Musings for the new year

My body clock is still all messed up. All because of time spent in Europe, our Spanish getaway over the last Christmas season. Each night, since returning on New Year's day eve, I tossed and turned, sleeping in short spells and waking up for longer in the dead of the night. It’s a definite sign of aging, this slowness to drag myself out from jet lag, even after more than a week.

But aside from sleep deprivation, during the day I actually felt pretty good. Could it be the new year effect? For so long, since Jenny’s tragic passing on, I have been wrapped up in that fuzzy familiar blanket of melancholy. But moving into the new year, the cloak of darkness has palpably lifted somewhat. I actually felt lightened and focussed. It felt strangely unusual too.

Do not get me wrong. I am not trying to forget my dear departed wife. Heaven forbid. My computer screen saver continues spewing out her pictures and I still spend long moments looking at them, eating into my productivity at work. And I still pause to look at the photographs I put up on the wall. In my office and every other corner of our house. The huge difference this time is the unusual absence of that sinking feeling. And that throbbing ache inside me that I have gotten so used to. Now I could auto-switch back to reality and unstick myself from the gloominess with minimal wallowing.

Truth be told, Jenny still dominates my mental state a lot of the time. But each time I remind myself. We are but mere mortals.

So I heaved a sigh, telling the Jenny in me, “Honey, we all die one day. There’s no getting away from it. It's just so sad and too bad that your day came so soon. But it's not yours to choose”. A grudging sigh of acceptance.

So why would it be so bloody hard to accept that she has died? Because in truth everybody dies one day. Nothing is permanent.  But as long as I live, I think the pain will forever be there. Dormant one day, but waiting to be re-triggered and smiting me again on some other day and with greater might than before.

But for the last few days the black clouds have lifted. A sense of calm. The inner storm abated.

Perhaps I had bottled up my grief for too long over the last festive season, even during my holiday in Spain with the kids, I recalled being weighed down, heart sodden by a baggage of gloom and grief. Returning back, visiting her niche again in our church columbarium, as I would every weekend, I sobbed my heart out.  Perhaps it was that outpouring and release that gave the new year a fresh start.

Work was mercifully manageable despite returning from a long vacation. But the holiday season has ended so I can expect the heat to build up quickly in the coming days or weeks. I am bracing myself to the challenge.

But what the heck?  Would I care too much if work starts getting on my goat? I may well decide to pack it all in, saddle up and ride away into the sunset. An earlier than expected retirement could well open up a new and exciting life for me.  So will I still be working when this year comes to an end? I am not sure at all. For now I will  hold onto the job. I will take it a day at a time.

Outside of work, I enjoy reading. But during the months of Jenny’s predicament with cancer, my reading and many other leisurely pursuits was put on hold.  Jenny and I were jointly stuck in survival mode. How could I focus on anything else? Not least reading for pleasure. The only reading that made sense then was the stuff of websites. Fighting cancer, eating the right foods and other health sites, if all these could even be counted as literature. 

After her passing on, my initial reading was still largely bounded by the world-wide-web. Namely, grief sites. I was searching cyber-space for consolation. A virtual shoulder to cry on, perhaps. I needed to learn from other widowers and widows alike. How they dealt with their spousal losses.

But eventually the old reading habit found its way home. What better friend than a dog-eared paperback companion to while away all this time I now have by myself, in the absence of my beloved Jenny?

I had since devoured a range of titles – ”And the mountains echoed”, by Khaled Hosseini (poignant novel of separation and familial love broken up by turmoil of war. Khaled Hosseini is a master story-teller, thru and thru), “A Grief Observed” by CS Lewis (journal of a widower’s grief, presented to me by a co-worker, much attuned to my own grievous state), “Inferno”, by Dan Brown (a gripping mystery thriller in the Robert Langdon series, though not the best by this author), “Whitey”, by Lehr and Gerard O’Neill, “The rise and fall of the Kray twins”, by John Pearson (these two books feature the lives and times of infamous real-life gangsters. I often wonder how real people can be so devoid of basic conscience, much as I abhor violence), “My favourite wife”, by Tony Parson (one of my favourite authors who is so adept in writing about family relationships). Currently I am half-way through a non-fiction, “Thinking like a freak”, an interesting read about how we can make a difference by changing the way we think. 

Aside from reading I spend some of my free time strumming my guitar and going for walks and slow jogs.  As always, my music collection was my constant companion on these solo jaunts in the park. I enjoy the fresh air and intimacy with greenery and nature.

Last Saturday, I spent the evening jamming with a few friends at the Actors bar at the Boat Quay, a small pub where weekend wannabe musicians gather to show off their mettle by performing to a live audience of peers. I summoned enough courage to sing U2’s “All I want is you” and Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m on fire”.  Good thing there were just another two people at the bar. And they appeared to be hard of hearing. So not too much damage done there.

I have always felt it a futile and pointless exercise to make new year resolutions. So none was made this year. Were there such flaws the year before that make it necessary for making resolutions? If so, why wait for a new year to emerge to correct them? It would be a crappy way to start a year making resolutions.

But I did wonder if for this new year I should stop adding to this blog. I did some soul searching.  What do I stand to gain by sharing my heart and pain? In this part of the world I am not sure if such blogs are well accepted. I risk being branded a weirdo. Culturally and socially there is an expectation that people in my situation should just put on a stoic face and lock up the unhappy state. Keep it private.  Revealing too much of your inner feelings make others feel awkward and uncomfortable. Which explains why nobody I know has really talked to me about what I write.

But seriously, I may need to learn to breathe again. To learn to live without her. I would forever be scarred but life for the walking wounded would still have to go on.

But for now I should stop with my musings and aimless rambling. And catch up on my sleep. Good night.