, the
damp and the wind. It’s a funeral day,
unlike yours, which was blazing. That
makes me smile, with a tear.
And in the birds that are singing.
The swallow on the wire, the starlings and blackbirds, their morning songs subdued
by the unseasonable turn, but the Robin almost touches my hand as I weed. His song, sweet and light, takes me to your long
thin secluded (cos you wanted it that way garden. The hoot of the owl; my owl, the fluttering
of the bats at dusk; my bats, from my maternity roost, sweeping their figures
of eight, marking before they disappear for their however many miles, however
many thousands of insects consumed on their nightly flights. And I smell it in someone else’s cigarette, burning,
in another garden, in the cooling air.
They say that smell is the sense
that most evocates memory. The smell of heat, of hot ground, and that smell
that has a name all of its ow when rain falls on the hot ground. Petrichor. The
roses: Superstar, Peace, Piccadilly, Ena Harkness; the cherry pie smell of
heliotrope, the cherry pie, the roast chicken, newly cut grass in Wembley or in
the park.
And fags. Always so many fags. The strike of a match,
the slow burning, the puffed-out tobacco cloud, the stale lingering smell –
everywhere. On clothes, in furniture … Smoking in your bed at night, that
smell, with my babies next door, the fear that kept me awake, the choking that
kept my head at the open window.
It’s in the little things that
you find when doing ordinary domestic activities. Moving the little perfume bottle, the one
your sister treasured, to dust; picking up the pen to jot something down. The pen I picked up while at yours, on my
last visit. The one, ironically, with
the logo of the charitable trust of the hospital who managed your last
days. I throw it in the bin. I have too many pens; enough tokens and small
treasures. Enough memories.
Yesterday, I was doing ‘safe’
activities. I was tidying away some hair
bands and slides, so frequently played with during hot weather with lock down
hair, in my dressing table drawer, and something flicked up and stuck out. I drew out a white envelope. A6 size. It had been sealed, and unsealed. It had been folded in several places, like it
contained something small. The first
fold was in half, horizontally, then two inward meeting vertical folds, so when
given over to me, it would have been a thick packet about four inches by two and
a half. I unwrap it. It is empty.
But on the front, in neat almost joined up capital letters, it reads
PROPERTY: OLIVE PURCELL.
It’s content, your wedding ring.
Thin, gold, worn thin, rounded sides (courting profile it is called – or comfort
fit). It would have been handed to my brother
when we went to pick up the papers and Mum’s things from the hospital, the
Monday after she died. It was the only
personal effect she had with her when she was admitted as an emergency. Her clothes, soiled and realised would never
be worn again; we never saw again – just a hospital gown and paraphernalia. I carried it back with me from your funeral and
have it in a special box at the bottom of my jewellery box.
Every activity is infused with
those memories, those thoughts and feelings and actions of a year ago. Your concentration on the here and now is well
and truly shot to pieces. Do you fight
or do you run? Run to a couch: to a book you can’t read, a film you can’t see,
music that breaks you. Run to the hills, where every tree or bird sound, every
ripple of water every smell,
Time heals. But it also stirs. I expect that, as each year passes, each
anniversary – some marked more than others – memories will dim; or they will
change, along with the accompanying feelings. The loss of a loved one will always
be mourned, tinged with pain and sadness; with regret and with guilt. It’s a
natural part of the process. We may not
remember the trains and planes. Or the conversations with celebrants and
undertakers or the pub we stayed in or held the after funeral gathering (which
you would not have approved of – tough!), or the food we ate, or the road
diversion to the crem…
We will always hold the pictures,
the sensations: of tears and frail bruised
hands; of semi closed eyes and water sponges held to dry cracked lips; of nil-by-mouth,
of seeing syringe-drivers changed – how careful and long drawn out that process;
of the hospital smell, of you dropping slowly ever deeper into not seeing, not hearing,
not knowing. Though you always knew us, our voices, our touch, so careful on
your paper-thin skin.
‘Midnight,
not a sound from the pavement…’. Goodnight, and God Bless. 💝
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