All Alone With The Memory

Since I have been staying at the home of my lovely friends, not only have I broken their fridge, but I also have been presented with lots of photographs to look at by my friends.

Gazing at photos and laughing along with my friends is one thing, but taking photo albums back to the room I am sleeping in so I can continue perusing. For some reason, when I am alone, those photographs have a different effect on me.

Photo by Octavio J. Garcu00eda N. on Pexels.com

You know when I was attacked…there were a lot of blows directed towards my head…and my loved ones had always made me aware that since then, there are things missing from my memory. As someone who apparently has lost memories, it is a strange feeling to see photographs which you are in, with people you do not recognize, at locations you do not recall, and not to find those images prompt any recollection.

I want to remember – but nothing seems to be there. It is a little unnerving. I sort of feel a little vulnerable that my friends have so many photographs that I am in…and I cannot find those memories anywhere in my brain.

I am going to sleep…because it is weighing heavily on my heart.

Memories…Letting The Happy Ones Dominate

Three years ago…I published this post.

Two years ago…I originally published this post, and I posted it last year for a second time.

One year ago…I published this post. I was very pleased with it. So here it is again.

(By the way, I did make it back there at the start of June, I needed to)

I am about to go on holiday for two weeks.  I will be visiting various family members and friends.  I hope to take lots of photos and share them in posts.  Two weeks of pleasure seeking and seeing loved ones – cannot wait!

But before I go, I want to get something out of my system.  It has been looming over me…so I am going to tackle it aggressively!  Well…I mean face it head on without shutting it out of my mind.

The park I went to that night.  It is a beautiful place.  One of my favourite locations in London.  I had been there hundreds of times in the five years I had lived in London.  I want that park to be beautiful in my mind…not a place I associate with a traumatic event.  Since that night, I have been back three times.

This is where it happened.  There is nothing outstanding about this spot.  But I do remember sitting on one of the benches that night.  This is a photograph taken from the bench I sat on that night.

When I first arrived at around 10.30pm, it was still fairly light.  There were people walking their dogs, there were joggers, there were teenagers sitting on the grass listening to music and chatting.  There were people sitting on other benches nearby.

As I sat there, I became engrossed with my own thoughts.  I remember tears rolling down my face because I did not know what to do about my ex-flatmate who seemed to be sucking all of the life and joy out of me.  I did not notice that all of the sunlight had vanished and I was sitting in the dark.  I did not notice that there were no more dog-walkers, no more joggers and no more teenagers listening to music.

I remember a man sitting next to me.  I remember a lot of other things which I am choosing not to write about because I don’t see why those details would be remotely helpful to anyone else.  What he did does not pain me anymore.  It is the situation with my ex-flatmate that pains me still.

The first time I visited this location after that night, I remembered something else.  The trees in this part of the park – they are brilliantly easy trees to climb.  I had been at this precise location a few weeks earlier with a friend and her sons.  We had been teaching the boys how to climb trees.  So much fun.

It was ever so helpful to remember that.  Such a beautiful park, I want the happy memories to be the ones that dominate.

When I first moved to London I bumped into a friend from Wiltshire who just happened to be visiting one of my neighbours.  She wanted to go out for a coffee and a chat.  It was a beautiful sunny day.  I still did not know the area very well.  But my neighbour took us to this park.  There is a house, part of which is now a café.  We sat outside in the sunshine, before having a wander around the park.  I fell in love with the park that afternoon.  I would frequently visit over the next five years.

It is very helpful to remember that.  This beautiful park, full of happy memories I have shared with friends.  I have taken many friends who were visiting me to the park and we have had long walks followed by coffee and cake in the café.  I want those to be the memories that dominate.

These are the ponds where people can swim.  I had always wanted to go for a swim in these wild ponds, but I was a bit nervous of going alone.  A few days before I was attacked, a group of us came down to this park to do our keep fit class.  One of the regulars was moving abroad to get married and he wanted to have a special class as it was his last week with us.  Everyone used to call the class “fat-camp”.  I was too vain to call it that, so I called it “boot-camp”.  It was lots of running and exercises designed to train the parts of our body we did not even know were there.  Anyone was made welcome, but if you loved pushing yourself you would exult in the class.  We normally met once a week near to where we worked so we could go straight from work.

