Looking with a naked eye

 Do we ever really see everything? Some things are too small to be seen with the naked eye. Most are too small for my naked eye. Thank goodness for contact lenses.

On the sixth anniversary of my mum's death, after a week of rollercoaster emotions (that I will vehemently deny because 'Really? You should be over this by now.') the sky filled with colours and it was a Eurovision that caused everyone to be united by song. 

One of my grief quirks is that I look to the sky for messages on anniversaries. It makes absolutely no sense and I chastise myself over this thought.

'What on earth are you thinking? Why are you even looking?'

'Well', you never know, do you?'

'You do. You don't believe in an afterlife.'

'I know... but... there was that heart shaped cloud....and the polo.'

'A polo? That's a stretch. Why would you interpret a cloud with a hole in the middle as a polo?'

'Well, Mum loved mints. If she was going to send a message it could be a polo.'

'Look, even if there was an afterlife what makes you think your parents are suddenly wielding such enormous power that they can move clouds?'

'Now you put it like that.'

And then I come back to my senses. Except that on the day before the 6th anniversary I had reached a hyper-state that out performed even the twitchiest of kids I teach and so when I went to bed I crashed and actually slept. In the morning of the anniversary I woke to see that Mum had filled the sky with pinks, purples and greens and I had missed it.

'How could you?' I berated myself, 'She went to all that trouble and you just slept. You don't normally sleep, why did you choose that night?'

'I know. I can't believe it. Northern Lights too and those pictures on Facebook look amazing.'

I wondered about Mum's choice of sky message. They had been to stay at the Ice Hotel (blooming freezing) and been on a snowmobile (I'm never letting your dad drive that fast again) and been very disappointed with the half-hearted Northern Lights display. She would watch the news of Northern Lights being seen in Scotland or off the North Yorkshire coast and complain that she'd been 'all that way and they're so much better in the UK.' They were so disappointing she hadn't even bothered to take photos.  

Anniversary days are never as bad as you think they'll be. The sun shined and I was left alone to read, walk, clean the house and collect cheese for the Eurovision cheese-fest. 

The Eurovision song contest is may favourite political event of the year. If you look carefully, even with a naked eye, you can predict future wars. Countries that are likely to come to blows in the future make fun of each other, or vote for the other, despite it being the worst song in the world and occasionally someone has a punch-up and gets banned. This year’s Eurovision was “United in Song” only if you looked with the naked eye. Any kind of visual aid would have highlighted the divisions. The Irish ballet dancing witch had a runic message tattooed on her face (Ceasefire in the rehearsals), boos were blended out in the audio as Israel performed (although they got loads of public votes). Europapa wasn’t able to perform because of an “incident”.  Ukraine sent a message of peace to Russia and this year they didn’t retaliate with bombing the singer's home city despite the fact they weren't allowed to perform as the EBC aren't on their side in their war. Thank goodness Palestine aren't allowed to compete as they aren't in Europe, unlike Israel, so they were saved from having to pick a side. I might need better glasses to understand all of this, however, mine, do allow me to see just how wonderful it is to have the country known for peace being the runaway winner. 

During the boring bit my son rang from the station and enquired, politely about the possibilty of a lift. It was the quiet time I needed after the excitement. Driving back into Maldon the sky looked lighter towards the estuary.

'Oh, look, it's lighter over there. Maybe there'll be more Northern Lights and I won't have missed them,' I said to my son hopefully.

'That could be them,' he said, 'You do know that you can barely see them with the naked eye? You need a camera to pick up the wavelengths.' (This was a much more detailed and scientific reply, which I am sparing you in case your head also explodes.) 

I laughed.

So, Mum went all the way to Norway to see the Northern Lights, saw them and was so unimpressed she didn't even take a photo and if she had it could have looked like Facebook did this morning? Well, that's quite a sixth anniversary message.

Not Northern Lights