Our House

It’s the little things that get you!  The smallest of reminders can drive the biggest decisions.

10 months have gone by since Caroline’s passing.  As each day passes it becomes easier to muster up the energy to get through the day.  As you move on from living day by day to gradually living week by week.  I have started to deal with the loneliness.  I’m seem to be on the go all the time. I am even able to have a wry smile when certain reminders of our time together pop up   Of course there are set backs and frustrations about the injustice.  I still can’t understand why such a good person as Caroline has been taken away from us.   As Georgina said to me though “you get on but you don’t move on!”

Then bang!  Something hits you.  Usually it is the smallest thing that pull the rug from beneath your feet.  It’s especially poignant when you are reminded that the most important part of Caroline’s life was her family and home.

I don’t know whether it is I’m still in a state of denial but I have struggled to confront the job of packing Caroline’s things away.  I just cannot bring myself to do it.  How can I just pack Caroline’s life away into a box or a bag?  How can I give the things she treasured so much to a charity shop?  I know that it will bring some good to a really tragic situation but I’m just not ready for it.  I’m sure I will do it one day but not yet.

Anyway, the other week Georgina wanted to decorate her bedroom.  If anyone has ever done any simple DIY the upheaval is quite unbelievable.  You can imagine. Piles of clothes, books, furniture and stuff piled on the landing whilst the bedroom is transformed.  Well to cut a long story short in order to make some space I had to packing some of Caroline’s clothes and belongings from the wardrobe in the spare room and take to St Peters Hospice.

So I took a deep breath and started to fold the clothes and pack them away carefully.  I was doing better than I thought.   Until I came across a number of shoeboxes at the bottom of the wardrobe.  Caroline had a thing about keeping the boxes for her shoes.  Must be a woman thing.  Amongst them was a light grey shoebox.  On the lid of the box marked in black felt pen “Caroline’s McDonalds Toys”.  I couldn’t believe it.  Inside the box were about 15 small toys still in unopened packaging.  The toys were the type that the kids get with their McDonalds Happy Meal.  Absolutely worthless in value.  If I had spotted them when Caroline was alive they would have been out.  However, these toys were clearly a keepsake and a reminder of the time Caroline cherished with the children when they were small.

I couldn’t bring myself to disposing of them just because Caroline had personalized the box.  Really stupid I know but it knocked the stuffing out of me.  We have so much kid memorabilia in the house.  If I cant deal with a box of McDonalds toys how can I deal with all the rest of Caroline’s belongings? I have now placed the box back inside the wardrobe.

These situations keep arising.  Recently I have been trying to get myself organized around birthdays and anniversaries of friends and families.  The dates are all kept in the bible that is Caroline’s Filofax.  It was bad enough that the page marker was left on the week that she passed away.  It showed that even to the end she was looking keeping up to date on people’s anniversary.   I started to make notes of the anniversaries and birthdays onto my phone then I came across May 27^th 2012 “Kitchen 2 Years Old”

Instantly I remembered how much the kitchen meant to Caroline.  We had saved so hard to have this lovely kitchen built.  It was Caroline’s pride and joy.  She had designed it and project managed its creation.  She even had a steam oven fitted so that she could steam her Christmas puddings.  The kitchen was magnificent when it was finished.  Caroline’s pride and joy.  Caroline deserved it!    Less than six months later she was too ill to even work in it.  She was looking forward to cooking Christmas Dinner for her family.  When it came to she struggled to complete the dinner on her own and had to ask me for help.  Me in her kitchen must have been so painful to Caroline.  For Caroline to ask me to assist her just showed how ill she was!

I know that a kitchen is an innate thing and is probably the least of my worries.  But I know how much joy it gave her.  It was a sign for her of far we had come as a married couple, as a family.   Seeing the date in her diary knocked me back.

The bigger picture is that the house as so many great memories.  However, it’s not my house.  It’s our house.  Its Caroline and my house.  It is seriously going through my mind about moving out.  It’s a great house but both the kids will hopefully be at University in September and I will be rattling around it on my own; I don’t know too many people in the village as my mates all live over the other side of town.

Yet something else to think about.  The house has so many great memories, which is comforting but at times suffocating. I will not be doing anything in the near future.  Wherever I move I will have to downsize the amount of stuff we’ve got. So will have to find the strength to pack Caroline’s belongings away.