However, a few days before I was the victim of a crime, we drove up to this park and started running.  We ran together down to the ponds and then went for a swim. Afterwards we ran back up to a grassy area near to where the cars where and followed the instructions of the guy who took the class – stomach crunches, leap-frogging, press-ups etc.  Then we nipped into the pub for a beer before heading home.

I remember loving every moment of that night.  It was perfect.  Perfect in every way.  The delightful summery evening, the friends I was with, the exhilaration of running and swimming at a beautiful location, ending the evening with a laugh and a few tears as we said goodbye to our lovely friend before he moved.

It is very helpful to remember that.  This beautiful park, the location for some of my happiest hours doing what I loved with people that I loved.  I want all of those memories to dominate.

So there it is…this has really helped to get this out of my system.  This is the park where it happened.  A tiny blip in an otherwise wonderful treasure chest of happy memories of one of my favourite places in London.

 

Learning From Mumma Bear

My mum is very sweet, I have to say. Believe me…it is not just me that thinks so. People love my mum! In the town we grew up in, everyone knew my mum and people loved her. They thought she had a gorgeous personality. She was always smiling, always chatting, always showing kindness.

Just over ten years ago, once we had all left home, my parents moved closer to my grandfather so they could help him as his health was starting to decline. In the village they now live in, people have come to know and love my mum. She has the same gorgeous personality. People say exactly the same things as they did in my home town – your mum is always smiling, so friendly, so kind.

Yup that’s my mumma! I have so many stories about the people whose lives she has touched, I could easily fill a book about Mumma Bear. We could not have asked for a better example of how to be a gorgeous human being than our Mumma Bear!

Besides all the work at home, caring for a huge family, Mum did not work for money when we were younger. She wanted to be around for us during our early years. She felt starting work before we were at school would disrupt our development…or something like that. But once my youngest sister Milly had started school, Mumma then decided to go back to nursing. For several years she worked on an endoscopy unit in the nearby hospital.

I remember the very first time she received wages. After years of gratefully accepting hand-me-downs from other kind families, Mumma wanted to go out and buy us something new. There was a new shop in the local shopping centre and they had some beautiful teddy bears. Mum bought one for the three of us “little ones”. I must have been ten years old at this time, because Milly was now at school. Mine was a slightly ginger brown. I called my teddy “Max”. Milly had a white bear which she named “Snowy”. Mandy, her more beige brown bear she named “Honey”.

Three bears for three little girls. We were so grateful to Mumma Bear. We all treasured those bears. I still had Max when I left home in my mid-twenties!

That was not the only treat. Mumma Bear really wanted to treat us. She took us to a local restaurant which was famous for their naughty puddings and desserts. I ordered a Banana Split. Milly ordered a knickerbocker-glory. Mandy ordered a salad! A salad…just about the farthest thing from a naughty dessert!

Aaaaah! It’s nice to reminisce over the pages and pages of special memories of those you love. Mumma Bear was the perfect mother to the three little girls, who still think she is one of the sweetest people on the planet.

The GateHouse Pub

I love Sarah’s prompt for this week, but I don’t think I can give an authoritative answer to this one. I will tell you about one pub where I have some special memories I cling to though.

Where I am living now there are pubs a-plenty, and lots of restaurants. This area is very popular with tourists and visitors. Most of the pubs are owned by Youngs – a pub restaurant company with quite an empire up and down the country. I don’t know which is the best. I have visited most of them with friends, but I have not adopted any of them as my pub of preference.

The thing about a pub is…it’s not just the food, it’s not just the staff, it’s not just about the comfort and seating, it’s not just about the music they play, it’s not just the other people at the pub…it’s all of the above that create an atmosphere that makes you feel relaxed and forget all your troubles.

In the town I grew up, all of the local pubs were a bit too rough and ready for me to go anywhere near them! But I have travelled a lot within the UK, and I discovered country pubs when local volunteers took us for a drink after a long day on a construction site or a large public event. They took us to some beautiful pubs with a relaxed atmosphere and we felt comfortable there.

