It snowed yesterday. Hard and long. I worked on spreadsheets at my desk, my eyes drifting to the reflection of the window in the mirror above the screen to watch the flakes fall over the garden. My hands stilled and I remembered how to breath. In. Out. In. Out. One hand on my stomach, one hand on my chest. In and out. In and out.
The photograph of my grandmother rests behind me by the typewriter. I have flipped it on its side so I don't have to look at her whenever I get up to make a brew. She died nearly two months ago. It would have been her birthday in just over a week and I would have sent her a card and a little present, probably late. I would have called her and she would have asked about the garden, about my job, about my partner, and all the other routine questions I answered again and again.
I miss her.
I miss my life too. Long covid eats at my inside. I cry more than I'd like to admit to. When folks ask, I tell them I am okay because I am okay. I am also immeasurably sad. Two weeks ago I lost all pleasure in life, spent most of my out of work time sleeping because what else was there to do. I remember May and cycling around the Scottish islands and I find it hard to reconcile this image of my body then to my body now.
I sit in the garden and watch a blue tit in the whitebeam. The tree only has seven crinkly leaves left. I count them as I track the bird on their wander from branch to branch. The bird feeders at my back need replenishing but my legs hurt, my body sway under the pull of dizziness, and I am tired, so tired. No. Not tired, fatigued. The word still feels foreign on my tongue even as my body understands it. A simple walk collapses me to the sofa, to my bed. I remember sobbing as I descended a flight of stairs fifteen years ago, my arms cradling boys clothes on my way to the laundry room. I was also immeasurably sad then. I got better. I trust that I will get better this time too. I know this is a process that will refuse to be rushed. So I let the sadness swirl inside of me alongside the blue-green glint of magpie's wings under the sun.
