Through your lens

I've never had a decent 'author' photo. It's been okay because I've never really quite seen myself as a proper author. I never thought I was good enough, as an author, or as anything really. I've always been plagued by self-doubt. It was something you and I had in common, along with the difficult fathers. But when I published my first book last year, I thought I'd better make a website and I struggled to find one of those suitably enigmatic portraits that authors have. So I cobbled something together using inadequate snapshots taken by friends. Some time after we got together, I asked you if you'd take a good author portrait for me but you never did. Like so many things we had planned, we never got round to it. Or so I thought.

And then I found this photograph amongst the files on your laptop after your death and instantly thought that here it was, a gift from you to me - the author photo that you never took. It is extra special to me because, though you'd never shown it to me before, strangely, you had written about it in a message to me, the message that you sent me when you were wavering about whether you were good enough for me. It was taken in the Yorkshire Sculpture Park last October on the day that we got together (for the second time!) This is what you wrote:

I was looking at one of the pictures I took of you yesterday on the bridge where the poppies are. I could eulogise. I'm not going to though, except to say that one of the qualities I saw there seemed to be a tremendous maturity and yet last night as I looked at you I saw a completely different face, youthful, angelic almost, such grace. I am overwhelmed.

So am I, when I look through the photographs that you took of me. Somehow, looking at myself through your lens, I see a different version of myself. I can see myself the way you did. And the gift isn't just the pictures to put on my website and on the jackets of the books that I must now write, it is the gift of having been truly loved. I can see myself through your eyes and know that, just as you were, I am loveable. I am good enough. It is the most precious gift. Thank you.

Perfect for me

'How do you just keep getting better and better?' you once said, as we'd discovered yet another shared pleasure. It was something we observed regularly, this amazing compatibility we had and yet, when you re-joined the dating site that I was on, just in order to view my profile, I didn't even notice you, didn't actually recognise you, would certainly not have considered you as a romantic prospect. And yet, there it was, an irrefutable, wonderful, easy connection between the two of us that did just keep getting better and better.

'Are you like, just my perfect man?' I asked as we were walking along Ecclesall Road on an early date.  'You tick all my boxes.' We were on our way to Ann Atkinson's Memorial book launch, the night that you would dance with me for the first time.

I don't think you replied, just smiled and held my hand a little tighter, walking with an extra bounce to your step. You'd just told me that you'd quite like to learn to tango. I had always wanted a partner who would learn to dance with me. We hit a slight problem when you realised that the tango lessons would be at the Millennium Hall; you'd had an altercation with the manager having parked your van in the space reserved for religious officiates, but, hey, it was a small obstacle.

Other boxes that you ticked:

• Like me, you loved to be outside but saw no need to turn the enjoyment of the countryside into a competitive sport. ('Beverley', one internet suitor asked, 'on your country walks, do you ever break out into a run?' 'No,' I replied. 'Never. Running would spoil a good walk.')
• You loved swimming
• Your idea of a good New Year's Eve night out was to be alone (or alone with me) contemplating the big questions of life, outdoors with a good vantage point - not a party or a drop of alcohol in sight
• You loved a good bonfire
• You loved music
• You loved making things
• You loved talking
• You loved books
• You loved words

This last one, along with the dancing, swung it for me. When I discovered that you liked doing crosswords and playing Scrabble, my head nearly exploded with joy. How I had missed having a man to play Scrabble with. Once we had discovered this shared delight, we played many times, mostly at my house but also on the mini-breaks we had together; you would neglect to pack food or clothes, but always remembered the Scrabble. I'm sorry to say that, when you died, I was in the lead. I know this will displease you immensely and that it was something you wanted to rectify. I'm sorry you won't have the chance. You will be pleased, though, to know that your mum and I have plans for a game soon.

