Streams

Two thirds into our trip to Europe and I find myself in the depths of London's Docklands furiously trying to coherently filter my thoughts so I can put down a record of how the hell everything is going. 

As you can tell from that sentence it is hard to explain how the hell everything is going, and nothing is very coherent. On the one hand we are in one of the world's greatest cities and it seems that its greatness is splendidly apparent to the kids. We've done some royal things, climbed up some stuff, been to the theatre and taken on a lot of tube journeys. They have enjoyed all of that, I think, if taken much of it in their carefree stride. If that sort of thing is the key to a happy holiday, then well, we've ticked all that and then some...and it has made us happy in the doing and the sharing. But on the other hand there is a huge, dark cloud of sadness as Keith sees some of his friends for the last time. Seriously, you could not make the horribleness of this shit up. It is awkward, exhausting and terrifying, but it is real, clear and present. And there seem to be so far never the right words to say or comfort to give. I have no idea how to deal with it all. I have no idea how Keith is dealing with it all. The doing stuff with the kids helps enormously, as it should, but then they go to bed and you just sit in a dazed fog of exhaustion, not quite knowing what to say or even if you did, how to find the energy to say it.

He's holding up physically but it is hard and he has been in a lot of pain.

It is glaringly obvious that there is not enough time to do everything we want to do. You could see it as a bit of a cruel reflection on our lives but I think even if we were here for twice the length of time we would still leave wanting more. Isn't that the right way to leave? Who the hell knows. 

I can tell you one thing though: one may have hits of pure joy embracing the occasionally divine architecture of this city, but the joy that can be felt from the love of people is unparalleled. Un-bloody-paralleled. It's like being at the centre of some sort of multi Ghostbuster-esque proton stream without the danger but all the unpredictability. Be it in person, through emails and messages, Facebook or massive piles of chocolate for my kids, it is the fuel source that keeps me going and gives us spikes of pure happiness. Know I hope I can give something back to each and every one of you. You are all fucking superstars. Oh emotion: how I love your swears.

Signing off for now with a badly composited but obviously overpriced picture of us up the Shard.

Lots of love xxxx