I will always wake up on the sixteenth of December and ask, 'What if...?'
What if is one of the most pointless questions about, as it makes you ponder the unrealities of realities. It offers no real hope. It offers no real opportunity. Unlike Pandora's Box, when it was unleashed, and all the horrors of the world were unleashed, hope and opportunity remained encased in the box. Are they bad things? Are they good things? Are they resting where they should - in a box that contained hated, heartache, violence, envy, wrath...?
Or are they just what they are - hope and opportunity. There to be used when needed, but never to have that much faith in, until you put some effort into the situation.
I'm being a bit abstract.
Like all anniversaries, you have a sense of nostagia. You think about how things were.
Would I want to return to this day five years ago? Never in a million years.
Do I look at what happened on this day five years ago and feel some nostalgia? No.
Was this day a turning point? Absolutely.
I got the call at around six p.m. I was supposed to be going out to my dream group end-of-year dinner. That didn't happen.
The call took all of two minutes. Mum rang. She'd gone. We knew that she was being let go that day. It was all over but the waiting. Then there was no more suffering, on her part. We were all going to get through this. There was no more to be said.
Was there a sense of relief. Hell, yes. Not because she was dead, but she was now at peace. The nine months previous were an abomination that no family should endure.
Of course there were logistics to be managed. Interstate transfers, paperwork, packing up a life in one city, moving back to another, arrangements to be made, people to call. All while coming to terms with what had happened.
But as with any long, drawn out process, the line was drawn and we could start moving in other directions.
Life now has two realms. Life with Lauren. And life after Lauren.
And I miss her everyday.
The photos on the bookcase don't get updated. You don't get news of what she's up to. You don't get to vicariously experience her life through social media. You don't get to be proud, roll your eyes, giggle (she had the best giggle) talk, ponder why she ate her eggs fried, with sauce on the side. You don't get to learn her foibles.
Because she's not here anymore.
And it's the loss of all that potential which gets mourned most of all.
But I'm going to try find some good in this - in the death of my beloved niece, some five years ago.
On a personal level, her passing has put me on the path of writing this novel. It looks at death as one of its themes.
I look at bigger 'what ifs'.
- What if people were more inclined to donate blood?
- What if people talked about death and dying more?
- What if we took each moment and lived for the present?
- What if more money was funneled towards cancers affecting teenagers and young adults?
- What if we were a more empathetic and compassionate nation?
- What if we took more care of the environment?
- What if we all thought more about how we could make our lives matter?
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