28th April 2012

Some days are worse than others and the empty space I live with cannot be ignored. For sure, in general terms I’m getting much stronger and at the moment I feel particularly encouraged, but the pain of loss has not gone away just yet. A bit like my photo edit, my life really doesn’t feel quite right. There’s something missing. All the colour’s gone. And almost all my dreams have died, along with Jane. I feel a little like the old me, looking through a pair of binoculars trying to catch a clear view of something still in the distance. But it seems like only yesterday that Jane and I regularly visited Deal and even began to make plans to move there. In my mind’s eye I could ‘see’ the house we would live in and we began to browse estate agent websites. On a couple of occasions Jane became more pro-active by pointing out specific properties and insisted that we should view next time we were down there. Just to get a feel for the move. I had very clear sight of the new life we would live and became totally enthusiastic about the whole venture. We built a good connection with a local church having a particular emphasis in an area of need that both Jane and I empathised with. Considering our intermittent travelling situation they were incredibly welcoming. For some time both Jane and I determined that we should move, but then the demands for specialist medical attention led us quite firmly towards Nottingham. The dream had to die, no choice. Intensive treatment for a particularly rare and serious cancer needed the clinical trials unit there. And palliative care doesn’t work in a motorhome either.

My problem is that I’m not sure if that particular dream has completely disappeared. Of course in one sense it’s completely gone as I can’t go live in Deal with Jane. And no way do I feel it right to sell up and relocate on my own. Nonetheless somewhere locked away in my heart is a little gem of an idea that says one day I should find a way to spend an extended period of time down there… and just see what God might do. I’m not sure how to go about it, but if I were to find a way to build a new bridge with those living in the area it still might work. I certainly feel unsettled in Derby, but then again I just feel unsettled with my life full stop. Probably nothing to do with where I’m living. Ok, another week and maybe I’ll go find the motorway in my motorhome again.

Acts 17:26 ‘From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.’ (NIV1984)