Grief

A wee bit more self-indulgence

Grief is a truly bizarre thing, they say there are many stages, you may experience all, some or none, so far mine have been numbness, sheer rage, auto-pilot, rage again, and now just constantly wanting to sob. It has taken nearly 2 months for that last stage to appear, mainly because I had to just plain 'get on with stuff' and I suspect partly because I couldn't or didn't want to believe Dad was really gone. The last night before I left the UK I was sat in the living room when I suddenly realised that once I shut the door the next day for the last time, that was it, the last 'link' with him was gone, there was absolutely no chance he was going to walk in the door with a big grin, a bear hug (my dad was the best for hugs) and a cheery 'hello my love'.

I was that nauseating thing, a 'Daddies girl', I can remember being devastated aged 5 when I realised that I couldn't marry my Dad, to me he was perfect, a total prince -even though in later life I had absolute proof that he wasn't, a part of me has never accepted it. Dad and I had much in common, a love of books, the sea, Africa, our careers, which meant we never had a shortage of things to talk about.

He was so sentimental, something that whilst clearing his house (alone, which was hard) I raged about, he had kept every letter ever written to him in his life (something he had in common with his father and grandfather - and he had ALL theirs as well)including all mine from my boarding school years, I have to say I was a far more prolific correspondent than family lore would have it and it was very amusing to read my teenage angst after so many years.

I miss him more than I can say/put into words,