The first game we played was on the 19th September. I know the date because it was the day of my son's fifth birthday party. After our first night together had left us confused and overwhelmed that week, we had agreed to be friends but there was no question that we were still assessing the situation, that we were on probation. That day you notched up a few more points in the wider game that we were engaged in. You were on call all day to help with the building of the Ninja Lego birthday cake for my allergic son and you fetched bouncy balls from Tescos for party bags, delivering them just in time for the party - as usual, I was running late. And then you waited for the evening when the children had gone back to their dad's and you came round after the party for Scrabble. I was exhausted and longed to curl up in your arms but instead we just hugged for a little longer than was decent and then set about playing the game. We disagreed on some of the rules but agreed, crucially, that there was to be no looking up of words. In my tiredness I knocked the board over at a crucial point in the game and impressed you with my ability to completely reconstruct the whole board. I can still picture the scene. You sitting across from me on the kids' dressing up box. You always looked big in my living room, like some kind of Hagrid figure who didn't belong in a normal house. When you died, I found a description of the game that you had written. Funny to think that, to you, I looked small.

Her son's birthday party has left her tired leaving our choices diminished.We hug for a long minute - her lonely, I needy. Small talk, pictures on laptops, then we play Scrabble. We appear close matched. I sit opposite her over the board and she looks small suddenly on a big sofa in a big room whilst I observe disembodied a fact in the room, not sure what to make of things. The game ends. It couldn't be better, a kind of quantum superposition of victory: by my rules she wins, by hers I win. Perfect. 

It was. You were. Perfect for me. 

The tightrope of grief

Every day I walk a tightrope in the darkness over a gaping chasm. I have no idea where I am trying to get to as there is no light out there to aim for but I know I must keep moving, edging tentatively towards some kind of unfathomable future. It is a balancing act, I am told, between grief and recovery.  Spend too long looking at the chasm and you risk falling into the blackness, never to return. But run too quickly over it and the darkness will eat you just the same, perhaps slowly or unexpectedly. Perhaps at some point in the future when you think you are sitting safely on the other side on a sunny patch of grass, the ground will open up and swallow you whole without warning. You can't escape from this kind of grief. The only safe way to go is carefully, inch by inch, breath by breath, word by word, day by day, putting one foot in front of the other, hoping, and yet I dare not even hope anymore, that one day you will be glad that you kept going, that one day you might reach the other side.

The best way to keep your balance on a tightrope is to focus on something directly in front of you which is fine by me because I can't look too far ahead; the emptiness is too overwhelming. So I put things in my diary, not because I look forward to them, but because they keep me looking forwards and, sometimes, looking forwards keeps me from falling. And sometimes I fall anyway. I don't yet know my limits in this new world. I have to test the rope to find out whether it can take the weight of me and this grief that I am carrying, this unwieldy monster that I haul around with me in the dark. Sometimes it is sleepy and well-behaved and I can carry it gracefully; the crowd don't even notice the beast on my shoulders. And sometimes, they notice it and are impressed that I can still tiptoe onwards with such a burden on my back. But sometimes, it is wild and wakish and it pulls me off-balance.  And when this happens and the rope is slippery and the spotlights are too bright in my eyes, when the noise of the band and the crowds is too much, I go down. And you, my safety net, are not there to catch me. Luckily, at the bottom of the chasm there is water. Luckily I can swim. So far, I have not drowned.

I have started to compile a mental list of the things I can do so that I can put them in the diary and keep walking towards them. These are the things I can still do: writing, swimming, walking, talking about you, talking about grief, reading about grief, leading writing workshops, talking about work, reading stories to the children, getting children ready for school and bed, listening to music, playing games. I hope that I can move house. The new house is like an investment for the future, a pleasant place for some future self to dwell in some future life where there is joy. This week I added tennis to my list. I grew up playing tennis and the memory of how to play is strong: hold racket, move legs, hit ball. Repeat for an hour. Success.

This is the current list of things I can't do: keep the score whilst playing tennis, drink, go to the gym, watch TV, read normal books, make flapjack, manage money, listen to the news, listen to other people's problems, talk about other people's relationships, not talk about you, make small talk.

