Written on Saturday 15th October 2011:
When I was last on an aeroplane, watching England recede into abstract swirls of greenery, I was clutching my mother’s ashes tightly, on my way to Cape Town for her memorials. This morning, as Amsterdam grew into sparkling reality below me, with the early morning sun glistening off seemingly endless fields and canals of water, the memories of that trip came flooding back. I realised that, leaving my family behind, I had once again entered a rare, solitary space. Without my children to play with and entertain, or an adult to converse with, I am left in an internal bubble, and I slowly feel my memories and emotions start to ease into the larger space I can now afford to make available to them. Pure tears of loss, of missing my beloved mother, flow again for the first time in a while, uncomplicated by subsequent events or the pain of those around me. I remember powerfully how much more intense, but less cluttered that initial grief was.
The sun is almost too bright on this crisply idyllic autumn day, and I snuggle into my coat and scarf as if they hold the soft safety of homely warmth. Speeding over canals on a train, watching the unfamiliar station names carefully to ensure I don’t miss my stop, I start to let the exhilaration of exploring a foreign city on my own creep over me. It has been many years since I last had this secret pleasure, and it will continue only a few precious hours before I have the next joy of seeing a beloved friend after what is only a few months, but feels like a lifetime too long.
