Shades of optimism after a long winter
The last six months have been tough but the days are getting longer and the season is just around the corner
Winter’s in the UK seem to get longer every year. I know they don’t but you’d think after living here for almost twenty years I’d be getting used to them. I’m not, I find them harder and harder. I swear they are getting longer and longer. Perhaps it is my age but my tolerance for the cold, having grown up in much warmer climes, is becoming less and less. If only it were the cold though. It is also the darkness and grey leaden skies that I find oppresive.
Things were not helped this winter when I injured my right knee just before Christmas. I’m still not sure I know what I did to it despite it being explained to me by two different medical practitioners. But either way it was painful (it still is a bit some three months later) and it stopped me running or doing any form of strenous exercise for over two months.
So this became the first winter I have made a proactive decision to escape from for a while. I flew back to Australia for two weeks in Feburary to get some sunshine. I spent time with my mum and sister and generally found the opportunity to relax and start some gentle exercise again. The sunshine was welcome.
Getting on the plane to come back was tough and the first four or five days after I returned I suffered badly from a depressive episode. My partner didn’t really know what to do with me. I didn’t know what to do with myself. Everything in the world felt oppresive and I struggled to see the wood from the trees. Everything was blurred by a mass of fog that wouldn’t lift.
They say time heals and that did apply to the fog. Like I always manage to do eventually, I worked my way out of the fog into a better place. In all honesty, I think as time passed I forgot about the sun, the de-stress and the connection with Adelaide and home started to thin out. It won’t break, it never will, but I started to adjust to life again and looked to make positive changes that.
Cricket training started in early Janauary but due to my knee pain I hadn’t attended. I finally made it following the gentle running I did in Australia. I needed to be back there. It is hard to explain but it gave me some purpose, something else to focus on. Most importanrtly it gave me a glimmer of hope that maybe winter was coming to an end. Getting bat on ball in the nets gave me some confidence again.
But I know, as much as cricket is an important life line to me, it isn’t a year round pursuit and I need to work on other things too. I need to find a way to occupy myself positively in the winter months. I’ve not really managed that after twenty years. A new hobby might bring some extra friends. I had some really close friends who left the city over the last few years and although we remain close I feel like there is a little hole in my life that I have never quite filled. It isn’t quite the same when you don’t see people all the time. And given it takes me so long to make friends, years to build trust, I better get working on that, and fast!
Roll on cricket and sunshine, and I’ll soon forget how depressing the UK can be in winter — until next winter but by then I’ll have other hobbies, working my way towards a wider circle of friends and have some escape plans for the winter, getting back to Australia and the sun is my plan.
