Finding some space.

Last Saturday we celebrated Christmas with my mum and dad who drove the 140 miles from the midlands to stay with us. It is the first time I have every cooked a Christmas lunch for them (though could not have done it without mums help). We opened presents just from each other, went for a lovely walk around the wooded areas of our estate. But it was strained, when someone you love is missing the hole just sits there raw and throbbing. For me this second Christmas without my sister is painful but so far better than last year. I have had the time to enjoy doing and making Christmassy stuff. For my mum, this year she is 'feeling'. Last year the pain was numbing and with house clearing and stuff to do she just drifted through it with my dad.



The culmination of emotions hit a low on Saturday evening and I ended up going to bed at 8.30pm. This did give me time to think and pray about how we could move on the following morning. The idea that came into my head was to go to a little place that I know in the New Forest. It is only a 20 minute car ride from our house it is a little off the normal touristy stopping bits, it used to be an old airfield. When you finally get to the car park this is the sight that greats you:





It is one of those places that I had always wanted to take my sister to, as she was an avid bird watcher and we have been with friends and had tiny birds come and eat from our hands at this point. Just me, my niece and my mum and dad went armed with a big tin of bird seed. It was just perfect. We all found some space.

I made friends with several of the New Forest ponies, one young foal experiencing her first winter kept following me as I hobbled away.

My niece and I both stayed still and tried to entice the little birds to come feed from our hands, alas not this time.

My mum remembered that she had been here before. It must have been on one of the odd occasions in years past when my parents came down with my sister and her daughter and they took my children out for the afternoon to this very spot.

I shall definitely be going back, this is my space to remember my sister close to home. I am very grateful to my daddy for taking these pictures for me.