Author: billyblagg

Sweet Dreams

Posted on by billyblagg

There’s one place you can see your loved one again; one place you can go and no-one else can.

The sub-conscious mind is a wonderful thing. At its finest – when we dream we’ve exchanged cheeses with the Queen in Botswana, accompanied only by Freddie Mercury and the Dali Lama on a unicorn – we marvel at how the mind comes up with such stuff and, unless we’re one of those who believes we can interpret this stuff – an Oneirocritic – -who then says “Ahhh…well cheese means…” etc., we just have a laugh and move on with our day.

Once we lose someone though, things take on an altogether darker turn. Elsewhere, I’ve described a dream I had after Gail died in which I instinctively knew I’d been working somewhere else in the country and I was driving home knowing Gail and I had had an argument and we hadn’t spoken for days. This was a lucid dream though, I knew that as soon as I got home and got in that door, I would see Gail again for the first time since July, and my subconscious wouldn’t let me do it. As I put the key in the dream door I woke up. I was utterly crushed.

As I write this I still don’t feel I’ve dreamt about Gail properly. For well over six months I simply never dreamt of her at all. After seven or eight months she started to be in them but somehow out of sight. Gail’s friends would tell me they’d dreamt about her, they’d spoken to her and she to them, but I had nothing. I’ll admit, it was starting to upset me. I discussed it online with a grieving friend – someone I’d never met – who had lost her husband in similarly health-related circumstances and she admitted to similar thoughts to mine. You almost start to ask ‘Why are YOU dreaming about the love of MY life and I’m not?’. You get angry at others for it. Illogical and self-defeating but that’s how the grieving mind turns.

After about eight months the desire to dream about Gail changed as she started to drop in under upsetting circumstances but never as I knew her; it was almost easier to return to the frustrating days when I couldn’t see her. Without fail these latest dreams are really distressing, leaving me shaken and upset when I wake up.

Always in my current dreams, we’ve broken up, she’s left me for someone else, she’s come back to get her clothes after moving out or something equally upsetting. These aren’t lucid dreams either. These are so real that my first thought on waking is always ”She’s left me and I’ve lost her’, to be replaced moments later with the realisation that the situation is real, but for an entirely different reason. It’s like being kicked when you’re down with your assailant then walking on you as they leave the room. These nights – and, frankly, whole days sometimes – can just leave you deflated; bereft all over again for what you’ve lost and angry for whatever the dream situation left you in.

I’m no Oneirocritic, but I understand it’s said that dreaming about being cheated on refers to feelings of insecurity. I’m not sure I feel insecure in myself, but I can guess you don’t need to be a Greek Philosopher to say that a certain amount of self-doubt is inevitable now Gail has gone.

With over 11 months passed as I write this, I’ve got to the stage where I dread to dream. During the months following July I could barely sleep, lying awake for hours going over things in my mind. Then I slept like a log for a few months before ending up in my current state where I stay awake as long as possible to stave off an unwanted dream. Quite where this cycle will go I have no idea of knowing.

I know how Hamlet felt at least.

Living In A Box

Posted on by billyblagg

I saw an old friend last night; someone I’d not seen seen for many years. Someone who knew me well enough to know who I am and what I’m like, but not someone who had seen me enough in recent years to understand I’d also changed

We talked about the differences since we’d last met. We were both significantly older for one thing. He had also been through a messy divorce and, of course, I’d lost Gail. He asked me a lot about how I was coping, feeling and dealing with things and – as you might expect from things mentioned here – I had much to say on the subject.

He listened and then said something: “You know over the years I’ve done some shitty things; things I’m really ashamed of and wished I’d never done. But I don’t let them bother me. I put them in a box, tie the box up so it can’t come undone and then I shove it in the back of a cupboard and don’t ever get it out. That’s how I cope. Perhaps you should try it?”

Given some of the short-shrift I’d given some well-wishers over the last months, you might have thought I’d have made my excuses and left to avoid unpleasantries. I didn’t though and for an odd reason. You see, it was something Gail used to talk about, using the exact same imagery. When I asked her something about a previous marriage or an unpleasant childhood memory that is exactly what she would say. “I don’t know. I put it in a box a few years ago and I can’t open it now”. It was an interesting comparison.

