Stings and Things

Few things make me feel tiny and sad and hearing my dad tell me he tried to go to the Transport museum on his own this morning is one of those things. He got on a bus to Georges Square in Glasgow to catch a bus to the museum, but there was a marathon race on in the city centre and he got overwhelmed with the crowds and just headed home. The thought of him being pushed about in crowds and feeling vulnerable makes me feel deeply scared for him.



It makes me sad; because he wanted to go somewhere and at almost 80 years old he didn’t bother asking me and tried to go on his own. He was heading somewhere where there were heaps of families all milling around and he would be that one wee man on his own. Why didn’t I think to ask him? Why did I sleep to midday and not notice his loneliness? I hate feeling like this, this guilt and stupidity when in actual fact he likes going places on his own and feels independent. Having an elderly parent is amazing and also a blessing but don’t get me wrong but I always worry he will die the minute I step on a plane to another country. Paranoid and negative I know, but I also know am not alone with this worry, I have heard other people with elderly parents say the same thing. I just say aloud on here.



Yet I always feel I should be doing more, since my step mum died over two years ago he has been doing well, and he doesn’t want me to feel like I need to look after him.



Still imagine you were at the transport museum and saw a wee man in a beige jacket with a slight limp and a skip hat walking round alone, would you look at him and think ‘that’s a shame he is on his own, where is his family?’ or would think ‘look that wee man does things himself?’ I don’t know but it makes me feel sad that I wasn’t there to help him today.



I was asleep after being up half the night as I got stung with a wasp on the ankle that sneaked into my bed at 3am. All those years of avoiding wasps and screaming through worldwide parkland areas to get away from the dreaded sting and the thing finally got me at my weakest, asleep and tucked up in bed. How did a wasp get under my duvet? Why?



So now am all healed up after my screaming fit in the middle of the night (I am sure the neighbours think am a battered wife) I am going to organise a trip for dad out to the transport museum. In fact, I am signing off this blog and going up to see him now.