Since being signed off sick in December 2013 I've needed a project. For a long time I thought what I wanted was to be back at work - I missed the environment; my colleagues, the socialising, and mostly the sense of purpose.
I loved my job and I knew I was lucky to have felt that way. I've always found it very hard to entertain myself and with very little in the way of hobbies, this became a problem very quickly for someone suddenly with day after day to fill. I didn't realise how strong my work ethic is until I could no longer live up to it.
I did attempt a return to part time hours in September 2014 once I was stable on hormonal meds, but it wasn't the same place I'd been thinking of. Too many staff changes meant it was barely recognisable; including a lady who though lovely, is now doing my job and therefore I was given what felt like menial tasks that I knew were unimportant. I couldn't blame the bosses; who knew how well I could cope? Who knew how long I would be there even? I lasted a couple of weeks and once the date for my surgery came up, gladly took my leave a second time, knowing that what I wanted to return to simply didn't exist any longer.
And then the brain mets and Occupational Health visits and suddenly I'm 64 again - retired and feeling lost. I try not to think of my life as having less years in it - more like I've sped through the next thirty and I'm now living the life everyone else has to muddle through a lot longer before they reach. I don't like to garden (unless it's with someone else, and closely monitored in case I kill something important), I don't play boules or golf or bridge. I'm not excited by art classes, museums or travel - which I would not only have to do alone, but realistically I'm not well enough for anyway. Don't begin to ask about insurance.
I love to eat, and going out to lunch is the way I get out every day if there's not already something in the calendar. I have a friend I go on "meat dates" with - he teaches me about the best burger places in and around London (FYI, my current favourite is Honest Burger, Spitalfields - the freshest, tastiest beef I've ever had) and I enjoy trying the new cupcake places as they pop up around London (best recommendation right now is Crumbs & Doilies off Carnaby Street). But food isn't a hobby - it's a pastime at best. Having worked as a secretary/office administration/personal assistant for so many years, I needed a project to get my teeth into - something big and that I could fall in love with.
Out couch shopping with my dad at the end of May, I impulsively bought myself a full colour, high quality photo scanner & printer. Both are something I missed having access to without a working environment and as my dad had recently retired his own business at home, I knew he was likely to be getting rid of his black&white ones in due course. I've enjoyed being able to treat myself like this since the payout - some have been good purchases, some not not much. If you know anyone who would like an Xbox360 for example - well I used it once in the day it arrived.
My dad and I had started on some ancestry work a few years back, wanting to record and research and learn - and we got pretty far back with some of the lines. I loved it when we'd worked on it before and decided that I would start scanning family photos. I'd recently been using Flickr (like blogger, it's Google based and therefore I have the most faith that it will be around a good long time) to upload my own photos and store in a safer place that just Facebook or Instagram. I'd heard a horror story recently of a woman who's family lost all of her personal photos uploaded to Facebook after she passed away; despite having the account password. Facebook bigshots decided to close the account after the updates made it clear the user was not the named person; and deleted all content.
I didn't want this for my family, so I made a 'communal' Flickr account that others have the password to, and began recording my life. I love the options of viewing photos in date order (although annotation is mind-numbing at times), and also having them in different folders depending on the content. I add to it anything I think worth keeping and now - well now it's grown into my whole life and long before it - and it's only going to get bigger the more I work on it.
Current photo total is 2124 and of those, 607 are 'older family photos' - mostly pre-2000 and all of which I've had to manually scan, crop and if not already on the back (sometimes on the front), find a date for. I love every picture and every moment. My dad and I have agreed to have a 'family docs' folder as well, which is going to serve to hold birth and death certificates that we can find, as well as lovely other things like dancing certificates won by my grandparents for ballroom. Also discovered was a letter from my grandfather to my grandmother - but that's another story.
The best thing about all this is the randomness of what effects me. I've scanned hundreds and downloaded everything I had elsewhere and off my hard drive to ensure it's all together and shed no tears (much to friends' surprise). I'm about to start on two large piles from my teens, maybe that will do it.
But this is what I love the most - finding a shopping list on the back of a photo from about 1984 - the picture my sister, brother and grandmother - and the writing likely to be the grandmother's as well. She had alzheimers for most of my life and I barely remember her as anything but that - so this - well this feels special and makes her very real again.
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