Pages

Tuesday 15 March 2011

Two Years

I cannot believe it has almost been two years.

On the 17th of March 2010 it was one year since life as I knew it ended. It was a strange day because everyone remembered. People sent message and got together and reminisced. But for me it was something different. I said at the time it felt like everyone was stepping in to my world for the day but the next day they would leave it and I would still be there. I know everyone remembers Jonathan and he isn’t forgotten but most people don’t think of him dozens of times every day. Most people are living there lives, albeit with a nasty hole in them, but a year later I wasn’t living I was surviving. It sounds sad but it’s not because I was surviving and had been for a whole year. I never thought I would make it but I did. For me the 17th of March was something of a personal victory day when I could say I did it, I survived and I am still here. I was sad beyond words and full of grief but I was also proud (and somewhat relieved) that I had survived and guilty that I was proud and guilty that I was here and he was not.  Life changed for me that day in 2009, all I thought I knew felt wrong and the world became a frighteningly unknown place. It’s the day everything changed and the day I started to become who I am today, me without Jonathan. Since even writing that still hurts being proud of any of it even briefly, well lets just say that took some time to get used to. There were so many emotions flying round that day that I will never forget it just as I will never forget 17th March 2009. Now I wonder if I will remember this day every year forever and I don’t know if that would be a good thing or a bad thing, it’s one of many things I still don’t know.

As the 17th of March 2011 approaches I am surrounded by images of a stricken Japan and I know there are many people who are going through what I went through and much worse. I have no idea how they will survive what has happened to their country, their friends, their families and to them. Some won’t survive but many will and they will be the strongest generation Japan has known for decades, a nation of survivors: I really wish I didn’t know that. The bittersweet relief of knowing I had survived which I felt last year is missing this year. This year I am sad, so very, very sad that almost two years have passed since I saw his smile or heard his voice. Sad that there are no new photographs and that I have over a years worth of stories that don’t include him and I wonder if this is how most people felt last year as the dreaded date approached and is this how they feel now.

I’ve been called an inspiration but I know others who have done more and gone further in their time. I also know that if asked they would say the same as me, I put one foot in front of the other and take it one day at a time. Two years on and I still cannot plan for the future so for now I am taking a path that does not require me to. I don’t talk about him all the time because though people are kind and patient there is only so much you can ask of them but I think of him. Just because you do not hear me say his name it does not mean he is not in my thoughts. Two years on and I still do not know how to live without him. I don’t know how to live with all that we have lost. All I know is that everyday I have to try. I have to breathe in and out and put one foot in front of the other in any way I can and then one day I’ll look back and see how far I’ve come. Because even now with the sadness of what is lost there is happiness at what was and gratitude for what remains and one day I hope that they will outshine the sadness so I can hardly see it and only remember what was and smile.

No comments:

Post a Comment