Of the pubs I have visited up and down the country with friends and workmates, some I have enjoyed, others not so much. I think on the whole, when I didn’t enjoy a pub, it was because of the behaviour of some eeed-yats who had drunk too much and decided to act up. Whenever that has happened, my friends and I would make a hasty departure. That’s the risk of pubs – you never know who else will be there and how much they will drink and the effect it has on them. So we are always ready to move on when the atmosphere changes.

I have lots of memories of fun nights with friends at pubs. We have played cards, we have put the world to rights, we have shared portions of chips or onion rings, we have argued over whose round it was, we have laughed, even danced, and occasionally cried together. In London especially, many of my friends and I have lived in tiny flats, where we had to be considerate of our neighbours. So meeting up for a drink at a local pub where there was more space and we could make a little bit more noise was handy.

I know quite a few of the pubs in Highgate, Hampstead, Muswell Hill, Finchley, Mill Hill, Whetstone, Crouch End, Holloway, Kentish Town….and beyond. I am going to tell you about one pub, it’s not necessarily the best pub, but it is one pub where I have some memories with friends that I like to keep close.

 

My memory is of an evening that ended at The Gatehouse Pub in Highgate Village. But the whole evening is one I remember fondly. It took place on a Thursday evening, at the end of a warm summer’s day.

I met with the group I met every Thursday for a bootcamp. Normally we would run down to a local cricket pitch, where the class would start. We would run sprints, and do squats and leapfrogs and all sorts of different exercises. But this night was different. One of the lads was leaving London to move abroad as he was engaged to be married. So we were going to have the bootcamp at a different location – Hampstead Heath.

We drove to Hampstead Heath. We ran from the Highgate side of the Heath over to the Hampstead side. When we reached the Hampstead Ponds for mixed bathers (there are men only and women only ponds too), we stripped our running clothes off and all of us had our swimming costumes on. We jumped into the water and swam a couple of circuits around the pond. There was a bit of splashing each other too. There was hardly anyone else there at that time so we weren’t annoying anyone.

Afterwards, we put our running clothes on over our swimming costumes, and then ran back over to the Highgate side of the Heath. There we found a grassy spot and the guy who took the class shouted out some instructions which we followed, press-ups, squats, leap frogs and stretches.

Two of our friends (a married couple) had a VW Camper Van. So we all got changed in the back of the van. The girls went first, we had to take our damp clothes off and have a quick dry off and put on our warm dry clothes. Then it was the lad’s turn to change. Once we had all changed, we walked up the hill so we could have a goodbye drink with our friend who was moving abroad for his wedding.

After all that exercise we were hungry. So a few of us ordered some food. I can’t remember the drink I ordered…but I do remember I ordered a veggie burger. I remember that night, sitting with friends whose company I really enjoyed. For almost two years they had been a weekly escape from the challenges in my life. I felt happy with them, relaxed. Some of them knew Jack, my ex-flatmate, but they didn’t mention him. Nobody teased me about him, nobody taunted me. None of them referred to something that had been said about him and I. All of that group just liked me for me. We had the same interests, we loved keeping fit and exercising in a really fun way – outside in the fresh air.

I loved Thursday evenings because they were a complete escape from Jack, who had been pretty much making my life miserable for around two years by this point. That night we sat in The Gatehouse Pub and I felt happy, I felt really settled and secure. It was a lovely summer’s evening and I had spent it doing what I loved with people I felt very comfortable with. We laughed and we made a fuss of our friend who was moving. It was his last bootcamp with us and we all said our goodbyes. Although it was sad someone was leaving, I remember feeling so very happy that night.

But the very next day, Jack was back to his tricks taunting me, yet another rumour about he and I was doing the rounds on Facebook and Instagram and in Whatsapp groups. I strenuously denied it, as always. I passed Jack several times and he always looked at me with a hateful expression. That was a busy weekend. I was involved in several work projects and had training sessions to conduct. Also I helped a good friend with a huge party she had organized for the Saturday night. I only arrived back home after 3am on the Sunday morning after all the clearing up. Then Sunday was very busy. On Monday I had a television interview. I must have looked awful because I was so tired. Jack was on the same bus as me that day. He kept up his disdainful attitude.