Perhaps that is how some people cope. Or do they? My friend said it got him through but it’s very hard to say if that person is how they think they are or whether that stuff in the box is actually in there at all. How can you tell? You can get a long way by pretending you have things locked away when you actually don’t. Indeed, knowing Gail as I did, I never thought that box was tied at all and those things escaped all the time. It was why she was so complex and maddeningly infuriating sometimes. Furthermore, by never confronting them, I’m not sure they didn’t do more harm. I’d long associated the Lupus with some bizarre thoughts and actions but I’d never been able to pin down which came first; the illness or the strange behaviour. In fact, in the months following Gail’s passing I’d come to believe the liver failure that had made her so confused at the end that she believed dreams were reality, had actually existed for perhaps a decade or more before the end stage.

But as we used to say when we got tetchy, when one of us was trying to lecture the other “Let’s cut out the cod psychology, eh?”

The fact is I can’t put everything in a box and forget it. The reason? I actually don’t want to. Why deny myself the thoughts of everything good I had just to give myself an easier life now? I was lucky. I had it good for a long time and that was because of Gail. Because I’m devastated by her loss and suffering badly through it, I don’t see the point in denying everything I had just to make things easier from here on till my end.

Nope, you can keep your box. I’ll take the anguish. It makes me remember, keeps me tethered and, in a wonderful juxtapose, gives me some happiness.

My Precious – Part One

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As everyone keeps telling you ‘Grief is different for everyone’. The trouble is you don’t actually want it to be. There are times when you want to speak to someone who knows exactly where you are at and can tell you where you’re going to go from here. I think that’s why Simon Thomas made such an impact.

Thomas is a former host of BBC’s ‘Blue Peter’ and a Sky Sports Presenter. In November 2017, Thomas’s wife Gemma was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia after a routine blood test at her GP. She tragically died just three days after. Simon Thomas’s story touched everyone and, particularly as he had to explain his wife’s sudden and unexpected death to their nine-year-old son.

Suffering from severe sleep- loss – and anyone grieving will know what getting into an empty bed at night is like – the Sky Presenter found writing about his feelings helped (Ditto there). Simon took time out from his job and used social media and his own broadcasting experience to share his grief to the public. Many people have watched his TV interviews, heard his podcasts and read his story.

Finding someone like Simon Thomas when you’re going through your own grief is strangely comforting. There is even, rather unfortunately, a part of you that thinks how easy you have it compared to someone else (crucially, there was no small child involvement for me). More importantly though, when you are suffering your own grief, you take strength from seeing others are going through the same thing. Then you see something you’re not going through and it throws everything into turmoil.

Of course, this is totally unfair. Simon has admitted to having severe depression before his wife passed away and had already chronicled his battle with alcohol when he was younger. There is no reason why our situations should be remotely similar and, in your more sane moments, you’d never expect them to be. But grief isn’t about being sane. It’s about dealing with something we all know will happen but never expect to happen to us. Insanity is a given.

So it was with some shock when in an interview in the early part of 2018, the interviewer noted that Simon had removed his wedding ring. I was floored. Taken his wedding ring off? EH? I have my on as I write this and can never envisage taking it off. Why would I? I’d still be married to Gail if she were alive so why take it off? And, even if you argue that, legally you’re now a widower and not technically married, and it should come off at some time, then when? I mean the funeral could be argued to be just as valid a time as any, but that would be considered distasteful, wouldn’t it?

Amusingly though, the old ‘everyone is different’ adage raises its head here too. In fact, I can imagine Gail reading this would laugh uproariously at me even broaching this. You see, for years I never wore a wedding ring. Some people liked to see some dark purpose behind this, suggesting to Gail I might fancy myself as a playboy and I liked a lady to think I might be a possibility – HA! – but the real reason was much simpler (and purer) than that. You see, I simply didn’t like rings.

Now me not wearing a wedding ring might seem odd to some but, for anyone struggling with that concept, here’s another whammy. Gail didn’t always wear hers either! There are two reasons for this and both are totally ‘Gail’. Firstly, Gail always looked great; her clothes were coordinated in style and colour and if, for any reason, she wanted to wear a particular colour palette then she’d have dress rings to match it and that might mean the wedding ring came off.

