That first year …
Drifting with the tide
Going through the motions
Existing, not living.

Getting up
Going to work
Taking James to school.
Sleeping, cooking, eating, drinking
Paying bills.
Relentlessly living.

Piles of post on the mat,
A full inbox every day
Messages, kind and sympathetic
A comfort in the moment.

Then back to reality.
Gaban is dead.
He’s not coming back then?
Where has he gone?
Why did he leave me?

Round and round again.
Always in my thoughts.
Always on my mind.

I carry on though.
I have no choice.
A small life depends on me.
He’s already lost one parent.
I have to be strong,
His happiness depends on that
His happiness is all that matters, 
And I carry on.

Camping is a lifeline.
We go to Charmouth,
A week with friends …
Not terribly successful,
We’re away though, by the sea,
Escaping the monotony of home, 
The messages, the phone calls, the drudgery.

Two families colliding,
An oil and water chemistry
And we’re glad to break free …
To Cornwall now, on our own
We’ve done it before, of course,
But always Gaban was there,
In the background
Knowing he’d be thinking of us
With plans to speak or meet.

This time we truly are 
On our own
That void again, that emptiness.
We pack the tent in pouring rain
Then pour it on to the grass at Tregurrian,
Watergate Bay, Newquay.
A shift, a turning point,
A coming home.

© Gill Tembo 5 June 2019