About logging off and taking time

I write this sitting on a beach in Spain. It’s a trip that’s been put off three times since last year and was almost put off a forth because I was apprehensive about coming here, COVID and all, I thought it might not be the same.

You see, this is my happy place, my home from home. I’ve been coming here on an off with my wife since 2003 and I came as a kid every year between 1964 and 1979. It has meaning.

We only admitted to each other that we’d had doubts in the airport once we’d checked our baggage when it was too late.

So we came. It was raining when we got here. And with the exception of one morning, the weather was crap for the first three days.

It didn’t matter because we’d started the process of decompression.

2020 had been a bad year for everyone but in addition my wife had breast cancer – she’s clear now – and my mother spent six months in a care home with her Alzheimer’s taking over rapidly until she had a bad fall and a bleed on the brain. She only came out of hospital for palliative care and she died not long after.

It was overcast on the third morning but 22 degrees and we sat in our beech chairs reading. It was glorious.

The weather turned and we’ve had wall to wall sunshine. But were sleeping 10 hours every night. Man…