Secondly, Gail was always terrified of losing valuable things. Her regular trips to Marmaris were to top up her wardrobe on fake designer goods, she arguing that ‘nobody knows they are fake’ (they didn’t either!) and, ‘if I lose them or they are stolen then I haven’t lost a lot of money’. This fear applied to her wedding ring too. She was petrified of losing it and, when she did wear it, always wore a tighter dress ring over it so it could never fall or be pulled off.

Gail not wearing her wedding ring never bothered me. My head simply didn’t go to those places that suggest there might be ulterior motive for it and, in any case, who was I to insist she did when I had none of my own?

Women are difficult things to fathom though and I sensed a change in attitude to my not wearing a ring in the summer of 2015. I ignored it for a while but it was now something that bothered her when it hadn’t seemed to before. So, on a gorgeous holiday in Santorini in the September of that year, I chose a pewter ring from one of the myriad of locally-produced goods shops there and I wore that on my wedding finger.

I remember showing my hand to an incredulous Gail . Our cat Gus is an independent creature and is the only one of our four who won’t wear a collar. Trying sends him into a frenzy as he tries to pull it off. Holding my hand up to Gail she just said ‘You look like Gus’. It made us both laugh.

As ever with Gail, there was element of truth in her Gus comment though. My old dislike never went away and, wearing this ring from a Greek Island, only served to underline my belief that rings just looked clumsy, bulky and out of place on my hands. Fortunately my reservations were matched by Gail who didn’t like the ring anyway and, while out shopping one day that November, she took me into a jewellers and bought me a slim silver unmarked, unadorned band. It wasn’t expensive but it looked good and felt right. And that is what I have on now.

Quite what Gail would make of this discussion is difficult to fathom. To find I’m now a staunch wedding ring wearer would probably amuse her and infuriate her in equal measure; but I also like to think she’d be secretly pleased that I still consider us married.

In truth though, the main issue is, if I did want to take my ring off – and I can’t stress enough here that I don’t! – then going through that actual ritual of pulling it off my finger and putting it into a box would be an act that I’m nowhere near close to being comfortable with. In fact, I think it would devastate me to an extent I can’t even contemplate; I genuinely feel the consequences might be emotionally or possibly physically dire if I were to do it.

So, 2019 and I have my very own ‘precious’. Who could have known?

But there’s another thing about rings…. see Part Two

Gail’s eternity ring I bought for her in Marmaris just a month before she died.

My Precious – Part Two

Posted on by billyblagg

Some years ago, on a trip to the North-East to see Gail’s family, Gail was asked by her Grandmother “Is your wedding ring in the shape of an H so your sister (Heather) can have it when you die?”.

It was one of those slack-jaw moments that provoked restrained anger and humour in the same instance. That comment pretty much engendered the same reaction over the years whenever the ring was mentioned – I’d often tease her about it if I found her wedding ring left on her bedside cabinet: “You want me to send this off to your sister now?” – except in the one period when it might have been thought to have had the greatest relevance.

You see, on our holiday to Marmaris, just a month before she passed away, I took Gail to a jewellers to buy her an eternity ring; something she wanted for her birthday. While there, I asked her if she wanted to have her wedding ring cleaned and resized. We’d bought it the self-same shop fifteen years earlier so it seemed a nice idea to return it to them for some work. I thought it might help her get over her fear of losing it if it fitted better. I was aware I might have to have it resized again if, as I prayed, she got better and put her weight back on, but it seemed a small price to pay to keep her happy.

The ring looked beautiful when it came back. It shone brilliantly, fitted perfectly and with her new eternity ring, she was able to wear both proudly for a short period before her hospitalisation (n.b. Just for the record here I’m just choked up typing this out). We never spoke about the rings again though.

When your loved one is being laid-out before the funeral, the Funeral Director will ask if there is any jewellery or anything you want the deceased to wear, while warning you not to make it anything too expensive. However, I had Gail wearing several Swarovski items I’d bought her over the years that cost £150+ each, but it was important to me that she looked as she would have done on a normal day so I didn’t hesitate for a moment in allowing these items to go, nor have I regretted it for a moment since. Yet, even though she was wearing her pink wedding dress, I didn’t put her wedding ring on.