On the Tuesday I saw him several times and he was horrid. That evening, after I had been out with some friends in Highgate Village, at a pizzeria, I turned down an offer of a lift home by a friend, who lived near me. Instead, I walked to Hampstead Heath and sat on a bench and cried. At least an hour must have passed before a man sat next to me. The next morning, Wednesday morning, I was in an ambulance on my way to hospital.

It turned out that was the last time I was ever at the Thursday bootcamp I loved so much. The last time I was with a group of friends who made me feel I could be me. The last time I was in a pub in Highgate with friends. The last evening I remember feeling happy and relaxed despite the challenges Jack was causing in my life. I cannot tell you how much I would love to be back there in the Gatehouse Pub in Highgate Village with people who made me feel comfortable and relaxed and happy.

____________

Is there a pub near you that you would describe as the best local pub? This is the writing prompt from Sarah Elizabeth MooreSarah Elizabeth Moore. Please link to her original post below:

https://sarahelizabethmoore.org/2019/03/17/writing-prompt-11/

 

Housekeeping Memoirs

Yesterday…I had the whole afternoon off. I used it to clean every inch of my little nest. I enjoyed myself so much (yes that’s right – I LOVE CLEANING!) that I wanted to write a post about it. But instead I found one of my first ever posts and decided it was time to share it with you again!

If only everyday of housework could go so smoothly….Often you get everything together and enter the room where you are due to work….but low and behold: a leak from a water tank, or someone has accidentally flung baked beans or raspberry jam against the wall, or one time, I had a pair of legs sticking out of the door…turned out the occupant was feverish with some horrible infection and had been in bed with nothing but a sheet over him, he had got up to use the bathroom, and collapsed onto the floor – guess who was cleaning on the floor where he lived that morning!  So, I didn’t get to do any work because I spent the morning being first-aider and getting help so we could get him to a Doctor.  But today…aaaaah!!!!!….no disturbance, no interference, nothing has one wrong or slowed me down today.  Wonderful!!!!

Oh the life of a housekeeper!  I have had a very pleasant morning so far and had lots of time to think of you.  The rest of the day should be easy.  I have done so much work already in this house.  I am just going to give the kitchen a refresh and clean the big windows because there have been some children firing water pistols all week, so I decided to leave them until the last point before the family get back tomorrow.  Then I am going to clean the washing machine and tumble dryer out and clean the hoovers and just basically leave everything sparkling including my equipment.

As a housekeeper you see all sorts!!!!  Some young men seem to be oblivious to the horrors they leave for their cleaner / housekeeper to find.  I have been trained as a house-holder that if a toilet is in too bad a state, there is no need to clean it, and some house-keepers even leave notes to point to the fact that they are refusing to clean something due to a lack of consideration on the part of the occupant.  I am not too bothered.  I have cleaned medical facilities, sports stadiums, concert arenas…I have seen worse things in those locations than I have in a client’s own home.  I would rather just clean it and move on with my life than enter into the shame game or go into battle with an occupant / client.

Did you know housekeepers can play tricks on their occupants?  Not all of them.  It all depends on the rapport you have with your client!  We might deliberately turn all of the pictures upside down.  Nothing too valuable mind!  If an occupant has a shopping list or a “to-do” list stuck to their fridge it is very tempting to add comic items to the list.  We might move toys and unbreakable items and set up a comedy scene – as I am doing at one house I clean in the boy’s bedrooms (I have such fun rearranging their toys.  Last time I cleaned their room, I had one of the teddies reading an encyclopaedia, and a “my little pony” is chasing “Darth Vader”.)   The boys come home from school and they love to see what I have done to their toys.

But some of my house-keeping friends are really crazy in the stunts they pull…only because they trust their clients will laugh when they find out their house-keeper has pranked them.  One of my friends removed all of the lightbulbs from the entire apartment she had cleaned including the spares in the utility cupboard.  So, when the male occupants came back when it was dark – they had to use their phones to see around that night.

Housekeepers have used various props, including mannequins (the old chestnut of leaving a life-size figure in an occupants bed with just a blonde wig visible.  What else?  Malt loaf – don’t read this if you have just had dinner.  Malt loaf can be moulded into various shapes and left in the toilet and then a pretend note of outrage can be left – poor client!!!!  One of the worst housekeeper tricks I saw involved a pair of boxer-shorts and Nutella.  I am sorry, the details are far too gross to tell you the full story!!!