I have never been good at small talk but now I feel completely inept. I can't get my face or the tone of my voice to match my words and find myself smiling whilst explaining breezily to strangers that I recently found my partner's body and that my mum died too and that's it's all been a bit tricky. But, hey, I'm lucky that, because everyone is dead, I have money and so I get to buy a lovely house. And they don't quite know what to say and I try to change the subject and then they start talking about their families and I realise that I can't bear to listen to them. I try to join in with conversations about partners and I fall back on the conversational female staple of comparing experiences and then I remember that I'm talking about someone who is dead and that no-one wants to hear about the sex life and domestic habits of someone who is dead. And if people are talking about their divorces, I have no empathy anymore because death trumps divorce every time and I know because I've experienced both. I am positively, twistedly smug in my misery. It feels ugly and unkind and not at all like me. And even when people talk about illness I lack sympathy and for a moment I find myself thinking, hey, worst case scenario, they're only going to die and death looks pretty appealing to me compared to this farce. We're all going to end up there and right now, that feels like a blessing. Death holds no fear for me. It is living that scares me. I would have hoped that all this tragedy would give me empathy but at the moment I am self-absorbed and all off-kilter, tumbling off the tightrope under the bright lights while I feel the audience is staring aghast.

So, I walk home crying and long to curl up in your arms because you get me even when I'm weird, but you are not there and so I curl up with your jumpers again and realise that, for now, socialising is on the 'things to avoid' list.

And then I wake up and get back on the tightrope and put one foot in front of the other again, walking towards some unfathomable future. And as I walk I am so grateful for the people who walk alongside me and for the ones whose hands form a safety net beneath me and for the people who fill the gaps in my diary and listen to my self-absorbed, inept talk. And I am so grateful for you and your love, the tiny light in the darkness, that tells me that, even now, I am beautiful and wonderful and enough.

I miss you

When things go wrong, I miss you.
When things go right, I miss you.

There's a crick in my neck and I miss your hands
to iron out the bumps and knots.
And yesterday I went to the gym
and there were men there your age
being alive and well
and I couldn't lift a thing because the weight
of grief is so heavy and my muscles feel wasted,
I feel wasted by sadness.
It is so hard to describe it,
so unbelievable,
the way in which I am still
shaking,
vibrating with it all,
the way in which sometimes all I can see is
that you are not there

and I couldn't hold back the tears again
because it was Tuesday
and you should have been there
meeting me at the gym for a swim
and you were not there.
You were not there.

And last night I watched singers sing
and it was beautiful
and I missed your hand in mine
so I held my own hand,
held myself together
and couldn't believe that you weren't there.
You should have been there.

And I have this thought every day:
Can we just stop this charade now
and can you come back
so I can stop being such a sad drama queen
and get back to living and loving you?
It is just farcical
that you are not here.

And, today, I got the best news
that the house of my dreams is mine
(fingers crossed, please help me,
I need it to be mine)
but all I can do is cry
because I saw it with you
and I saw you there
in the garden building bonfires
and I want to call you and tell you the news
and you are not there.
You are not there.
You will not be there.

On souls and soulmates

I meet your family for the first time a few days after I discover your body. It is surreal to say the least. With all of us in shock, we skip the small talk and set about the important business of discussing coffins and writing notices to go into the local press.  'How do you want to refer to Paul?' your Mum asks, trying to get the wording right for the newspaper. 'Partner, boyfriend?' I don't know the answer. I want someone to confer with. Actually, I want to confer with you but you are not here and it seems odd to ask if I can phone a friend. Anyway, which friend would I phone? No-one really knew us together. Partner seems presumptuous when we weren't even living together and boyfriend seems ridiculous; you were fifty-three and a giant of a man. It just doesn't seem right. And suddenly I find myself speaking, before I have had time to censor myself. 'Soulmate?' I offer. 'Does that sound silly?' And your mum, bless her, says no she thinks soulmate is just fine. I already like your mum.