Somewhere in the back of my mind – but try as I may I can’t remember when, why, or for what reason it was discussed – I know we talked about this and I somehow knew the expectation was she wouldn’t be cremated with her wedding ring; that I’d keep it with me as a symbol of our marriage. But what you don’t anticipate after is, though it may not burn in one way, that ring sure burns in another.

The fact is, unless you can somehow utilise it as a pendant or use it in some other fashion, the wedding ring is an awful artefact that just eats away in your soul; a symbol of something you had, have no longer and will never have again. And, of course, I can’t do anything with either the wedding ring or the barely-worn eternity ring. I can’t sell them – that wouldn’t feel right and, irony of ironies, pretty much like Gail when she was wearing them, I’m terrified of losing them, so they are locked away where I rarely even look at them.

On Gail’s first birthday after her passing in July, just before I went out for her day, I did get the wedding ring out and looked at it. I felt I needed to take it with me that day but was wary of just putting it in my wallet or putting it on a chain, instead I slipped it onto my little finger and it fitted perfectly. I wore it for that day but took it off as soon as I got in.

Now you might not think this stuff matters much, but when you’re grieving, things like this this just tear you apart. The fact is though, the left wedding ring is a heartbreaking artefact that serves no purpose except to leave you numb. These here will simply pass onto my kids when I go. I wonder how many wedding rings passed to the next generation and are sold just to pay for a new car or something? Not that I’d begrudge that; in fact, I’ve preempted it by telling my two kids the rough value of the rings and just urged them not to waste the money.

I wish in may ways though I’d just let Gail take the rings with her. I really think I’d have been happier knowing that, rather than having the upsetting ‘small silver item in the drawer’ version of the elephant in the room.

In that black way you do when you’re gripping onto your sanity with your fingernails though, I can almost laugh about this with Gail. You see her Grandmother’s bizarre suggestion may just have been the best idea after all.

The Wedding Ring

Holiday

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I had already experienced a holiday on my own when I went to Hong Kong in February. But I had also gone away a couple of times on my own when I was with Gail – a World Cup trip to Germany and a visit to Krakow to go to Auschwitz – so I wasn’t too daunted by the prospect of travelling alone. It was odd certainly, but I can’t rightly say I had no experience whatsoever.

In June though came a different thing altogether. A holiday in Italy with my daughter Natalie and new Son-in-Law Steve. (N.B. Gail is not Natalie’s Mother). This had come about as principally a Christmas present for them both, but also as a thank you for the support I’d received the previous July. This visit to the Amalfi Coast was an attempt to do some of those things that had long been on the list but had faded from view during the years of Gail’s poor health. There had been a time we could have done them, but we had other things to do – other things to spend our limited resources on – and fitting them in became more unlikely as the days progressed.

But now, without Gail and the difficult to acknowledge, but basic fact that, it’s cheaper for one to travel rather than two, I’d decided to start seeing those things I wanted to see. There had to be some point to being on my own and this had to be it. I know Gail would have approved.

Also, though it was barely acknowledged, it was still a basic truth. Gail and I would never have gone away with anyone else – even my Son and Daughter-in-Law and Daughter and Son-in-Law – not for any particular reason either. It’s just not who we were. Gail and I worked together on our own and anyone coming in from outside – even close family – would have seemed odd.

So it was, 2019 would be a chance to see some things I’d almost certainly not had seen but for the events of July 2018, but it was also a chance to do something else I’d not have done, and that is go on holiday with my kids and their respective partners. I booked a hotel in Sorrento so I could ‘do’ Pompeii, Herculaneum, Capri and the Amalfi Coast. In terms of the Bucket List – I hate the term but it will have to do – and also trying to realign my new life, it really did tick all the boxes.

It was the first night in Sorrento though when I realised I had some explaining to do. Not that I knew I did at first; it just crept up unawares.