What else?  Housekeepers often show a lot of love by folding towels into flowers or animals, and folding toilet paper to look pretty.  We try to spruce things up wherever possible.  I must say I love to have a laugh with the girls but I couldn’t play any horrid tricks on any of my clients.  I am too worried about someone having a really bad day and being overwhelmed – a practical joke might seem fun and completely innocent – but for many years I have realized that some people are incredibly delicate / fragile and you don’t know….I mean how could you know?  We can’t read what is going on in someone else’s mind.  Instead, I often like to imagine my client or occupant has had a terrible day and is exhausted and stressed out and comes home to find their place is beautiful and sparkling and so much love and thought has been poured into the housekeeping of their home.

If you have a lot of love and a lot of giving in your heart, housekeeping is a wonderful role because you can pour love into your work. Personally…I love to make things sparkle. For that reason I especially love cleaning bathrooms and kitchens.

The Rough And The Ready

Last Friday I was struggling. I was on edge all day. On the verge of panic. Unable to cope with all the multi-tasking I have to do at work. I became tearful at work when I thought of weeks more of this intense pace stretching out in front of us, without the chance to break away and go and visit Goldfinch in Australia. I wanted to run. I didn’t know who from or why. But I wanted to escape.

This is how I felt five years ago. I was cornered. I was overwhelmed. I didn’t know who was safe, who I could trust. Friends and colleague were talking about me and Jack. I had no idea exactly who was saying what, except for those who blazenly taunted me to my face. Every aspect of my life was touched by the slanderous gossip, name-calling, accusations, undermining of me as a person and my sincerity or integrity.

You know where it led me. I went to a park after a night out with friends because I did not want to go home. I was the victim of a crime that night and woke up the next morning in an ambulance.

But around a month before that night, I remember a small incident. I escaped my part of London and travelled to the other side of London for a social event. My sister Milly was there. I met some new people who had been working with her on a project. There were some deaf volunteers there too. Milly and I both learnt British Sign Language when we were teenagers.

I remember saying goodbye to Milly and her husband when they dropped me off at the train station. Somebody had given me a gift. Two bottles of wine, one red and one white, I recall. As I walked towards the train, the gift bag gave way and the wine bottle smashed on the concrete floor. There were glass and wine everywhere.

My main concern was that glass was a hazard to other people. I searched for a member of staff asking if they had any cleaning equipment to clear the glass. I would have done it myself. I asked if they had a hazard sign or cone or tape, to warn other people. The station employee said just to leave it and they would sort it out. I was so anxious. It was my fault. It was my fault there was dangerous glass on the station floor. It was hazardous to other members of the public. I wanted to fix it. I stood rooted to the spot, determined to be a warning to other people that there was broken glass and they must be careful. I became unreasonably emotional and ended up in tears.

It wasn’t really the glass that was upsetting me. It was the situation in my personal life that was overwhelming and was completely taking all the joy out of life. The effects of tiredness and stress can accumulate. If you become isolated with a challenge and do not know who to trust you can become desperate in your thinking. Its as if you are cornered, they are coming at you from all directions, you want to escape. I wanted to fix it. I was ready to accept some responsibility for the situation between Jack and I. But the relationship between us was so strained back then…he would not speak to me.

So, when the wine bottles smashed, I just fell apart. You know the expression “the straw that broke the camel’s back”. I was in a flood of tears. I didn’t know what to do. A guy came over to ask if I was alright. When I explained I had dropped the bottles and now there was broken glass all over the floor, he responded by kicking the glass to the side of the wall (so it was less hazardous I suppose) and telling me not to worry, accidents happen.

Well…last week, those feelings were coming back. Every summer since I was attacked I have a rough few weeks. I have flashbacks of events from that night. But I also seem to relive all the stress and anguish that led me to go to the park that night. I had wondered if having made peace with Jack things might be different this year. They don’t seem to be. I am having waves of panic, sleepless nights, dreams recalling some of the most stressful situations I was in five years ago, those same feelings of being cornered, under attack, needing to escape.

