Weird, never thought I'd be writing that as a post title, but I just couldn't quite 'get there' this weekend in Le Touquet. Normally its one of the highlights of my annual social & boozing calendar but this year…… well either it, or maybe I, just wasn't quite all there.<\/p>\n
It started in its usual entertaining fashion – a bunch of us down at the beach, playing silly buggers on the carousel and drinking Heinekens in the beach bar, toes in the sand, saying 'well the forecast was shitty rain but its bloody lovely here'. Slipping in a cheeky ice cream, going on to various other bars, chatting to middle aged golfers, hitting the VAGs (vodka & grapefruits for you uninitiates out there) and generally getting 'on it'.<\/p>\n
But, the weekend took a major nosedive as we sat at dinner and the person next to me said 'have you heard about Ayub?' Now Ayub (Yubby) is the mens goalie, has been coming for years, nice chap - and not there this year. I'd vaguely assumed that he'd got work on or something, as only 5 men managed to get themselves organised enough to come this year, unlike the bursting at the seams ladies team, so it wasn't that odd that he among others wasn't there.<\/p>\n
So I said 'no'? Imagining that the story was going to be he'd crashed his car \/ lost his job \/ turned into a woman or any of the usual stories that follow a 'have you heard about….' intro. But no – it was followed by 'he's got some kind of terminal cancer and apparently he's in a really, really bad way in hospital'.<\/p>\n
Cue: My heart sinking like a stone and the rest of the weekend pretty much following it down the toilet.<\/p>\n
And then I felt bad, because:<\/p>\n
a) I didn't know Yubby was ill at all, and felt that we all should do, as his annual team mates<\/p>\n
Then b) because maybe everyone did know and had chosen not to tell me in case it upset me, but thus reinforcing how bloody different I feel vs everyone else<\/p>\n
or c) even worse because it somehow felt like a friend dying of cancer was the 'new news' – a bit of almost gossip to carelessly toss about the table, before you instantly forget it, and get your nose back in your beer and moules frites.<\/p>\n
plus d) wondering if people now think I'm better – or have just forgotten that I have the fucknasty C as its not (or I'm not) important enough to them to remember<\/p>\n
and of course, most selfishly of all e) wondering how many years it will be until the name Ayub is replaced with Scotty…. and wondering just how upsetting or for how long my serious illness\/death might be the news, before everyone headed off to the Sports Bar for more fun.<\/p>\n
It threw up all manner of questions which my silly old head was tossing about and trying to make sense of:<\/p>\n
– The occasional shallowness of casual acquaintances and loose friendships<\/p>\n
– The short-term nature & impact of bad news, before its old hat<\/p>\n
– The blithe insouciance of those who've never experienced major shit, not understanding what it feels like to the person who's living it and those around them<\/p>\n
– The fine line between hockey weekend wholesome fun and 'it's all about me' self-indulgence<\/p>\n
– The throw of the dice that says one person will be healthy and the next one, screwed<\/p>\n
– The strange things in life that throw certain groups of people together, like illness, and the fact you can never guess who'll be in your own 'life groups' that form by their own accord and not your own choice<\/p>\n
– How guilty having a good time can feel when you know someone else is having an utter shocker<\/p>\n
– How isolating it is, to be surrounded by people but feel alone<\/p>\n
God – I fucking hate being diferent. I just felt like my body remained sat at the table with a fake smile stuck on my chops while my mind and spirit literally lifted up and wafted somewhere else. I'd have felt utterly shitty for Ayub hearing the news anyway, but it really bloody sucked on Friday hearing it at that point.<\/p>\n
Plus the hockey was crap. I felt like a lard arse post-honeymoon excesses. I drank lots but couldn't get pissed and am worried its something to do with the bloody disease. The not-terrible-but-there pains in my neck, shoulders and ribs which might be nothing, but equally might be something.<\/p>\n
And topped off with poor Hawksey bending his knee backwards in the way that its supposed to only bend forwards, hearing a loud snap and swelling up. All meaning he'll probably need another operation once we've managed to se a couple of specialists and get an opinion. He's back on crutches, in his knee brace and my sexy white surgical stocking… poo. Not great for him either.<\/p>\n
I think all this is me having my head in a bit of a bad \/ worried space at the moment. As ever, doing my best to push it away and make the most of good times before bad times are either confirmed or not confirmed… but I'm not doing a very good job of it at the moment. Anyway, the appointment is a week today so I guess the wait will be over soon enough.<\/p>\n
Big love to you all – Sx <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Weird, never thought I'd be writing that as a post title, but I just couldn't quite 'get there' this weekend in Le Touquet. Normally its one of the highlights of my annual social & boozing calendar but this year…… well either it, or maybe I, just wasn't quite all there. It started in its usual entertaining […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n