Goodbye

It’s 47 days since she killed herself.  

She is everywhere. She is in the flowers we planted together and the ones we planted alone. She is in the greenhouse where we tended the plants together and in the garden she dug outside. She is in the kitty sleeping contentedly in the lounge. The well-integrated kitty. She is in the trees and in the birds singing in them. The friends in high places. She is in the mushrooms and the flowers and the bees.  

She is in the kitchen, in the knives and forks lined up carefully in the right order in the draws while I laughed that there was no right way. She is in the cupboard full of glass bowls, stacking each one neatly while I got impatient. She is in every piece of rope in the shed, and in the car and in the campervan. She is in the music and the videos and the memes. In every doggo.

She is in every painting that I paint, picking out the good bits and encouraging me to do better. She is in the wind and in the clouds and in the sunshine. She is in the fresh morning air and the steaming hot coffee. She is walking with me in the orchard in the morning and shopping for groceries with me in the afternoon. She is in my waking and my sleeping. In my mind and in my broken twisted heart.

She is in my bed and in my bedroom and in the washing basket and the fabric softener. I did not deserve her. I was locked up inside a world of fear and rejection and desperation. I couldn’t hear her voice calling me forward. I could only hear the voice that told me that I had failed. I didn’t see her teaching me. I could only hear the voice that said I’d let her down. Inside my misery I failed to see her beauty. I miss her.

I miss every thing I missed about her when she was here and I miss everything I will never be able to tell her, and everything I will never get to do with her. I miss every thing that my other children will never try to be for me. I miss every moment that I will never again have to tell her again how much I love her, how we can do it, how we will not give up, how we will not fail. I did fail and she is no longer here. I will never get the chance again to have her darling little hands around my neck hugging me, or around my waist praising me or to feel her tiny little hand in mine as we walk along the beach and she tells me that I am cooler than anyone else’s mum.