I actually think I might be having a worse time so far this year. Perhaps that is because I am cut off from friends and family socially. Perhaps the accrual of tiredness because of work has made it hard. Normally my life is graced with variety. I am involved in different work, different projects, I work with different people, in different locations. The past few months have been the same…every day the same. The feeling of wanting to escape is growing.

At the end of this month it will be five years since that night. It is still the night that took me away from my chosen career, my chosen home, my world, my purpose. It is still the night that left me with severe injuries, blackouts, headaches, nightmares and fear of whom I could trust.

People say such silly things. Someone said to me again the other day “everything happens for a reason”. If only I could sent fire to that expression. Do people think about what they are saying? It was also recommended to me that I focus on the positive and what I can do to help others. Yes yes, I know that having experienced a traumatic event myself and gone on to do marvellous things, I may be able to be of assistance, inspiration, a source of practical advice to someone else. I do realize that we learn things when we go through challenging experiences and we can develop precious qualities and we may be able to help others. But really!

The truth is my life has been like broken glass ever since that night. My life is in pieces. But I am a positive person and I do make the most of my situation. I keep going. I keep smiling. I keep singing.

But still…it’s back again. The waves of panic, feeling cornered, feeling overpowered, under attack, nowhere to run to, noone to turn to, nobody to trust…it comes back. I ended up on my own at that park because for so long I had put a brave face on, I had kept going, kept working, kept smiling and kept singing until I shattered like broken glass.

The brain is powerful. The things that cause flashbacks are varied…the smell of grass, the smell of men, the warm weather, feeling dehydrated, feeling there are excessive demands on me.

When I was on my way home after work last Friday night there was a man walking towards me. He was carrying a grocery bag. As I neared him, his bag burst open and glass bottles of beer smashed onto the road and beer began running down the hill. It took my brain back to that night I dropped the wine bottles at the station just a few weeks before I was attacked.

I watched the guy. He shrugged and laughed and carried on walking.

Is that what people want me to do I wonder? Shrug, laugh and carry on. These past couple of weeks have made me realize that despite it being five years, despite being busy, despite having the longed for peace with Jack, despite so much else that has happened on a positive note…the memories of despair and the memories of trauma are still there. They leap out at me from the shadows of my mind.

I think I am in for a rough few weeks.

 

Missing You

I am a funny creature. It is a really good job he is 10,100 miles away. Or this would be a problem! A serious problem!!!

What eases my conscience is that I have told “Jack” that I have been very much in love with Goldfinch and still miss him enormously. Jack is being very good about it. He seems to understand that it is hard to let go. He says those memories with Goldfinch are very special. (And he is right, they are. They are part of me now.) But Jack says he and I are going to build lots of special memories too.

At the moment there is something about birds. I see birds sitting on the bird-feeder in the garden pecking at peanuts. I see pigeons perched on roof-tops. I see a little red-breasted robin that seems to perch on the wall so it can greet me whenever I arrive home at my little nest, I always say “hello” when I pass it you know.

But every bird I see makes me think of Goldfinch. I do wish he was here. But it is probably a very good thing he is not. Or else my life would be in a real pickle.

In A Sky Full Of Stars I Think I Saw You

My letter to Goldfinch…has finally arrived in Australia, almost two weeks after I posted it. Deep sigh. He sent me a very sweet e-mail today. I have had a very busy day…so I am still thinking about what to type back. But I think I will have to sleep on it.

Sometimes I really do feel as if I am over three billion miles away (as is Pluto from the sun), not just 10,100 miles. I still sense my orbit around him is steady. I keep my eyes focused on him. He is not going to lose the very tender place in my heart where he resides.

In my mind I can see him in his home, in his city. I am so glad I had the summer with him (Australia’s winter). It has given me so many wonderful memories. It is so much easier to picture him over there now I have seen his home for myself.

I love Jack. I always did, but I had to suppress it. My love for him is finally allowed to flourish and thrive. A new orbit is establishing itself. My life is now shifting to revolve around him. But I am so glad that for two years Goldfinch has been in my life. He has allowed me to know the wonders of love and not hold back.

We Reminisced

I mentioned in a post the other day something that a certain somebody reminded me of. He had been watching a video of my in my Bollywood glory! Well I told him about my memories of him singing in the flat. He sang in the shower. He sang in the kitchen. He sang in the corridor outside my room! He sang such funny songs. Not the songs you would expect him to be singing. It was like a comedy show. Always the life and soul of the party. Always charismatic, energetic and fun.

