I Swear You Will Be Fine

You always had a strange thing with this. You would never completely finish what’s in the bottle. Not so much food or drinks. But mainly toiletries.

The biggest example was toothpaste. There would easily be at least a week’s worth of toothpaste in the tube, but when it crossed a little more than the half-way mark, you would open a new one. And because you mostly used my bathroom, there would be 2 tubes on the vanity. I would be using the older one, and you, the newer one.

Same thing with shampoo, conditioner, body wash, face cleanser, anti-perspirant and perfumes. As I have (almost) left everything the way it was, there continues to be 2 tubes of Clearasil face cleanser, several tubes of the John Frieda shampoo and conditioner, and of course, the Mahogany Teakwood body wash, that is still so precious to me and still retains the rich smell.

(Digressing slightly on the Mahogany Teakwood- we now have several candles that have the same scent, as well as room spray and hand sanitiser. So your smell constantly wafts through the house.)

It used to annoy me so much. We had this conversation/ argument so many times. “Why can’t you just use it to the end?”. You would usually say, “But it’s almost finished”.

There is now a large Listerine bottle on the counter. It was opened just a couple of days before you passed. I have been using it, but very stringently, frequently alternating it with other bottles of mouthwash. It is now down to its last few mls of the clear purple liquid. Perhaps just one last mouth full. But I can’t bring myself to finish it. It has been like this for the last few weeks. At some point, I will gather the courage to use it up. But until then, it remains on the bathroom vanity, not nearly finished.

I guess this is how life treated you as well- constantly reminding you that you should end it, when there was so much more to live for and so much more to see. Not nearly finished. Not even half finished.

Love you and missing you more each day my darling,

Mum