You see Sorrento would have been a place Gail loved; the restaurants, bars, atmosphere but most of all the shops. As I wandered with my daughter and SIL I actually found myself stopping on occasion, so used to knowing what shops Gail would want to go in. I found myself looking at clothes thinking ‘She’d look great in this’ and, as happened in London at Christmas, had to physically hold myself back from going in and finding the price of a couple of pieces of jewellery. It was like walking a tightrope, but one where you’d suddenly woken up and found you’d been placed on the rope without your knowledge.

I wanted to reach for Gail’s hand – something I miss more than anything – and I did find myself looking enviously at my daughter and her husband as they were able to do that easiest and most magical of things.

Before I’d even contemplated that though, my daughter drew my attention to something I hadn’t even realised. “Dad, you OK? You’re quiet?”. Was I? How did I know? I’d spent a good deal of time on my own since the previous July and I just lived within that; not in a depressing, lonely way but simply as someone going about things without the person they normally spoke to not being around to converse with.

I realised quickly I was quiet but for a reason. You see, I was speaking to Gail in my head. “Look at that Pet, that’s nice isn’t it”, “Would you like that?”, “Oh, You’re getting that then are you?”, “Oh yea, that really suits you” etc. etc. All that and even “Not another bloody shoe shop, Pet. Give me a break eh?” . It was our life together for so many years, so many holidays and now I was living it for her because she couldn’t.

But all my daughter saw, of course, was me being quiet, not conversing, deep in thought. It was a hard lesson because I’d not had anyone around to see me and question anything before. Now I could see how I was.

Even so, it took me two days to summon up the strength to tell my daughter why I was like I was. It’s hard because, if you have to talk, you want to say things like ‘Gail would have loved this’ but you have to respect who you are travelling with. Also, with Gail not being her Mother, there simply wasn’t the emotional crush for my daughter as there was for me. I had to explain something in words that actually only existed in my head before then and that is ‘This hasn’t ended – in fact, it’s not even started. Gail is here in my head every second of every day and I take her with me everywhere and see things that we should see together on my own. I see Sorrento, these clothes, this jewellery, this bar, this food, because she can’t’. That’s hard. Really hard. And I struggled to get the words out.

I had similar emotions in Capri a few days after – another place Gail would have loved – and there was even the Monte Solaro chairlift that I would have insisted on going on and which would have had Gail swearing profusely at me for making her ride. I was able to do it myself, of course, but I actually found I missed the verbal abuse and the associated joy in hearing her… so I simply inserted it into my head as I went up and down.

Again, not being a travel blog, I’ll say no more about Sorrento than that. It was a wonderful holiday and one I would never have experienced had Gail still been with me but, in much the same way that I can never see a lemon again without thinking of Sorrento, the holiday was still Gail-tinged and there are things I saw did and experienced – too many to recount here – that will always seem in my memory to have had Gail associated with them.

Perhaps, one day, with my aged brain far-away and never to return, I will actually believe I went there with her. In my way, I did.

The Streets of Sorrento
Hand in Hand in Sorrento

June 3rd – Gail’s Birthday

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Another hurdle, a big one; Gail’s birthday. There’s no getting round this, it’s hard. You can’t celebrate – there’s nothing to celebrate or anyone to celebrate it with – but you can’t ignore it either. The day was made more difficult by the fact that we always went away for both our birthdays. For Gail’s this was a trip to her favourite place, Marmaris in Turkey. There she would we stock up on designer goods for her impending Ascot Day later in the month and, often, even get Christmas presents in. In between, we’d visit restaurants, go to bars, chat and laugh. We loved it, it was always one of our favourite weeks of the year.

One thing I couldn’t do is go to Marmaris. It would have been like cheating on her. In fact, I can’t even return to Turkey let alone Marmaris. But I had to do something to mark the day; something that just involved me and somehow being with her. I decided eventually that I had to do something I wanted to do that she would understand, so I decided to go the restaurant of a top chef in London I’d always liked, have a meal there and then see where the day took me.

My posts for the day reflected on my memories of the last birthday she was to have.

For the first time in a good many years there’s no holiday in the first week of June. So what to do with the day? On what should be a happy occasion, it’s now sadly a day I will probably dread for the rest of my life.

