Something that you don’t realise at first after your person dies, is how much you miss doing nothing. The quiet moments sitting on the couch with the tv on. Pottering about the house and garden, doing your own thing – but together. Going grocery shopping or buying a small something for your space. Things that you kind of don’t count at the time, but are actually far more important in the big scheme of things that the sparkly exciting things we all post on Facebook or instagram.

It’s exciting going out to new places or away having adventures, and those things absolutely have a place – and I am very much going to enjoy doing more of them. They are the ‘living your life to the fullest’ moments and are magic when they are happening or you have them to look forward to, but it’s the everyday things that I have been missing the most up until now.

This weekend for me – not counting the P!nk concert (which was amazing) was one of those nothing weekends that has been blissful! Watching tv together, napping on the couch, doing some gardening and shopping have given me back something that has been missing in my world since Claytie died. There is something incredibly comforting and soul soothing in the everyday ‘nothing’ stuff that we all take for granted.

It can be really easy to numb yourself by doing everything – I have been doing that with the best of them for the last three and a half years. Saying yes to any and all invitations, and if there are no immediate invitations creating your own events. Staying busy means you can skim over rather than examining in detail the grief things that are hard in your life. It means that you don’t really notice how big the hole is that has been left from not having the day to day stuff.

I am almost as excited about the quiet moments as I am about the big stuff that is happening, and that feels kind of scary at the same time – I have only ever had that with Claytie before now. I feel nervous and excited and very lucky to have it again in my life. I’m really looking forward to more of the ‘nothing’ weekends and the feeling of contentment that they bring.