Houses and flowers.....
Posted by torsum
Tx
Posted by torsum
It’s the Saturday after the funeral and I cant believe what’s just happened. My phone rang early and it is the agent from down south with a more reasonable offer on the farm, and they want to settle in 10 days. I have to do this. I have to sell that chain around my ankles and look forward. I rush into Subiaco and meet the agent and my accountant. I gloss over the pages, incapable of absorbing anything, and I sign. Done!
I drive home to mum and dad and tell them the news, and then it happens. My first round ever of uncontrollable crying convulsions since he died. It wells up from a deep place in my stomach and as I wail I slowly curl myself up into the foetal position on the couch. Mum strokes my back and dad has my feet. Well this is certainly a snap shot in time to remember.
After what seems like forever but is probably only minutes I sit up and say “so what on earth do I do now?”. There is silence. God I hate the silence. Nobody is going to help me here. Yet again it's up to me and quite frankly it’s obvious really. It’s got to be all about Sophie and moving forward, so I grab my iPad and start searching for two bedroom apartments in Claremont close to her school.
Frantically and now with some semblance of purpose I troll the real estate pages. The same place keeps coming up time and time again and it is in a great location directly above one of the best shopping centres in Perth. I email the agent to see if we can view it the next day, being a Sunday. Time is of the essence especially since my daughter has said she cannot come back to this house. Not the place where it all happened.
Just then there is a knock on the door and my gorgeous psychologist friend comes in. She’s quick to explain that there are no rules for grief and whatever works is all right. My new best friend is the tissue box. I haven’t cried this much ever, not when he collapsed and not when he died. Nope, I’ve been the clinical doctor the whole way through and now it’s begun. The strange thing is I feel better crying. There is a wave of something, apparently endorphins, that washes over me every time I convulse. It’s like a drug. I want more.
I stand up to see her out and suddenly I am hit by the sight in front of me. Flowers everywhere. They are consuming my living room, dining room and kitchen. “Get these flowers out” I shout. They have suddenly become a symbol for death. How dare people send them, new and fresh like a baby, only to have me watch them slowly die over the next week and toss them out. Don't they understand this? It's torture! Cards and flowers are doing my head in. There is a mad scramble around the house as my sister, parents and the psychologist all grab bunches of flowers and tip them into the bin. Within minutes they are gone and I can breath again.
Note to self - send food, alcohol or beauty products next time someone dies!!!!
Tx