14 -11-2011

I should write but I really can’t think of anything to say. I have written too many words these past few weeks, another 2,000 today for an article, and if I am honest, I have been cleaned out, my locker of words and thoughts is empty, and emotionally I am spent too.

Yesterday was my son’s 14th birthday, 5,000 miles away he sat with all my friends and lunched and laughed, and I called him and fought back the tears. I don’t know if he felt my voice break, but never have I tried so hard to not let my mask slip. I learn that my daughter has landed the main part in a major production. The lead role, to be played in front of 1,000 people every night for a week. How proud, the hours I have spent supporting her over nearly 13 years, and I will not be there.

When do you stop living your life vicariously through your children, banish guilt and anguish and be calm that you have left it all behind without recourse? When do you accept that it’s OK, you are allowed to have your own life? And at what point do you let everything else that mattered slip through your fingers and accept that none of it was yours anyway, so be happy to watch it wash away on the tide?

When? Now I think. A weekend of loss and letting go. The final sigh!

Photo of the week: In memory of children.