(Originally posted at: https://www.facebook.com/notes/malcolm-campbell/remembering-2020/10151333249134995 )
How can it be 14 years? I remember her as if she still lives a bus ride away…
Every year since Sarah died, I’ve taken my motorbike and ridden the same route I did the night she died – from the hospice to the end of the road she lived on. On that night, I didn’t yet know she was gone, I was riding to go and get someone who wanted to be there. But between me walking out the door, and getting to my bike, she slipped away. I didn’t know, but I felt her in the wind around me that night. I heard her whisper about taking one last ride with me, and I sang a song we both loved, loudly, inside my helmet.
It wasn’t motorbike weather today. There were frost warnings, the rain was torrential this morning – I made the decision that memories don’t always have to be on two wheels, and doing it in the car let me play the music, loud, as we’d often done when driving together. Music was one of the things we really connected with – I’d make her cryptic mix CD’s, and she’d figure them out in a few hours, and tell me how I could have done them better.
If she was still here, I’m sure we’d still be having adventures. On motorbikes, on boats, dressed up in castles, … so many ways. But then, Sarah was magic. Pure, unrestrainable magic. So maybe she is still here. Maybe I can go ride places she’d have wanted to go and leave the pillion seat open for her. Or more likely, she’d be riding another bike beside me, like the wind.
Another tradition we have is that our Christmas tree stays up till the 9th January. That year, I visited her in the hospital and hospice every day. I was out of the house a lot, and returning home to Veronica, a cup of tea, and the lights on the Christmas tree gave me a lot of hope. We only turned it off when I got home on the day Sarah died.
So now we do that every year. The tree stays lit, until I get back from the ride to remember her. That’s when we turn it off.
Turning it off, putting it away together, never feels sad in itself. The tree is a collection of memories, as I’ve written before, and remembering isn’t sad in itself.
This night, 14 years ago, I was drinking whisky with Sarah’s sisters. Telling stories, sharing memories. Memories that’ll go on forever.
In her last few weeks, I promised her I would never forget her. That was the easiest promise I ever made. No-one who met her ever could. I remember her with traditions on this night, but I remember her every other night too. She is magic, and she is all around me, every day
“I want to be magic. I want to touch the heart of the world and make it smile. I want to be a friend of elves and live in a tree. Or under a hill. I want to marry a moonbeam and hear the stars sing. I don’t want to pretend at magic anymore. I want to be magic.”
Charles de Lint – an author we shared our love of frequently
And now I’ve written this, I’m going to grab a glass of whisky and play a game with some friends. Those are both good ways to remember her too.
For those that didn’t know her, this is what I wrote after she died: https://www.skirnir.com/seolta/sarah/
All my posts about Sarah are saved here now: https://www.skirnir.com/seolta/