Every once or twice in a lifetime, two people come together and something magical happens. Biologists might try to explain it with talk of pheromones and procreative urges and psychologists might tell us that we are drawn to each other in order to replay some familial drama but, for most of us, at the point of falling in love, all rational thought goes out of the window. In fact, we feel so far from science, that we feel that we have actually slipped through that window, or perhaps have gone even further and broken through some space-time continuum into a different dimension. Suddenly we exist in a new galaxy where we and the object of our affection are the only living things. We are twin stars on a collision course that has been predetermined by some unfathomable force. (As I said, science is irrelevant. This is how it feels.) Where once we thought we were the arbiters of our own fortunes, we are now inexplicably tossed on the waves of destiny, pawns on a cosmic chessboard, out of control. We don't care if we mix our metaphors, we just know that there is a rightness to this connection and that we are meant to be together, even though we have no idea who meant it to happen or why. Things that were blurred come into focus. We see our best selves reflected in the other's eyes. We have met our soulmate. This is how it was for us, even though we had no idea how we could make it work. We were discussing it right until the day you died.

In the aftermath of your death a few people took the opportunity to tell me that they weren't sure we could have made it in the long run. I wanted to punch these people. 'You could never have lived with him,' said one. 'He was a slob,' said another. I think they were trying to make me feel better. At least now that you had died, I could be spared the disappointment of finding that you squeezed the toothpaste from the wrong end. In fact, your erratic teeth-cleaning habits had already been a subject of negotiation. You had lived alone in a shack in a field for years and unconventional was too conventional a word for the way you lived. But both of us went into the relationship with our eyes wide open and what other people couldn't see was the focus and recognition of those eyes. What we had was unique. It was special. It was beautiful. It was not of this world.

It was, though, a paradox. We were deeply in love and, for both of us, nothing had ever felt more right and yet logic told us it couldn't make sense. I had two children who got me out of bed at 7am in the morning and, left to your own devices, you would go to bed at 2am and get up in the afternoon. I'm hardly known for being house proud, but your messiness was on a scale unlike anything I had ever seen. Caring for a sick child had turned my life into a military operation where you were disorganised and carefree. And yet, somehow it worked. And it didn't just work, it worked beautifully. When we were together, it was simple and magical and irrefutably right. But when we went back to our respective lives, sometimes, especially at the beginning, doubt would set in. Two or three times you sent me panicky messages saying that you couldn't envision yourself in my life, that our circumstances were too different, that it was doomed to fail. And then, one day, something changed. I wrote you a letter saying that I thought we had something special but that I needed to be able to trust you. I was reading a book on polyamory as research for my novel and I sent you this quote:

"I believe that every person you connect with on this planet has some sort of message to give you. If you cut yourself off from whatever kind of relationship wants to form with that person, you're failing to pick up your messages."

 You wrote me a letter back saying that actually, now, you couldn't imagine me not being in your life. You wrote: 'After much soul searching, many tears, and wandering up and down the road talking to myself, sometimes, quite sternly, I know what I want beyond all doubt. I want you more than anything in the world.'  When something feels so right why shouldn't it work? It might not be logical, but since when did logic have anything to do with love? I will never know now whether we could have made it in the long run but I know we were soulmates and we had a chance.

We still are soulmates though we are now living in different dimensions. Bodies may be separated but souls roam free and sometimes I feel your soul is still in communion with mine. Sometimes I feel you close by and I see signs of you still in nature. The other day, I lay on the ground looking at clouds and asked you to do something for me and the clouds shifted to form a heart shape. And as I walked away, I saw a heron (my symbol for you) on the river and I just knew you were there. Don't ask me how I think you control clouds and birds as I have no idea. But I feel you when you are around. I read that psychologists call it animism, imbuing meaning into creatures and objects, the grief-stricken mind constructing a false reality. But what do they know really? They think love is all about wanting to marry your father.

