My City Of Ruins - Tears At The Springsteen Shows......

Now there's tears on the pillow
darling where we slept
and you took my heart when you left
without your sweet kiss
my soul is lost, my friend
Now tell me how do I begin again?

My city's in ruins
My city's in ruins

The final verse of the song that reduced me to tears at both of the Springsteen shows I went to with Kyle last week.
It's one of the songs I was referring to when I mentioned about not being able to listen to some of Bruce's songs anymore - but there's not much choice when you're in the middle of a crowd of thousands in a football stadium.
Those were my first Springsteen shows without Carol to come back home to and tell all about it - and they were some of the best I've ever seen.
Just another thing on the list that we used to do together that I'm now having to continue without my soulmate by my side - it's all part of that scary future, a future that has now become my very scary present.

The Bruce shows were part of that mad 2 weeks I had put the plans in place for a few months ago – it seemed like an age away at the time and yet it’s suddenly here.

Kyle and me travelled almost 1300 miles during the week, taking in 5 shows and 3 rounds of golf.

Apart from Bruce we also saw Pearl Jam, and thanks again must go to Gary for the tickets. That show was for Kyle but we had 2 tickets so I went along, without having any idea what to expect as I didn’t know any PJ songs! I must admit it was a very good show – even though my attention was wandering at times (I did a lot of crowd watching) and Kyle really enjoyed it.

In London we saw Robert Cray – the first of the Bluesfest shows I’d booked tickets for. I’ve seen him many times going back to 1987 (supporting Tina Turner at the first concert I ever took Carol to!) but he’s been on Kyle’s wish list for a few years – and as usual he was excellent.

Last but not least we went to see the quite wonderful “Sunshine Boys” at the Savoy Theatre. Danny DeVito and Richard Griffiths are starring in this version of Neil Simon’s play - and it was great to see them on stage together – very funny and highly recommended.

I must report that golf was less successful!! I took Kyle to a couple of the courses that I used to play when we lived in Altrincham. We did enjoy ourselves without challenging the course records anywhere – but we needed water wings for the second round as the weather certainly wasn’t favourable!

Our trip also involved lots of visiting and it was good to catch up with everyone again. We sat on Carol’s bench in Margaret’s front garden – no surprise it had me in tears – and had our regulation curry in Rusholme. I had a brew with Theresa, who’s currently in the middle of decorating and lots of other stuff after moving house, and went to the cemetery to check on how the roses are doing and have a look at Carol’s vase.

It was a hectic week and we finally got home in the early hours of Wednesday morning – ready for a couple of days at work and then I’m off again on Friday for week 2!!        

Thinking about the week we’ve just had I can’t help but wonder about the word “enjoy” – I have enjoyed the week, and a number of other things this year if I’m honest – but it’s different now. I can’t really describe why - and I don’t want to dismiss it purely as guilt. There’s something missing in everything I do, something missing in the way I feel – so I can still “enjoy” things but there’s always an underlying sadness, a nagging at the back of the mind that says “if only”….

So what about work then? Well I have gone back but things have changed! My return to work meeting turned into a “we’ve decided to close the offices” meeting. In fairness it wasn’t unexpected, as we’ve known our contract was coming to an end – but there was uncertainty about what would happen to us. Well the company has decided that closure is the best option so those staff that remain (and there aren’t many of them) are being made redundant at the end of July.

In some ways I’m relieved – I’d written previously about my concerns – as the decision has been made for me and we can draw a line under this chapter of my working life. It doesn’t help me with what comes next but that’s not for thinking about right now. I’m going to take some time (the holidays are booked for August / September anyway) and look at my options later in the year.

I did put Bec in a panic when I showed her a job I fancied on a cruise ship last week – I was only joking but maybe a complete change of direction wouldn’t be such a bad thing!!

So time continues to march on and every day we get up and face it again – I couldn’t tell you how we do it – we just do.