Hope – Page 45 – A Dad trying to cope with the loss of his Partner and becoming a single parent.

Posted on February 17, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 93 Comments

Cut the grass

I know it’s all gone but the field looks better for it….So let’s go back to just before the thaw.

I was sat in my car. It hadn’t moved in weeks so I thought I had better run the engine for a bit. Reverse it a few times up and down the our little drive. Make sure the brakes haven’t seized up. If I was sat for weeks my knees would definitely have stopped working. I was looking at the three peddles and scratching my head. I had forgotten which one was the clutch. After a few test presses I sussed them out again. Clearly driving doesn’t come naturally to me.

That’s probably very like parenting with me as well. I’m probably better at being the kid than the one apparently in charge.

Then a worrying thought. What if I’m getting this parenting lark completely wrong. What if I’m making things worse for a Hawklad. Who knows. I’ve never been assessed. It was easy when there was two parents. Someone would tell me if I was wrong. A quietly whispered ‘tell you what why don’t you go and cut the grass and I will do that’. But then that abruptly stopped in 2016. This summer it will be 5 years of me parenting solo. No checks. No assistance. No manual. Doing this all by myself. Over those years there were many times I would have definitely told myself to go outside and cut the grass.

What if I’ve got this wrong….

Would my partner have done it differently. Probably. We often politely disagreed. Even down to how to change a nappy. She wanted him to go to a different school. Was she right? She had a different view on the approach that should be taken with his Aspergers and Dyslexia. Have I been too laid back on the implementation of his Education and Health Care Plan. Have I done all I could for him. Have I missed something which would help him with his fears and phobias.

I guess the answer is that I will never know. All I can do is my best. Hope I get most things kinda right. Hope I don’t drop too many balls along the way. Maybe even find the time to cut the grass.

Posted on February 17, 2021February 16, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 85 Comments

Pancakes

Oh no it’s pancakes. I have been let back into the kitchen. How can I wreck the pancakes this year. Like most things baking – they don’t come naturally to me. So this year the ingredients are ready. Carefully measured out.

What could possibly go wrong…

AND the results…..

Where do I start….

Not exactly round. Not exactly fluffy and light think putty. Either to thin or verging on a bread loaf. The taste well I thought ‘delicate, unobtrusive flavouring’ while Hawklad thought ‘tasteless mush only saved by mountains of sugar’.

So somewhere between 5 out of 10 to 1 out of 100. But here’s the thing. Pancake Day was special this year. Really special. It made the day DIFFERENT. In these lockdown times that makes it special.

Posted on February 16, 2021February 15, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 60 Comments

Miss it

A few more hours of snow before the warmer weather arrives.

I think I’m going to miss it…

As I was looking at our lake set in a winter wonderland. Briefly illuminated with a beautiful sun beam. All very fleeting and temporary. All too soon it will be blasted away by our normal Yorkshire weather. Soon the snow will be gone. Soon the lake will be gone.

Our little family lockdown feels way more permanent and long lasting. No chance to travel and explore. The snow covered Alps, Scottish Highlands, Snowdonia and the Lakeland Fells seem so out of reach at present. No prospect of walking on the moors and the beach. So it was kind of nice that the snow came to us. Bringing the wilds to us.

But just all a bit too fleeting.

Once it’s gone then it feels like the lockdown will really kick in again. More about grinding the days out than setting out on adventures. But at least we have had a taste of what it’s like to be out there. A reminder of what a beautiful world we live in. Why there is always hope and something to live for.

Posted on February 15, 2021February 15, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 64 Comments

Forgetful

Do you get those moments when you realise that you have clearly lost the plot. I’ve been telling Hawklad that the school half term week off is the last week of February. It always is….

I couldn’t work out last why a few of the teachers kept talking about end of module lessons, need to get things finished this week, we start something new in a couple of weeks…. Still the obvious didn’t sink in. Not until one teacher set an ‘end of half term test’.

Ok the week off is this week. This is completely down to me. School emailed parents after Christmas with the correct dates. The school calendar is clear. Basically the muppet gauge is registering ‘off the scale’ currently with me. That might explain why I put my coffee cup into the tumble dryer with the towels. That might explain why I filled my bath with cold water. That might explain why I lost my mobile so I tried phoning it on the land line – kept getting the engaged sound and didn’t work out that I was repeatedly phoning the landline. Might explain why I couldn’t find the toothpaste and strangely found that it was in my hand all the time. Might explain why I put Deep Heat on a hand cut rather than Sudacrem.

Everyday I move further away from George Clooney and ever closer to Homer Simpson. That’s both in looks and thought.

Wish I could forget that bit.

Posted on February 15, 2021February 13, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 67 Comments

On ya bike

A heatwave is coming but it’s certainly not here yet. It’s a tad bracing on the knees.

The weeks keep passing without going for a run. So needs must. My old exercise bike is getting some hammer. Last year I started a Creaky World Tour. How far can I get round the world by exercising in Yorkshire. Initially using the Pokemon Go app to track my runs and dog walks. Then as our family lockdown tightened that became mainly using my battered old exercise bike. The last time I checked I had made it to Volgograd. So let’s check in again.

