So I've moved country, again. It's nice to have a hobby. I didn't do it quite so well without her, I was the packer, the lifter of heavy things, writer of multiple lists and neurotic check-and-check-again-er. Mostly she laughed at me, and unpacked essentials that were caught up in my whirlwind of over-zealous packing. I managed this time, to pack everything four days before I left the country, once I was finished I stared around the empty flat and could hear her laughing at me as I decided whether to unpack a toothbrush and some clothes or just buy new ones.
I suppose, in theory, I've moved to what most people would call home. People with happier childhoods and some general sense of belonging to a place, a culture, a people. I've never felt particularly attached to this country, certainly not this bit of it, which holds such a wealth of terrible memories that I was dreading this move. It was, on paper, a terrible idea to move here. I'm in the middle of nowhere, several hours and a bridgeless river away from the coldest city on the planet, no friends, no family. So far I've found it oddly comforting to be able to spend great swathes of time completely alone working to get the house (inherited) and estate ready for sale. I'd prefer, obviously, to be able to do that in a country where it's not suicide to leave the house without two pairs of gloves, two scarves, and swaddled in fur or feathers.
The absence of family seems utterly normal here, my Grandfather lived here alone and I was sent to visit him alone. I remember meeting him for the first time, a great bear of a man in furs and a face mask. I would stay with him for two weeks or more and hear him speak only a handful of sentences. The man was a battleaxe, even on the first day of spring you would find him preparing for winter. When I was very young he had a pet wolf that he had trapped, it had escaped and eluded him for three days in the forest. He believed it was a spirit trying to teach him humility and couldn't bring himself to kill it. I remember a great beast of a man in furs looming out of the ice fog to meet me in Lenin Square and an endless drive over the frozen river, stopping the car to let a pack of wolves overtake us. Most of all I remember a four-day walk with dogs and the utter misery of it. He didn't speak a word and I was so cold I thought it would kill me. When we got there the farmer asked why we hadn't driven and my Grandfather said 'the boy needs to learn.' I didn't understand, but I think it's coming to me now.
It goes without saying that it has been almost a year. I imagine the first of January will find me sleeping in the bottom of a vodka bottle. A year. An entire year without her, without them. I'm not proud of this year. I've worked, too hard, scraped a handful of friends, sunk into bitter depressions, drunk too much, talked too little, remembered too often, and broken the heart of an exceptional man who deserved far better. I've taken myself away from the few remaining people who know me and still managed to care, and have dropped myself into my ideal environment. Here, I can go weeks without seeing another person, weeks without saying a word. She would be appalled. I suppose I can't keep weighing up my decisions based on what she would have thought, but why not? Surely better her judgement, the best person I've known, than mine, possibly the most despicable?
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