Exhausted

This morning at 4am I'm wide awake reading some of the kind, heartfelt messages some of you have written so I posted the following

To all of you. Tricia's sleeping at the moment like I hope the rest of you are (Lauren's awake because it's close to 1pm in Sydney). I know this is the start of a difficult path but all your kind words and love have already begun to smooth the way. My intention is to keep posting updates when I can, sometimes whenever I can. Tricia will help when she needs to. I gave up 7 or 8 samples of blood yesterday and a larger amount of tears. I know at times this will be a pretty lonely place to be but thank you all for being there. Oh bugger it! I'm making a cup of tea before I get too morose.

So I did just that I got out of bed and made that cup of tea, walked up the garden in the dark and enjoyed it in the hot tub. There's something special about being alone in the dark, in the quiet. It was almost as if I could escape my troubles for a while. Then still in the dark (I turned the lights off when I walked up to stop them turning on as I walked past, don't want to give the neighbours a shock) I returned to the house and sat in the big black sofa in the kitchen and had a conversation with Lauren in Sydney.

I stirred my bones and decided to regain some routine so on to the treadmill for 30 minutes before having a cool shower.Tricia was still asleep.

Usually Tricia makes breakfast the night before, today was no exception. So eventually I took breakfast back upstairs for us to have breakfast in bed. My day had started. I would like to say I had a productive day but I would be lying, I did almost nothing.

Imagine this.

Every single thing I look at in the house, in the garden, in the shed, in the garage, in the loft in fact everywhere has history. Every screw, brush load of paint, fish on the fence, decking around the hot tub, shed roof, house cladding has been done by me, Tricia and our daughters. I remember every banged thumb, cut hand, even the splinters in my feet and now the splinter in Mila's foot. Far too much wood. . When I look around I see our home with a huge amount of pride and love. And those of you that have spent any time here will know we have created a space for our family and friends to enjoy with us. Today I looked around and I wept.

August 2020 not one to remember with any fondness. Tricia got herself a parking fine. This morning she fell and bruised herself on the hopeless front steps. Today I had confirmation of my redundancy.

Maybe a better day tomorrow.