Yesterday, I went back to 'our spot'. It is a desolate beach on the South coast, near to Rottingdean., that my friend, Tess (RIP) used to frequent last year.
I was reflecting on the recent death of my friend, Tess, who passed away at the weekend. I was in a nostalgic mood (typically cancer season) and I was remembering Summer '18 - the last time we had enjoyed each other's company. It had been to 'our spot' and we had made it 'ours'.
On Tuesday afternoon, the day after hearing the sad news relating to Tess, I had gone to have a private vigil to celebrate the good memories and pray for her peace in death. Yesterday I took some wine and a picnic, as a kind of tribute to Tess. I was aware that I had some emotions to address and clear.
It took me by surprise. I looked into the sea and visualised Tess swimming and laughing and enjoying herself. She had a a fun-girl vibe - when she was in a happier place.
Out of the blue, the waterworks hit me sideways. Uncontrollable sobbing, and I could feel my heart hurting. It seemed as if I was lead to go to actually do this, to cry it out.
I noticed how the beach was utterly devoid of any other people and that the clouds were looking ominously like rain.
At this moment, as I was blowing my nose very strongly into my beach towel and wiping hot tears from my face, I heard a low call, 'Hey'. It was Lee.
I looked at him. 'I'm so pleased to see you, I had thought about you this morning'.
He came over and tentatively sat down, "You're not alright today, are you ok?", he asked.
Now, to put you in the picture, I will briefly describe Lee and how we came to meet.
Lee is from Laughton. He cycles a lot and drives a converted ambulance. Last year, Tess and I met him on the beach. Lee is 6'4", ginger, funny, intelligent, a bit of a misfit, and a very good conversationist.
Last year, when he first arrived on the beach, he was ruddy faced, hot and bothered form a long cycle drive that he had made from Eastbourne. He wanted to swim. The rock pools where visible and the tide was a fair distance out. It was a very warm day. I told him that I too had wanted to swim, and we both agreed that the prospect of swimming over rocks was never a good one. I explained how, as a child, I had badly grazed my upper body (rib cage) on some hidden rocky outcrop that I had not seen. I swam over it and felt the rock collision, extremely hard on my rib cage. It left a nasty graze and had put me off sea swimming for a bit.
Lee and I decided to 'risk it for a biscuit' (Tessa's phrase) and Tess had said that phrase at the time. So we went for a swim. He was more tentative than me. "You go first, I might follow", he suggested. So I did, and I often do..take the lead on things...because I can be more daring and optimistic than others.
Life is short, don't knock it if you haven't tried it, you only have one shot at life, what's the worst case scenario?, don't be a pussy (just do it), do it anyway, always do one thing a day that scares you, never stay too long in your comfort zone...you will stagnate, G-d's got you, if you are lead to do something - do it. These are all thoughts that come to mind when I find myself feeling too afraid to do something, that I really want to do. More often than not, I do it, unless I can categorically say that I am jeopardising my life. Judgement call. what's the likelihood that I might die in the process? Minimal likelihood, then it's worth doing.
We swam out a bit, and chatted about sea swimming. Tess was waving at us from the shore. After our swim, we went to join Tess. She thought we were brave to navigate the rocks and rock pools. Lee and I had felt a bit pleased with ourselves for not having endured any bodily injuries.
The rest of the afternoon we sat and talked together about life and things and general chitter-chatter. When Lee left, to cycle home, Tess and I agreed that we both liked Lee.
From time to time, Lee would drop by on our beach days. We swam and talked and laughed a lot. He became our 'beach mascot'.
Yesterday, I am sure, that he could not have appeared at a better time. I told him immediately what was up.
Ironically, Lee had turned up on the Saturday - when I was there with a friend, not Tess -
to explain her absence I told Lee that Tess and I had had an altercation some months back.
He had noticed how we had not been on the beach, of late, and had pondered that Tess may have passed away.
Lee expressed his sympathy and was interested to know what had happened - including the back story. "You feel guilty?", he asked.
"No, not at all. Tess is in a better place now", I said, "I'm just releasing my feelings and remembering her when she was happy. I'm nostalgic over the good fun times that we had, and that was often here".
I don't know how deftly Lee managed to steer the subject away from Tess, but he did. Before long, we were exchanging stories and experiences and anecdotes....eventually arriving at some of the genius 'Black Adder' episodes, and other comedic frivolity.
I was feeling very blessed, that an 'Earth Angel' (Lee) should arrive to metaphorically take my hand and pull me out of the indigo whirlpool vortex that I was falling into. In my imagination, when I experience a full emotional meltdown, it is Indigo blue and a whirlpool and I spin around in the vortex for sometime until I'm then able to drag my body out and dry off.
Thank you Lee. You're a star.
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