'life events'

How long should condolence cards be left displayed for? On the 6^th of January the pavements are littered with Christmas trees. So for Christmas, ten days is considered to be a suitable recovery period. Obviously, a death is (usually) more traumatic than the festive season. Although in my AS level Psychology course I distinctly remember both being termed ‘life events’, a clinical and bloodless term for heartache, catastrophe and acute stress. A life event such as Christmas was given a score of 12, whilst ‘death of relative’ was given 63. Moving house was surprisingly high, I seem to remember, about 40. Anyway, the point was that if you have more than 150 points in a given year, you are more likely to suffer a breakdown, or depression, or similar. I was enthralled by this way of quantifying the ghastliness of one’s life. (By the way, ‘Change in Church Activities’ was given 19)

I’m well aware that the opening question is about as stupid (and bloodless sounding) as trying to assign a score to the ‘event’ that is ‘death of relative’, but I’m still intrigued. I noticed a few days ago that my mother had quietly removed the twenty odd cards we had displayed on the shelves in the living room. I noticed their disappearance immediately, because I would look at them every morning, arranging them in my head from the most vile (three pink butterflies, and a purple bow) to my favourite (a Rossetti detail of hands entwined), with special note made of the comedy ones (anything using a euphemism for ‘death’, anything religious, anything so eye-bleedingly hideous as to make one glad that the dead in question is indeed dead, so as not to be subject to this horror). But anyway, now they’ve gone.

When I would see the discarded Christmas trees in the gutter on my way to school – or this year, for the first time, on my way to work – it was always a grim reminder that the holiday, with all its manufactured nauseating cheer, was firmly over. It was the beginning of January, fucking freezing, whipped by wind, grey and flat skies, work to do, the Christmas tree star packed away in the attic, and that is that.

And so the cards have been packed away, I’m never going to ask her where, I don’t look at them anymore over breakfast, and that is not that.

(On a brighter note, I am well within healthy levels of ‘life events’ so far this year. Recent calculation show that I’ve got at least another 40 points before I hit 150, where the depression and breakdown kicks in… Although a Change in Personal Habits (20) combined with Outstanding Personal Achievement (28) could quickly change all that. I’ll work hard at keeping them both at bay.)