It was funny, watching him dancing around and singing “We’re up all night to get lucky.” His dancing is just as distinctive as my Dad’s! I have missed the singing and dancing so much!

I have missed him! Tremendously! At first I wasn’t going to say that. But in the end I did. I couldn’t help myself. And it felt good to admit it.

Sometimes over the past few years, I wasn’t sure what I was suffering from the most, the stress of all the awful things that were said about me? the trauma of being attacked? the distress at being removed from my home, my career, my friends? or just being away from a person who had completely captivated me from our first acquaintance and always made me feel excited?

It was really nice to reminisce. There’s not much else to say right now. We’ll have to see.

So Close To Giving Up (All I Need Is A Word)

Just a reminder that my 05:58am GMT scheduled posts are mostly republished posts from this time last year. I think I might be confusing some readers. Last summer Goldfinch was living in England (he was here for work). I thought he was upset with me about something…

This tiredness malarkey is hard to beat.  I have slept a lot over the weekend, but I am still exhausted. I am so worried that Goldfinch is not talking to me. He has not replied to any of my texts or voice mails and when I try to ring him, it goes straight to his answering service.

I am not certain but I think it is the weight of this burden on my heart of all that happened between me and my ex-flatmate.  It’s daft, but it is exhausting to relive all those words and looks and thoughts and feelings.

But, I am glad to have found a medium to express these buried memories and emotions, because talking out loud has not been the way to communicate these for me.  For starters, no one is patient enough to let me work through it.  Everyone butts in and asks questions that I cannot answer.  But writing about it all…at least it is all coming out and I am not on my own with these painful memories and emotions (that frankly are not anyone else’s burden, but my own).

For over three years I have been trying to work out what happened and what went wrong and I have narrowed it down to the week I have been relating to you, the week after that cup of tea with my flatmate.  That was key to what happened afterwards.  The following months were agony.  Neither of us were brave enough to sit down and talk again, so the situation became unbearable because we did not communicate, we just hurt each other it seemed.

Then one summer evening after my birthday, I went to a London park on my own, because I did not want to see my ex-flatmate.  It was around 10pm, but it was light when I arrived and there were lots of people around.  I sat on a bench and let myself weep. After a while, a man sat next to me on the bench, and made a few friendly comments.  I became aware of how dark it was and how there was no one else around.

I stood up and said I had better be getting back home. Seconds later, I was on my knees after huge strength pushed me down by the shoulder and I remember with a shudder the words, “You’re not going anywhere.”  I am never going to write a post about what happened between that moment and waking up the next morning in an ambulance – it is not going to happen.  It is something I do not need to relive or write about.

But as I have said before, I am still tormented by everything that happened between my flatmate and I that caused me to go to the park on my own, feeling I could not bear to see him, and deeply grieved that my ex-flatmate still has found no words to communicate to me after that night.

It is a big grey cloud that hangs over me and sometimes blocks out the sunshine.  Even worse, it has perhaps led me to sabotage my wonderful relationship with my gorgeous Goldfinch who gave me his frank opinion of my ex-flatmate last weekend.

This is what happens with emotional tiredness…you do stupid things that you later regret.  My sister Milly called last night and we chatted.  That made me feel a lot better. Thank goodness for family.

But still, not communicating only causes pain.  I have tried to communicate with my ex-flatmate a handful of times over the last three years, but have not received a word back from him.  Everyone involved says he wants to talk, but is still in shock about what happened to me and does not know what to say.  But I no longer care what he says – the silence is unbearable.

And now, waiting to hear from Goldfinch is unbearable. I love him. I am so worried that I have hurt him or made him angry.

Look…all I can do right now is carry on cooking and freezing meals, clean my kitchen and go to bed.  I don’t have the emotional energy to jump on a train and go and stand in front of either my ex-flatmate or Goldfinch.  I am way way too tired.  I just want to curl up in a little ball and pretend none of this ever happened.

I want my life back, my career back and I want to be back in my room in my flat with Ella and Dean, and any flatmates who are willing to empty bins and not be hostile on a daily basis.