The ups and downs

Yesterday was kind of rough. We had one of those 'I really miss Sam' days, where tears come easily and regularly. We knew there was no avoiding it; so early in the day Anthony and I sat down to watch the DVD slideshow of photos that we had played at Sam's funeral. We cried all the way through it (Oliver was out), but it was a good release. And a good chance for a cuddle.

When I went grocery shopping later, I deliberately put my headphones on, so that I wouldn't have to talk to anyone. I used to hate it when people did that, I thought it was so rude. But it's amazing how much your perceptions change after someone close to you dies.

Like the smiling thing, behaviours that once made me cranky are behaviours that I now adopt myself. We never think about the whole lot of things we don't see when we look at others (and neither should we, I guess): that there might be a reason they look so grumpy or sad; that they have headphones on and look away when you catch their eye...

And then there's the way that people react when you talk about kids. In the past, whenever I've talked about my kids with a group of people, there's never been a little thought in the back of my head that maybe one of them might be that person who can't have kids.Or that might have lost one.
Now, that person is me.
On the whole, I try very hard to push my feelings aside when I talk about kids with others, or just focus on Oliver.
But sometimes it can get to be too much. When people talk about how much their kids are pissing them off, or getting in the way of stuff they want to do (like I have heard too many times this week from too many different people), all I can think about is 'at least you still have them'.
Usually I don't voice this thought, but instead find a way to change the subject or extract myself from the conversation. Though yesterday I did speak up, to someone very close to me who was already feeling vulnerable, and I regret that.

The other thing that I hate to see is strangers being horrible to their children. As a teacher, I was already hypersensitive to this, but I am even more so now. I have seen many examples of this over the past few weeks, and it all just adds up.
There are so many people in the world that shouldn't be parents, and sometimes it really gets to me. Why do they get to have kids when I can't? Not that it's the kid's fault; all I feel when I ee them is a mixture of pity and sadness, that they won't have the kind of life they should have.
But I get so angry at their parents, and probably their parents, and the shitty, crazy, mixed up world, that has its priorities all wrong.

So I think this ishow I ended up where I was yesterday. A combination of events and experiences, on top of a crazily busy week where many people did (and didn't) live up to my expectations of them (including one I have posted about before, who completely, very disappointingly, dropped the ball), the whole end-of-inquest thing...it's a wonder I did'n't go completely off the rails!

But, dear reader, it's out of my system now, so don't worry too much about me. Back to livin'...