Flipping through the pages

It is a cold dank day with the sky the colour of a soiled mop. But when the doorbell rings, I am ready. Ready with all my bags. Some bags on the floor and some bags around my eyes. I open the door to the driver.

“Give me five minutes,” I say to the driver, handing her the bags one by one.

As I watch her carry the bags out, I take one last look around the house. The house that housed twenty-five years of my life. My life’s best moments and worst.

I walk to the balcony where I once had a small garden. A garden of low-maintenance plants – ZZs, Snake, Spider. I never had the time or patience to grow flowers. “You have a black thumb, Mom,” my kids would tease me. I realize I have a stupid smile on my face. Memories do this to us; make us relive the past. I sigh to myself as I close the balcony door and come back into the living area.

I go to what was once the kids’ bedroom. There is still a picture of all of us pasted on the wall. It was taken at the scary house ride in an amusement park; there is horror written all over our faces. I try to remove the picture, but it does not let go. Maybe the house still wants to hold on to us! So be it.

I come out of the room, closing the door behind me. Those twenty-five years flash before my eyes just like a YouTube video playing at 4X speed. Those newly married days of romance, the overflow of love for the kids, that struggle of being a working mother, the agony after those spousal fights, the pangs of loneliness with kids flying the nest, and the overwhelming feeling of worthlessness on his leaving.

“Are you ready, Ma’am?” asks the driver.

“Yes,” I say to her. “Let’s go.”

I follow her to the car. As I climb in, I look up to the sky. It is a cold dank day with the sky the colour of a soiled mop.

 “It is going to clear soon,” I tell myself. The day will soon be bright and the sky will be a beautiful concoction of blue and yellow and orange and white. That stupid smile comes back, as we drive towards my dreams.