Your mum feels your soul too. She tells me that she feels you are more at peace now and not quite as sad as you were at being torn away from this world. She doesn't know how she knows it but she says it is like someone has just told her and that it feels true. On your birthday, I take her out to look for a spot for your bench and suddenly, out of the blue she says, 'Paul would have loved to see you dressed like that. I don't know how I know it, but he would. He would have called you his little wood nymph.' And she laughs at herself because the words feel so odd in her mouth. 'Wood nymph is a nice thing isn't it?' she asks. And we look at each other and smile because, of course, that is just the kind of thing you would have said. And I look down and realise that I am wearing the skirt that I wore when I dressed up as Heidi, on the day we first got together and that I haven't worn it since. And my heart sings with the closeness of you.

I tell my bereavement counsellor about some of the things I have felt. 'A lot of people tell me things like that,' she says. I tell her about the skirt and what your mum said. 'That must feel so real,' she says. And then she throws up her hands like she is sick of this charade. 'Well, it is real,' she says. We have slipped through that window again and we don't understand the science of it but some things are bigger than us, bigger than science.  Love and death and grief are unfathomable. In our cynical, empiricist culture, we just don't have the words.

Dressed as Heidi on the day we got together

In love with your ghost

On the beach in Filey in December - not a seagull in sight

I discovered 'our song' this week. It is a song by Martha Tilston, called Seagull and I saw her perform it at the How the Light Gets In festival in Hay on Wye. It isn't a sad song about loss. In fact, it's a song that captures perfectly the confusion and excitement of falling in love and it reminded me vividly of our own process of coming together. And, even though you weren't physically there, I knew that you thought it was perfect too. And that made me happy. And I felt joyful because the feeling of being in love was, for me, so alive as I heard it. And I sang it joyfully at full volume about ten times while I was driving until the singing gradually got drowned out by the tears when I remembered that you're not here anymore and I am in love with a ghost. And then the tears ran dry as they always do eventually and I made a mental note to ask my bereavement counsellor if it's a bit dysfunctional to still be in love with someone who died three months ago or whether this too is a perfectly normal part of grieving.

I am discovering that it is a strange business when the person you are in love with dies. There isn't really anything quite like it. There are other deaths and other losses, but nothing like this.

When you lose a parent (and I have lost both), you're not expected to look for someone else to fill that gap. Your father is still your father and your mother is still your mother. You won't ever have another one and that's ok. There will always be a hole in your life where that person used to be but you will talk about them with other friends and relations and they remain there with their names in tact: my mother, my father.

Some say the worst grief (and I can believe it) is to lose a child. I've only lost a tiny foetus and that was hard enough. It must be unbearable to see your child leave the world before you, even if your child is an adult. Nothing, not even another child, can replace the loss of the unique individual that you engendered. And you will keep their photo on the mantelpiece, maybe even keep their room as a shrine to their memory. They will stay in the same position in your heart for all eternity.

And if your friend dies, even your really good friend, you can still talk about that friend, maybe with other friends, and the gap will be there just the same because there will be some things that only that particular friend would have understood. But you will have other friends and maybe they can grow to hold the weight of the friend who is missing. Probably they won't feel too insecure to be your friend. Probably they won't worry that you loved your dead friend more than you love them. Perhaps some really good friends might even hold your gaze while you talk about your departed friend without looking away embarrassed or changing the subject. Because we want to honour our friends by remembering them. That's not dysfunctional. That's right and proper.

But when the man you are in love with dies, what are you supposed to do?

I was forty-four when we met so, although you were certainly up there with the big loves of my life, I had been in love before. And being in love has always ended but not like this. Usually, in my experience, love is slowly eroded over time, by the attrition of arguments and resentment until you can't imagine that love was ever there in the first place, or until love is just a pale, sad memory, or the dim glow of embers. Separation usually follows and then there is sadness and pain, but soon the embers die down and there is just ash, or, if you're lucky, love is replaced by the fond glow of friendship that carries on into the future. Of course, for some really lucky folk, the 'in love' stage mutates into a deeper, long-lasting love - I'm not so experienced with that sort of love. And sometimes, someone leaves you abruptly with no warning and it feels like your heart has been shattered into tiny pieces. But there is still a sense to be made of it. Friends come round with bottles of wine and tell you that he didn't deserve your heart in the first place and though you might rail against it, at some point there is only that truth: he didn't love you enough so you must let him go, put your heart back together piece by piece and wait patiently for the man who does deserve you to arrive.

