On Wednesday my son and I watched the solar eclipse. We actually couldn’t see the sun from our flat, but the trees outside had made a pinhole camera effect on the buildings in front of us. So we saw many shadows of the eclipse on the wall that were shining through the leaves.
It was beautiful to see, and because we weren’t looking directly at the sun (which, apparently, you really shouldn’t anyway) we got to see the environment change and react to it. We saw approximately 5,382 seagulls fly over screaming their heads off. I joked that they probably thought it was end times. They might be just a tad early.
My wood pigeon friends also seemed to go to bed early for the night and didn’t come back when the light returned for their usual pre-bedtime snacks.
Later on, my son went to bed and I stayed up until 4am to watch the Perseid meteor shower. I saw ten of them, which is actually pretty good for living in a city with so much light pollution. The highlight was definitely seeing a really big one, it glowed orange and streaked across the sky slowly. I couldn’t help but say “Wow” out loud despite being completely alone.
All night, I was stood hanging out of my window staring at the meteors in complete silence not wanting to take my eyes off the sky – I didn’t want to miss anything or for my eyes to have to readjust to the darkness because I got bored waiting and scrolled Over-40 TikTok or something. This gave me far too much time to think. The truth of what I’m feeling always seems to launch an assault on me in quiet moments.
Since WeeGee died, any time something notable happens – an eclipse, a meteor shower, the birth of a GIANT penguin baby – even if it still means a lot to me, makes me happy and I am excited for it, there is another feeling running underneath it: “This is something else she has missed”, and I grieve not just not being able to tell her about it, but how these events used to feel to me before she died.
This grief, a monument to the love I had for her, has caused events that used to JUST be SO exciting, awe inspiring, soul rejuvenating to me – “THERE IS SPACE STUFF HAPPENING. I LOVE THE UNIVERSE” – to now also be tinged with emptiness and sadness. It was easier when I was watching the eclipse with my son, because I was focusing on sharing that moment with him, but watching the meteors alone, it just seemed to amplify my grief.
Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star
The Perseid meteors are not shooting stars, they’re space rocks, very pretty space rocks, from Comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle. I’ve never needed anything to be magic, or to grant me wishes to appreciate them or to be overcome with awe. With how many meteor showers I’ve watched in my life if they did grant wishes I’d be writing this from my mansion in a very aesthetic neon lit office using the latest iMac, not in a council flat on an old faulty MacBook.
Although the irony is not lost on me that I was staring at Pleiades the entire time – the Seven Sisters who in one Greek myth, became stars after being overcome with grief.
I understand how stars have become synonymous with grief. That when someone dies they become a star and are watching over you. It is quite beautiful. I have always found comfort in the stars scientifically, the light from stars take YEARS to reach Earth. The Pleiades stars take over 400 years. therefore I am watching the Pleiades how they were over 400 years ago.
Love is quite like that, despite the fact WeeGee died 6 years ago, her light is still visible now in the way she changed me. I am who I am partly because of her influence. I even have concrete evidence of her light – gifts from her all over my flat and cards with her unique handwriting. The fact that she existed so importantly in my life is still very visible in the present, even though she is now stuck in the past.
But watching the meteors, I found myself wishing I believed in the fact that she is now a star, that I could see her every night, and talk to her and she could hear me. But I don’t believe that, because it is not enough. I don’t want a symbolic star version of WeeGee, I want to look directly into the past and see her still alive.
I’ve never wished or needed science to be magic until now. I instead found myself angry that it wasn’t magic. Just let me see her or talk to her one more time, let me send messages into the past and receive a reply. Instead, staring at those beautiful “shooting stars”, my wishes go unanswered, just like my messages to WeeGee. I guess I’m still really struggling with the very specific loneliness of a specific person.
I’ve always felt it’s just as well the Universe or shooting stars don’t grant requests, because people tend to wish for winning a race or being in a mansion with a brand new iMac over ending world suffering. But I just wish I believed in the magic enough to feel that she wasn’t gone, just changed, instead of feeling a big gaping hole in my life where she once was.
The Failed Weekly Update
This was supposed to be a weekly update type post, where I was really happy about seeing the eclipse and meteors and how meaningful they were to me. That is true, I was happy, especially watching the eclipse with my son and it was very meaningful but grief ran through the words I typed in this post the same way it did my thoughts the day I watched them.
I always give myself a hard time for being upset as if I’m deliberately making this exciting event miserable.
“Oh yes, obviously I’m doing this ON PURPOSE. I have deliberately decided to stand under a meteor shower and feel fucking bereaved. Excellent plan, Rhio”.
I tried really hard to hold on to the happiness I felt. The difficult thing is that part of that happiness is now tangled up with grief. Happiness is something I’ve always shared with others, and I didn’t have her to share it with. I guess part of me is angry and grieving that they really don’t feel the same as they used to anymore and I’m taking that anger out on myself.
Back when I had my other blog, I also wrote a post about watching the same meteor shower. It was written 14 years ago, and in that post I just spent 1600 words being ridiculously excited and I even drew a comic of me watching them. That’s the Rhio I remember, the real feelings I remember and I spent the whole night 14 years later watching meteors waiting for the same Rhio to show up.
Here’s a snippet from that old blog post :-
“I watched the meteor shower last night. It was FREAKING AWESOME. I stayed up WAY TOO LATE watching the sky for AGES. I stood silently contemplating my place in the Universe, and felt so comforted by my INSIGNIFICANCE to this GIANT system I cannot even BEGIN to comprehend the scale of.
Space always does this to me. Then I was overwhelmed with this urge to go to space. I don’t think it would even scare me. The only time I’d struggle being off planet, is if my son was on planet. I cant ever imagine being so far away from him. Despite my thoughts of wanting to “BEAM ME UP, I’VE HAD ENOUGH OF THIS PLANET” my son keeps me grounded on Earth”.
That’s the horrible thing with grief, it almost feels as though you’re waiting for the person you lost to come back, but at the same time also you’re waiting for the you before you lost the person to come back.
I know I’m different now, I know WeeGee is gone, but if shooting stars were magic, I would no longer be wishing for a mansion and a brand-new iMac – despite the fact my Touch Bar is broken and is currently having a flashing green rave while I’m trying to write. I’d be wishing to see WeeGee again, and to feel the way I used to feel before she died.
Absurd Universe 