Last year, on this day, we took the cliff walk from Marmaris – where we went every year at this time – to Ichmeler, to dine in the gorgeous Karem Restaurant. I hadn’t realised how lovely Ichmeler was. It was a beautiful day and we were chatting and laughing like we usually did, I took the photo below from the table (I have one of Gail but it’s too painful to post) and I said we needed to return and stay in Ichmeler next year and Gail agreed. I’m still not sure if either of us thought we would be coming back, but we made our plans and I’m glad we did.

Ichmeler 2017

I’ve just checked out the window and this isn’t Ichmeler though and it never will be. I can never go back in this life. I’ve planned to return one last time however. When I go, the kids have instructions to mix our ashes and take us both to Marmaris, take the walk to Ichmeler and scatter us along the shoreline.

Until then, I have to find us something else to do, Pet.

I started off at Phil Howard’s Elystan Street restaurant, having three delicious courses and leaving before suddenly realising I’d had – completely out of character – lamb’s LIVER. The dark humour cloud was hovering over me that day. Trying to work off a bit off excess, I took some back-doubles around the Chelsea / Kensington area before surprisingly finding myself outside of Gail’s favourite hotel.

See, I love it when stuff like this happens. I came out of the restaurant and decided to walk off a bit of dinner – you know how fat I am 🤣 – and I walked with just a vague idea of the direction I was going in, I cut down back streets, double backed a bit and suddenly I found myself outside of Gail’s favourite hotel. Eh? We came here for some memorable teas over the years and she bought her friends here as well. So.. go in? I don’t think I’ve been led here for no reason so why not! A glass of Laurent Perrier? Be rude not to.

The Blue Bar at the Berkeley

A walk from the Berkeley along Piccadilly bought me to my favourite church. St James’s Piccadilly. I go there every Christmas and try to drop in any time I pass. I was there for a purpose as I knew Gail always liked to light a candle if she was in a church so I wanted to light one for her. It became apparent though that I’d stumbled into something being assembled and I discovered I’m wandered into an evening concert of sacred chants, mantras and songs by a duo known as Illumina.

Seeing my difficulty, I was kindly asked to stay – admittance free – and, though I wasn’t sure I would be able to handle more than a few minutes of it, I took up the kind offer. I was so glad I did. I ended up staying for all bar the last few minutes, finding the whole thing relaxing and rewarding in a way I wouldn’t have been able to envisage if it had been suggested beforehand.

Then it was on to Covent Garden. Our first ‘date’ as such was in Rumours, London’s first cocktail bar (yep it was THAT long ago). It’s sadly long gone and isn’t even anything now – all boarded up – but ‘Be At One’, a smaller cocktail bar, is next door to where Rumours used to be and it’s cocktails till close now.

And that was it. At the end of the day I realised I’d walked from Chelsea to Covent Garden. Once again a day I’d been dreading had opened up into something else. By the time I got home it was five minutes past midnight and Gail’s first birthday ‘elsewhere’ had passed. Another day I’d rather not have had, but one that had its surprising aspects.

The Black Cat Is Back

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A number of you have enquired about Puffy – the Ghost Cat who appeared mysteriously two days after Gail died. She is back. Not sure why. Perhaps I’m struggling? So I fed her and took this picture. If all you can see is a cat bowl and some decking please let me know and I will contact that nice man in the white coat again.

Easter 2019

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As anyone who is grieving will tell you, the first year is a series of milestones as each ‘First  without’ is ticked off the list.

There is no easy way around these days, so for the major birthdays and anniversaries, I tried to do something life-affirming and slightly different. This tended to veer towards a place I’d always wanted to go too; a restaurant I’d always wanted to visit or something, placing myself in a situation I might otherwise have not found myself in. I found by doing this that small, unexpected pleasures often opened up, sometimes making the day memorable for another reason. I also found this meant I somehow took Gail with me and I could  ‘share the occasion’ with her.

Some firsts just blindside you though and Easter was one that shocked me. I thought after and decided that Easter is strongly associated with spring and re-birth and, although it wasn’t something I’d considered much before, it has its own unique atmosphere. I discovered this to my cost as, not having steeled myself for the occasion, Easter became an awful time. Again, like Christmas, some of the problems associated with the season aren’t ones you can really talk about without them sounding trite and pathetic. Nevertheless, the fact I had no-one to surprise me with an egg was a horrible realisation of loss; that token gesture of chocolate becoming a focal point for thought, generosity and lost love.

