I’d begged my mum for letters. I’d asked for one for Christmas, for my birthday, my wedding day, the day my first child was born, on Tuesdays, in fact she’d ‘best write me one for every day’ I said, you know just in case, she’d laughed. I needed advice on how to change a tire, how to put up a shelf, what to do to stop a baby from screaming, what to do when said baby becomes a teenager, how to cook a Christmas dinner, when the last postal date before Christmas is; I needed her advice on every thing! As soon as she was ill, I begged her for letters but the time ran out all too quickly. The day she died I searched high and low, messaged her friends to see if she’d left the letters with them, I needed her to have left a piece of herself behind for me.
Eventually my brother found two little books, one for each of us. She’d started to fill these with quotes and random tip-bits but had only got about five pages in, I raced through those in minutes. She had left one page for my birthday though; one page that I waited six months to read.
My 30th birthday arrived four days after my mum’s birthday; where I’d spent hers sweating out a hangover in the Rio sun, I was now back in England, in her house, without her. There’s something about turning 30 – I’d always seen 30 as a marker for when you had your shit together by; you’re mature, have a mortgage, a husband, a successful career, maybe a kid or two? I had none of these things, I still felt like a teenager. This was a whole new decade, my 20’s were gone, never to be seen again and I wasn’t sure I was ready.
I read her letter alone in bed. She wrote about the day I was born; I’d arrived early in the morning just as the sun was rising, she’d held me in her arms, both of us drugged up, my pupils fully dilated and spinning, she remembered looking down at me and thinking ‘no one would ever love you as much as I do’.
So after that emotional start to the day I got up, pulled on my Cheshire Cat costume and went on a Disney themed pedi-bus tour around London Bridge. For those not up to speed on things such as pedi-buses, this is a 16 person bike with a bar in the middle which is used to peddle to a series of bars where shots are consumed.
Eventually leaving Mrs Incredible, both the Mini Mouses, Mary Poppins, Pocahontas and a number of other characters; Buzz Lightyear, Snow White, Captain Hook and I got the train back to mine in a very drunken state.
The next day I awoke in Buzz Lightyear’s bed which is odd because I’d gone to bed with Captain Hook – this all sounds far dodgier than it was! Snow White had passed out drunk and there weren’t enough beds so I shared with Hook, only sometimes I sleepwalk when I’m drunk.
In fact one time, a few years ago, I was living with a male friend from Uni. One morning I went into his room ‘oh my god, I was so drunk last night!’ I declared in a worst for wear state.
‘Err yeah!’ Came his reply!
‘What?’ I questioned.
I’d got home around 3 that I knew and that was all I remembered. One shoe was in the bath, a necklace was found in the kitchen, my dress for some reason was in the living room, my coat dumped inside the front door; it seems I just wondered around undressing myself for bed.
At 5am, apparently, I slept walked into my housemates room. Kicked his door open so hard it ricocheted off the wall and then proceeded to yelled at him to go to work (he’d spent the week skiving and spending the days on his PlayStation). He rolled over in a sleepy state and declared ‘it’s Saturday’ to which I replied, something he has never let me forget, ‘don’t look at me, I’m naked’ and with that I wondered back to my room, bouncing off the walls for balance as I went.
Any way I awoke the day after my 30th feeling the hangover much more than I ever had in my 20’s.
Having spent months feeling horribly insecure and depressed, wondering if I’d ever feel happy again, why people even liked me in the first place; my birthday had come as a great surprise that people made the effort to come and it was fun and random and there was this tiny glimmer of something in my belly, like a tiny light had been turned on, as if maybe, just maybe things were going to get better.
Unfortunately Bridezilla’s wedding was just around the corner…
Riding storms 