We'd arranged that I fly back to Kota Kinabalu on my final day, instead of us driving back (the 6 hour trip we'd already done last week). Florence had also arranged that her sister Susan meet me there so I could do some shopping before coming home.
So we headed back into Sandakan first thing in the morning, checking in and then heading off for another local street breakfast. Afterwards they dropped me back at the airport, and I began what was ultimately to become a 24 hour journey to get home.
I don't think I felt sad to be leaving, but I was a huge mixture of emotion about coming home. I was really looking forward to seeing Trevor and Maxine, but I was also feeling apprehensive because of coming back to reality. I did want the holiday to end, but I did. I had really been looking forward to having a break on my own....to not be a mother, and to not be a wife.....and yet that had been the part I had struggled the most with on an emotional level.....
I couldn't just 'switch off'.
Before the trip I had been most concerned my brother and I wouldn't get on and it would be disastrous on that level. It wasn't like that at all. Yes, a few moments of anger and discomfort, but, as I said in the very beginning, we are completely chalk and cheese. Always have been, always will be.
But I know in my heart it meant the world to my brother for me to go and see him....to make the effort.....that he is important enough to me in my life. And he is.
And I would go back and see him again. But I wouldn't go alone, and I still don't see Maxine and Trevor making the long trip, or surviving the heat!
The flight home was very long, with the stopover in Singapore being extended, and smog in London causing us to be re-routed to Manchester for a few hours. Trevor being Trevor had arranged for Maxine to miss school so that she could come and meet me......what a wonderful surprise that was!
I don't think I felt sad to be leaving, but I was a huge mixture of emotion about coming home. I was really looking forward to seeing Trevor and Maxine, but I was also feeling apprehensive because of coming back to reality. I did want the holiday to end, but I did. I had really been looking forward to having a break on my own....to not be a mother, and to not be a wife.....and yet that had been the part I had struggled the most with on an emotional level.....
I couldn't just 'switch off'.
Before the trip I had been most concerned my brother and I wouldn't get on and it would be disastrous on that level. It wasn't like that at all. Yes, a few moments of anger and discomfort, but, as I said in the very beginning, we are completely chalk and cheese. Always have been, always will be.
But I know in my heart it meant the world to my brother for me to go and see him....to make the effort.....that he is important enough to me in my life. And he is.
And I would go back and see him again. But I wouldn't go alone, and I still don't see Maxine and Trevor making the long trip, or surviving the heat!
The flight home was very long, with the stopover in Singapore being extended, and smog in London causing us to be re-routed to Manchester for a few hours. Trevor being Trevor had arranged for Maxine to miss school so that she could come and meet me......what a wonderful surprise that was!
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