It also makes you shudder with regret and pine for lost opportunity, because the selection and giving of an egg is normally just another one of the year’s events. You’re grateful and happy for the gift, the fact that someone took the time to select it and give it to you, of course, but what you suddenly realise is – however much you appreciated the gesture – you’ll still on some level had taken that gift for granted, something you just ‘do’ every year. Without it, the yawning chasm it leaves just wipes you out.

I can see the pain etched in my throwaway social media post.

Times You Have Got It Wrong # 354
“Easter isn’t as emotional as Christmas I’ll be ok”

‘Nuff said

Kissing A Fool

Posted on by billyblagg

A MixTape’88 entry that I feel needs a place here for another reason.

You see, I thought Gail and I were solid; there was little we didn’t tell each other, know about each other or couldn’t talk about. I believe, were Gail to be back here now, that would still remain the case. Grief doesn’t work like that though. It’s too simple, too neat. Grief likes to fuck you over.

With the Love of your Life not around to ask, things keep popping into your head. I had a situation late last year. I thought of something, a question, that I didn’t know the answer too. I couldn’t understand why I didn’t know the answer to it and I gradually got more and more wound up thinking about it during the weeks(s) that followed. Not knowing was bad enough, but why did I not know the answer? Why had I never asked? I knew we were both independent people and didn’t rely on each other to go out, or do something that didn’t involve the other, but were we drifting that far apart that I hadn’t even thought to ask her this most vital of questions? What type of relationship did we have?

Eventually at end of my tether one evening I sat down and had a stiff word with myself. I needed an answer to what I was doing to myself. The realisation when it came was seismic. The reason I didn’t have the answer to this question was because, had she been here, I wouldn’t have bothered to ask. It wasn’t important. It didn’t matter. When Gail was alive we were busy living a life; even if that life involved work, hospitals, illness, trying to balance the financial situation, it was still life, still what we did. Had a guardian angel appeared in front of me at that moment and told me I could have had Gail back for the evening, I still wouldn’t have asked that question. I would have just wanted to spend that time with her talking about things that did matter.

So what was that question? What drove me to think I was going insane? Answer: I don’t know! Seriously. Once I’d got my head round the fact of why I didn’t know the answer, the question itself went from my head and, try as I might – and I won’t try that hard – it’s never come back.

You see, once you can’t ask someone then the questions flow even if you’d never thought to ask that person while they were here. Nevertheless, what you didn’t say will haunt you regularly. Like ‘Kissing A Fool’. It played a huge part in my life but I never told Gail. I wish I had. I so wish I had. Every year during the spring, about Easter time, it got a regular play in my car when I was driving to some work related thing but I never told her. She deserved to know and I think she would have liked to have known, but some foolish pride or something stopped me from telling her.

So indeed, she was kissing a fool…

Perhaps it’s one of those generational things, but my kids look at me oddly when I quote pop / rock lyrics at them as a design for life. Nevertheless, I’ve found a song lyric perfectly sums up a mood or a belief as much as any of the best poetry or literature.

In the first months of 1988, George Michael’s ‘Faith’ was a staple for me and Gail and I could have used any of the tracks on this [pretend Facebook] tape anytime between January to March. At Easter ’88 though, with the relationship discovered and in tatters, Gail put this on a tape and told me this song was about me. I’d heard it dozens of times of course, but I listened to the lyrics with fresh ears and I realised, as ever, she was dead right. It disturbed me and, for the first time ever (perhaps last time too?), I set about trying to make a set of lyrics in a song NOT about me. It took me six years but I managed it eventually. I’m genuinely proud of that.

For reasons I can’t adequately explain, even though I wanted to tell her so many times how this affected me, I never did. Now I never can. But you were always my star Pet. Always.


You Wear It Well

Posted on by billyblagg

Gail was beautiful. This isn’t a husband just speaking fondly of his dead wife or something now up for debate, she just was and everybody knew it. I told her frequently and, if she was feeling a certain way, she’d do the self-deprecating thing or, if she was feeling good enough herself, just thank me. The basic fact remains though I’d had years of people – men and women – quite literally stopping us in the street and telling her she looked fabulous.

