Grief and song lyrics

... plus a spooky moment in a hospital gown...

I can remember the mustard yellow. How the walls, floor, even ceiling seemed to be awash with the mucky colour. How I was sitting, in a thin, paper hospital gown, wondering if anyone was ever coming for me. How afraid I was.

I was in the bowels of Inverness hospital, my legs hanging awkwardly from the wheelchair I’d been placed in. The pain I had been experiencing, so sharp and consuming it was as if I had existed within it, had dulled to a threatening, low twinge. I wanted to pull down my mask: it was damp from where I’d been biting it and there was no one around. But I was scared that, any minute, someone would appear to whisk me back to my bed. That I’d be told off.

The night before, around midnight, I’d heard the nurses whisper about me. They’d been saying how selfish I was to be here, in a Scottish hospital, from London (the word London dripping with germs) during a pandemic. One came to my defence, pointed out that the borders had opened, that I was allowed to travel, that I was visiting family. “Still,” one said. “Still, it’s about personal choice isn’t it? I wouldn’t have come.”

Perhaps this entire conversation didn’t happen. It could well have been morphine-induced paranoia, a night terror etched from my own brain, during a time when we all lived in a frenzied confusion of what behaviour was right, and what was wrong.

I remember I felt very alone. No one was allowed to visit me and I’d decided that the staff had concluded that I was immoral, and infectious. I felt immoral and infectious. There was very little that could have pulled me out of my woe-is-me state.

And then, the small plug in radio behind me, suddenly, switched half-way through a song to another one…

“You’ve got the love, I need to see me through.”

With it, I was back in that emptying night-club. Approaching 5am, a hand-written letter clutched in my hand and being poked over the DJ booth, until it was under his nose. It was New Year’s Eve, Hogmanay, and I had a glitter encrusted eye patch on my face and a double sided note begging the DJ to play You’ve Got The Love, the Florence and The Machine version, because…

Sooner or later in life, the things you love you lose, but you’ve got the love I need to see me through.

I knew this to be true, I explained, in my wavy scrawl. I was surrounded - that night - by the seven people who had seen me through. My best friends, hugging me, dancing, novelty eyelashes sticking to their cheeks.

My mum loved Hogmanay. Each year she’d print out the lyrics to it, hand them out on Calton Hill, just before the bells, to ensure that everyone got them right.

That night when we sang Auld Lang Syne my best friend squeezed my hand. She knew who I was thinking of, how I was feeling in that moment, her simple movement let me know that she was here. She did it again this year. She’s done it every year since I lost mum.

She’s always here. They’re always here. Their love, along with that of my family and the other loves I’ve collected along the way, got me through that time.

The same song juddering out, in that lonely corridor, was surely a sign from somewhere that I’d be alright. And I was. I am. The next day I was discharged from hospital, I eventually got the surgery I needed to free me from pain. I had, I have, so much strength given to me by the people around me. That song, and that lyric, will always remind me of that.

Here are a few other lyrics that, I think, speak to my grief, or have done in the past. What song lyrics speak to yours? Let me know in the comments…

Am I sweating… Or are these tears on my face? Should I be hungry? I can't remember the last time that I ate. Call someone, I need a friend to talk me down. But one foot wrong and I'm gonna fall… P!nk, One Foot Wrong

This was how I felt hiding my grief from everyone. By day, I’d be in my room, sleeping, ignoring the mouldy bowls of uneaten noodles gathering around me, in a fit of sadness that I blamed on boys and hangovers. By night, I’d have covered myself in a cloud of Charlie Red, pulled a smile onto my face and was laughing, joking and pretending everything was fine. I felt as though, any minute, my facade would slip and I’d be consumed by grief… That once I fell there would be no way out for me. I was hiding, yes from others around me, but also from myself.

Anyway, turns out the song is about a bad acid trip! But hey, I felt very understood by it at the time. (I also once got to tell P!nk about the time I saw her, at a festival on my own, and how I am convinced my mum’s spirit stood beside me during her set. Or at least I tried. I was splutter crying so much. She was so kind to me.)

And it's you when I look in the mirror. And it's you when I don't pick up the phone
Sometimes you can't make it on your own… Don't leave me here alone… U2, Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own

I went through a short period, just before mum died, where I couldn’t visit her in the hospice. I don’t like to talk about it, it’s a memory I’ve pushed deep down within me. But I listened to this song, which I think must have been out around the time, on repeat. I was so fucking afraid of the day she would eventually die, her face was everywhere I looked. Except she wasn’t in front of me, except I wasn’t holding her hand. I could have. But I was too frozen with fear.

And the only solution was to stand and fight. And my body was bruised and I was set alight. Florence + The Machine, Only If For A Night

If you can’t hold on, hold on. The Killers, All These Things That I’ve Done

So, turns out that The Killers lyrics are ‘if you can hold on, hold on’ but I always thought it was can’t - and I’ll continue to sing my version (ditto with ‘slam your body down the wine is all around, in Spice Girls Wannabe). Essentially both of these reminded me that - even if you’re going through something that feels literally impossible to live through, and you feel like you can’t hold on… You somehow do. You’re bruised, charred, in physical pain… Yet you’re still there. Somehow. Fighting. How do we do it? I don’t know. We just do.

And I complained the whole way there. The car ride back and up the stairs. I should've asked you questions I should've asked you how to be. Asked you to write it down for me. Should've kept every grocery store receipt. 'Cause every scrap of you would be taken from me. Taylor Swift, Marjorie

How do we truly appreciate the people we love? How can we ensure that, when they’re gone, we don’t regret missing moments, regret not asking the right questions…

This entire song reminds me of my grandma (so much so it inspired this poem). As a teenager there were so many moments, with both her and mum, that I was a heel-dragging brat. I’d resent having to go to the shop for her, or go and see the things she liked on holiday. Of course I regret that now. Certain spoiled words, and actions, creep up and hiss at me on dark days. But how can I use that regret to ensure I don’t make the same mistake again? We’re all so consumed by ourselves… yet how do we stop?

I don't want to feel safe. I don't want to feel free. All I feel is nothing. And right now that's all I can be.

I don't want to be loved. I don't want to be understood. I don't want to be around when the vibes are good. I don't want to feel safe. I don't want to feel free. All I feel is nothing. And right now that's all I can be For Those I Love, The Myth/I Don’t

I came across this album quite recently - and, for me, it encapsulates the raw, all-your-skin-seems-to-have-been-torn-off-but-no-one-has-noticed stage of grief. So much so it can be quite hard to listen to. This lyric, in particular, showed me that it was actually really natural, and normal, to have spent many years in that numbness. Everything I came across was about healing, getting back to normal, and I didn’t want that. I wanted to remain in the nothingness. Eventually, with time, I broke out of it. I don’t feel this way any more, it can come every now and then, but I think that’s OK.

I wish you never had to go. Wish you could meet my wife, wish you could see my life. Willie Burke Sherwood, Killer Mike

I believe this is why we carry our grief with us, why we will never truly ‘heal’ from it. As there are always going to be moments missed. People that they’ll never meet. My husband never met my mum. (I think she’d have loved him.) I didn’t get the chance to meet my husband’s dad. That tears at me, sometimes. For me (and this may not work for others) the only way I can get through this is to sit, and listen, to the small voice inside me that tells me mum is somewhere in the ether, somewhere inside of me.

(for more on that thought, here’s the time I went to see a medium)

Wow! I actually only meant that newsletter to be a short one, as I’ve been so busy with an external project. Let me know what lyrics help you… Perhaps I could make a Spotify playlist…