funeral
today is paul's funeral.
i am wearing a heavyweight cotton 3/4 length sleeve tulip shaped mini dress, black, from gap - a vintage black and white neck scarf stripey thick black tights and black knee high boots. i have wizard of oz red glittery nailvarnish, red lipstick and dark eyes. my hair is in a freshly cut and bleached white faux-hawk of sorts, although i realise that's a rather cunty term to use.
it may seem odd to be recording such trivia but in all honesty i still don't think the realisation that we are at an end of a painful era has fully hit me yet. the living room is full of cards and flowers. the house is still full of paul. little things, like a to-do list written on his whiteboard. post-it notes stuck to his monitor. not sure when the real tidy-up and moving on will occur. how do you even measure such amounts of time?
later on today i will be the only one doing any kind of 'speech'. mel is far too tearful, my mum is too raw and hasn't yet processed any of this fully. i will talk about how he has been a surprising father figure for me over the past 20 years when my own father had vanished without much of a trace. i will talk about his kindness and his generosity. i will do my best not to cry.
and outside all of this, yesterday i received an email from my dad. the first time i've heard from him since i was doing my dissertation and he emailed me out of the blue asking if i had any memory of him abusing me as a child. as usual, his timing is impeccable. so that will be put to one side to be dealt with once today is over and done with.
i feel rather hollow.
i am wearing a heavyweight cotton 3/4 length sleeve tulip shaped mini dress, black, from gap - a vintage black and white neck scarf stripey thick black tights and black knee high boots. i have wizard of oz red glittery nailvarnish, red lipstick and dark eyes. my hair is in a freshly cut and bleached white faux-hawk of sorts, although i realise that's a rather cunty term to use.
it may seem odd to be recording such trivia but in all honesty i still don't think the realisation that we are at an end of a painful era has fully hit me yet. the living room is full of cards and flowers. the house is still full of paul. little things, like a to-do list written on his whiteboard. post-it notes stuck to his monitor. not sure when the real tidy-up and moving on will occur. how do you even measure such amounts of time?
later on today i will be the only one doing any kind of 'speech'. mel is far too tearful, my mum is too raw and hasn't yet processed any of this fully. i will talk about how he has been a surprising father figure for me over the past 20 years when my own father had vanished without much of a trace. i will talk about his kindness and his generosity. i will do my best not to cry.
and outside all of this, yesterday i received an email from my dad. the first time i've heard from him since i was doing my dissertation and he emailed me out of the blue asking if i had any memory of him abusing me as a child. as usual, his timing is impeccable. so that will be put to one side to be dealt with once today is over and done with.
i feel rather hollow.