I joked about it in her eulogy but Gail had always had to fend off attention from both sexes throughout the time we’d been together (and it was certainly the case before we met too). This didn’t bother me – rather I actually enjoyed it – but her attraction didn’t just come from her own looks and personality. Gail had a style of her own; she could co-ordinate clothes and make them look more than they were. I can’t recount the number of times Gail was stopped and asked where she’d got a specific item of clothing and had to convince an astonished person when she simply answered ‘Primark’. Gail made good clothes look good, of course, but her trick was in making cheaper clothes look great too.

On our last holiday together in Marmaris just weeks before she went into hospital for the last time, I was approached by a woman in the hotel we were staying in. “Can I just say how much my friends and I keep commenting on how glamorous your wife is? We can see she’s extremely ill but she has so much poise and style. We’re all saying if only we could look like her…” I thanked the woman profusely – I knew it would mean a lot to Gail (although I knew how ill she was when she could barely take the compliment) – but, seeing how painfully gaunt Gail was, I could only wonder at what they would have said had they seen her just a year previously.

The woman was right though; feeling terrible and in pain, Gail would dress for dinner as if she was going out to the Ritz (I won’t bore you with how stunning she looked when we did go the Ritz!). She had difficulty wearing the clothes she wanted as they hung on her rather than fitted her as they had previously, but that didn’t stop her from mixing and matching to look her best.

Gail always looked as if she had her own personal spotlight. She had her issues – and I wouldn’t want to pretend otherwise to anyone coming at this site who didn’t know her – but none of those precluded her from the way she presented herself; always looking fantastic and dressing with style, grace and panache. She was pretty good at raunchy and slutty too 😉

Now, with her gone, the question of what to do with her wardrobes – and there’s a lot of stuff – raised its stylish head. My immediate thought post-July 2018 was I needed to move from the house we shared. A three-bedroom town house is too big for one man and four cats but also we lived where we did because we were together; alone I had no reason to be where I was and, in fact, with elderly parents and a daughter living 50-60 odd miles away, it made sense to move closer to them. But a quick look at some properties in an area I’d want to move to made me realise I’d have to downsize the wardrobe space drastically to even think about moving.

At least, that’s what I tell myself. The fact is though I never had any issues about Gail’s clothes. Following a blog online about coping with grief , I was vaguely astonished to find someone getting his in-laws round to help sort his wife’s clothes out a year after she passed away. A year? Getting help?

I started listing things on eBay within a couple of weeks of Gail’s passing. I didn’t need help; wouldn’t have appreciated help. Not only didn’t I find this odd or hard I actually found it cathartic. Gail’s gorgeous clothes that she loved and looked great in could be enjoyed by others. That was important to me; that someone saw something, wanted it and would enjoy it for themselves. It was as if her life would be continuing elsewhere.

A cynic could say the same would be true if I’d just bundled the lot up and taken them to a nearby charity shop – and there have been charitable donations made too – and my altruistic reasons actually meant I made a good deal of money from some items I hadn’t originally paid for myself (although a lot I had actually bought).

There’s not a great deal I can say in defence to that other than I really don’t care. I’m comfortable with it, I’m the one left and I’ll do what I want. In fact, I love seeing the comments on eBay from people who’ve bought something, love it and say it looks fabulous on them because I adore the fact that Gail’s clothes have a life with someone who appreciates them.

The ‘everyone handles grief differently’ mantra will crop up here regularly – you may already have seen it – and all I can say the clothes issue simply wasn’t a problem for me. The photography, listing, selling, packaging and posting gave me a purpose that helped me a lot during the first year and, with barely half the stuff sold, I think it may serve me well into old age.

Am I overstating things about Gail’s clothes though? Were they that special? Well, how many people do you know could design and then carry off this hat? Then tell me I’m going over the top. So spectacular, so ‘Gail’ was this, I placed It was on her coffin at her funeral and it sits proudly – as an ornament no less – in my lounge.

Having said all this, I still have about 70 pairs of glasses and 50 bags available…