I did all of that. And then you arrived, on cue or perhaps a little too soon for my liking. I was still healing from that kind of monumental heartbreak and I wasn't ready but it turns out you had to arrive then otherwise it would all have been too late. And, it was just like that song, our song: true love flew in through the open window like a seagull. And it bashed about and freaked us both out and yet, we couldn't stop smiling. And like Martha Tilston we closed ourselves up from time to time and almost ran away. It was too big to handle. We had all those feelings: 'should I stay, should I go, should I even be here?' But in the end we opened up and we stayed and it was beautiful and terrifying all at once. And it is these words that I sing so loudly: 'you are beautiful, you're beautiful, you're beautiful, you're beautiful.' Because it is, in my head, the only word for you and I never told you when you were alive how beautiful you were. You were such a truly beautiful soul. And 'I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you. I really really do.' Because that is how it was and how it still is. My love for you doesn't diminish because you died, in fact, in some ways, it has continued to grow. Our love was growing, rising, expanding, full of energy and potential. And even though you are gone, I still feel your presence. And as I talk to your friends and family I am still learning about you. I am still in relationship with you. My love for you has not died.

And yet, you are physically gone. And joy is replaced by sadness again. And if I were to keep talking about you as my boyfriend or partner, people would think I was weird. And if I made a shrine to you, I would definitely be seen as weird. And when I talk about how much I loved you,  how much I still love you, even now some people turn away and change the subject. I feel like there's an expectation that I should, somehow, get over it, look forward, move on. And even as I write about you I know that I am bringing you back to life again and then grieving all over again when I close my laptop. And I wonder if I could ever make room for another love and if another love could love me, the person who is writing publicly about this lost love. And yet, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I really really do. We have moved from a lifestyle conundrum to a metaphysical conundrum and the process of grief is an unending cycle of joy and pain, love and loss. The seagull bashes about and freaks me out and sometimes, even now, when I remember you and when I feel connected to you, I can't stop smiling. And then the tears come again. I don't know when it will stop. When a love hasn't run its course, how can it ever stop?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQ3wUMaRPoE

Birthday wishes

Today would have been your fifty-fourth birthday but the first one of your birthdays that I would have spent with you. I wonder what we would have done? It's a beautiful day so we would have been outdoors, maybe even a trip to the seaside. Instead, later on today, I will pick your mum up and we'll go looking for a spot to put a bench in your memory.

On my birthday in February, we woke up in each other's arms in a cottage near Brimham Rocks. You gave me wrapped presents, bought from shops. Only someone who knew you well would understand the significance. Usually your presents came from the e-bay stock in the storage unit of your house. But I had standards and you were rising to the challenge. One of the things you gave me was a limited edition print called Stardust. You said it reminded you of the journey of our love. Or something like that. How I wish I was paying more attention, but we had to pack up and drive home ready to fetch the children and to host my pancake party.

We spent the day together although you were in the background again, pretending we were just friends for the sake of my children. You coped admirably with the onslaught of mothers and young children, eventually seeking refuge in the making of pancakes. It was ok. We'd just had three beautiful days together. It was lovely just to see you there in the throng of people celebrating my special day.

I wanted to buy you something for your birthday today, so I named a star after you. Cheesy, maybe, but it seems fitting. You were a cosmic kind of guy. I paid for an extra bright one (what a marketing ploy!) because how could I not? And paid for it to be in Ursa Major because where else could it be?

And I wrote a poem for you, because there would definitely have been a birthday poem. 'Send me a poem, Beverley Writer,' you would have said. And here it is. I hope you can read it from up there.

Stardust

Today, no cake,

just this ache

and space.

I write 54 words

instead of lighting candles:

53 for each birthday missed,

one for this day

missing you.

Blacksmith Paul is

in the Great Bear now

and stardust rains like

love below.

With memories held tight,

particles of light:

we form a constellation

of you.