Talks

It's like I don't hear it. Brother tells me about talks he has been having with mum. Talks about her "arrangements". Where to go, what to do, how and all the details when she is no longer around.

I've had theses conversations with mum before. And at those times, it feel so natural, so simple to talk about death. Perhaps because death didn't seem so close. At least, never as close as now. And it frightens me. It intimidates me so.

The cancer is eating away her intestines, her pancreas. God only knows where else and how else mum will be affected. All I can think of is how is she feeling. How is mum taking all this? How is mum feeling deep down, knowing that there may not be much time left? A thought comes to me: what is the point of all these days, these final days when you know where things are headed?

These questions never bothered me, or at least not as much as they do now. I am so afraid that she is afraid and uneasy inside. Those thoughts dominate my mind nowadays, and suppress even my own feelings toward all this. I am confused, broken, lost. Perhaps you have noticed from the very disjointed and incoherent way I've been writing these days.

"Should I head back?" I asked mum yesterday. And I asked the same question to my brother. They both told me to stay. It's not time yet. One day it will be, and I need to prepare for that. But now is not yet the time.

I need to make the most of my time here, time when I am away from it all to recuperate, to gather strength and courage. Because I have a feeling the next time I am back home, it might very well be a longer and more difficult stay.