The bike is showing just under extra 2000 miles. Wow didn’t think my little legs could go that far in 20 odd weeks. So where am I?

Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan. (All the photos from Tripadvisor)

No rest for the wicked. Let’s see how far I get in a few more months time. Plenty of months of exercise biking still to come.

Posted on February 14, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 81 Comments

Valentines

The 14th February has sneaked up again. Seems to come around every year these days. That’s the fifth since that summer from hell in 2016. That’s another reason to light a candle.

Posted on February 13, 2021February 14, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 87 Comments

Prunes

Don’t you just love WordPress. It’s a bit like Prunes. You know they are good for you. So many benefits but a monumental pain in the backside….

Blogging is really so good for me but WordPress is a monumental pain in the ….. It just feels like wading through treacle.

Will it just once allow me to format the post as I want it to look.

Will it just once have a truly user friendly editor.

Will it just once not keep trying mess up my photos so I have to constantly keep on reloading them.

Will it stop showing me that my blog looks fine when some users can’t see the photos or only see messed up formatting.

Will it stop messing up a post when I dare to try and include a music or video link.

Will it stop changing all my text into micro font if I accidentally delete a bit WP doesn’t want me to do.

Will it stop randomly deleting people from my following list and then not bothering to tell me.

Will it stop randomly deleting comments I post.

Will it stop randomly deciding to freeze the iPad app. In fact will it stop freezing my iPad – it’s the only app that has ever done that for me.

Will the help desk stop blaming Apple for the working of its App.

WHINING OVER.

I like blogging. It helped me cope with loss. It helped me become a better parent. A better person. Made some great friends through it. Kept me connected with people during this period of isolation. So I guess I will keep taking my Prunes. The benefits are so worth it.

Posted on February 12, 2021February 11, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 89 Comments

Origami

Tracks. Can you guess the little visitor?

***********

“Dad I’m not happy…”

What’s wrong?

“School. Apparently they think that origami is a fun activity”

Well many would agree.

“Not here they won’t. So when a teacher says ‘I have a fun activity for you‘ I personally would not be then referring to origami. I am tempted to contact my lawyer on this.”

Easy

Not quite snow drifts yet. Maybe not this time.

I keep thinking back to a childhood memory. The family house had no central heating and just two fires. A fake burning log pile electric fire in the back room and an old cold fire in the living room. I can remember having to help dig a path through the piled up snow to the outside coal bunker. That woke you up in the morning. It also focused the mind. No coal. No fire. No heat in the house as the electric fire used up the coins set aside for the electric meter far too fast.

Looking back I am so in awe of my parents. How on earth did they cope with 5 kids without the help of things we so take for granted now. They didn’t even have a fridge for so many years. They either grew they own food or bought it from the local small estate shops. No supermarkets to fall back on. Both had to work as well. Work hard. No overseas holidays to recharge for them. A holiday for them was catching the train to local seaside tourist towns. Whitby and Scarborough. No overnight stats as well. Jump on the train. Potter about for a couple of hours then grab fish and chips for the train journey back home. That’s one of my other vivid childhood memories. The family jumping back onto the train with our fish supper wrapped up in newspapers. As the train set off we started passing round the bottle of tomato ketchup. Proper ketchup, the stuff you had to shake vigorously before unscrewing the bottle top and copiously spreading a think layer of the red stuff over the chips. Unfortunately someone had forgotten to screw the bottle top back on. My dad started to vigorously shake the ketchup bottle just as the Ticket Collector appeared. The top flew off and dad sprayed the carriage – very very red. I still can’t work out who was more angry. Dad or the Collector. It was definitely a frosty trip home.

Seems like a different world now. As hard as I think my parenting life is these days, it pales compared to those times a few decades back. I so need to remember that the next time I start to complain about how hard my life is. Nothing compared to what my parents had to survive.

It’s a relatively easy life now.

Posted on February 8, 2021 by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 70 Comments

Pixar

The sun always rises. It always rises in cartoons – eventually.

I so would like to have a word with those really talented people at Pixar Studios. You keep making the most wonderful cartoon movies. What a list

Toy Story, Cars, Monsters Inc, Nemo, The Incredibles, Wall-E, on and on

I don’t know how many times Pixar has become the essential Parenting Tool over the years for me. Keeping both child and Dad occupied and laughing. But I need to have words. What is it with the fixation with death and loss. Is it possible to go a few years without have your cartoons venture into the subject. If I want to be depressed then I can pick up a Leonard Cohen cd or watch Love Story. When I’m trying to find fun things to do like watch Pixar movies I really don’t want to venture into the sad stuff.

We endured UP the other night. It’s a great cartoon with some really funny bits. But man those first ten minutes where Carl losses his beloved wife before they lived out their dream. I was in buckets of tears. Really Pixar. It’s not big and it’s not clever….

So come on Pixar stop going all Love Story on me. Or at the very least bring in a labelling system. List movies like UP as ‘contains mega bereavement’ at least then I can prepare myself for it. Or even better do more movies that are just slapstick ‘buddy’ adventures where I can park my sad emotions for two hours.