The Worrywarts
My lifelong friend packed her bags and headed back to South Africa for a visit yesterday. My immediate reaction to the news that she was going was how lucky she was to be going home for a visit so soon after moving to the end of the world. The reality is she has dipped into their savings and gone without her family for the express purpose of visiting her ailing father. He had a rather bad reaction to a hip operation and as he has to undergo more major surgery she has headed home to spend time with him, just in case.
The Mauritian has just recovered from an anxious few month after hearing that my grumpy father-in-law was involved in a rather serious motor bike accident. It seems that there were a lot of complications brought on by the accident and he was in and out of hospital since January. The Mauritian is by nature a worrywart and in these past months he has almost driven both of us into insanity. We had to make an arrangement to pay off our large phone bill because the poor Mauritian couldn’t stand not knowing what was going on and was calling home almost every day.
I am so grateful for the fact that though aged, I have healthy parents.
The trouble with living so far away from ones family is that the information one receives about a sick loved one is just never enough information. Questions you want answers to just cannot be answered and the poor people at home just never get back to you quick enough. The trouble with living so far away from ones family is the feeling of complete helplessness, add to that a ten hour time difference and you really do have enough reason to worry yourself insane. The reality is that if you were at home the self same information that is not enough from a distance is more information than one would normally ask for, you can get the answers to all your questions but you don’t think to ask them and you are, in most cases, pretty helpless in a situation anyway the distance really doesn’t change that. The trouble with living at the end of the world is you know your family at home is not telling you everything because they “don’t want to worry you,” the truth of the matter is that were you still at home you wouldn’t want to know everything anyway. It’s all so contradictory, the family at home is thinking: “They are so far away and there is nothing they can do so let’s not worry them.” and those at the end of the world are thinking: “Nobody ever tells me anything, I have to nag or throw a tantrum just to get some information. They just don’t know what it’s like being so far away and not knowing!” Okay, so maybe not in so many words, but you get my drift, I’m sure. Reverse the situation and those of us who have chosen to live at the end of the world will do the same to those at home, the difference being that we will justify it by saying that because we chose to change our home we need to cope without worrying the family at home.
Can you tell I’ve been thinking this over for a while?
I know that whatever goes on at home, when there is a need for me to know something someone in my family will let me know and give me as much information as they can. I also know that if they think I should try to go home, whatever the reason, I will not have to ask. When it comes to being kept informed about the important goings on in my family I am very secure in the knowledge that I will be kept up to date and well informed. No need for me to worry, right? Wrong!
I worry sometimes about silly things that just might happen, the kinds of things that, were I still living at home, I would dismiss as the mindless wonderings of a worrywart. There are a thousand questions about mundane everyday things I want to ask my mum, but I don’t because, well they are silly and mundane and don’t need to be asked. The Mauritian clearly disagrees with me on this point and will ask his family anything, no matter how daft the question may seem to me. His logic is he needs to know if he should worry, while I think its nuts to look for a reason to worry. I would rather use that energy on a rambling blog about life at the end of the world then waste it on worrying.
That’s what I say, but the moment I notice that the little “SKYPE” icon, that tells me my dad has switched on his computer, is not green when it should be, I begin to wonder if there is something wrong. I do believe I am turning into a worrywart and that scares me.
So to sort this conflict out in my head I have resolved that at any given time if there is any cause for concern about someone back home or at the end of the world, I will only ask for the information I would ask for if I was at home and I will tell those back home as much as I would tell them if I was there and not here. Thus insuring, in my rather long winded way, that I will receive and give more information then is actually required and I won’t feel like a worrywart anymore.
The Mauritian has just recovered from an anxious few month after hearing that my grumpy father-in-law was involved in a rather serious motor bike accident. It seems that there were a lot of complications brought on by the accident and he was in and out of hospital since January. The Mauritian is by nature a worrywart and in these past months he has almost driven both of us into insanity. We had to make an arrangement to pay off our large phone bill because the poor Mauritian couldn’t stand not knowing what was going on and was calling home almost every day.
I am so grateful for the fact that though aged, I have healthy parents.
The trouble with living so far away from ones family is that the information one receives about a sick loved one is just never enough information. Questions you want answers to just cannot be answered and the poor people at home just never get back to you quick enough. The trouble with living so far away from ones family is the feeling of complete helplessness, add to that a ten hour time difference and you really do have enough reason to worry yourself insane. The reality is that if you were at home the self same information that is not enough from a distance is more information than one would normally ask for, you can get the answers to all your questions but you don’t think to ask them and you are, in most cases, pretty helpless in a situation anyway the distance really doesn’t change that. The trouble with living at the end of the world is you know your family at home is not telling you everything because they “don’t want to worry you,” the truth of the matter is that were you still at home you wouldn’t want to know everything anyway. It’s all so contradictory, the family at home is thinking: “They are so far away and there is nothing they can do so let’s not worry them.” and those at the end of the world are thinking: “Nobody ever tells me anything, I have to nag or throw a tantrum just to get some information. They just don’t know what it’s like being so far away and not knowing!” Okay, so maybe not in so many words, but you get my drift, I’m sure. Reverse the situation and those of us who have chosen to live at the end of the world will do the same to those at home, the difference being that we will justify it by saying that because we chose to change our home we need to cope without worrying the family at home.
Can you tell I’ve been thinking this over for a while?
I know that whatever goes on at home, when there is a need for me to know something someone in my family will let me know and give me as much information as they can. I also know that if they think I should try to go home, whatever the reason, I will not have to ask. When it comes to being kept informed about the important goings on in my family I am very secure in the knowledge that I will be kept up to date and well informed. No need for me to worry, right? Wrong!
I worry sometimes about silly things that just might happen, the kinds of things that, were I still living at home, I would dismiss as the mindless wonderings of a worrywart. There are a thousand questions about mundane everyday things I want to ask my mum, but I don’t because, well they are silly and mundane and don’t need to be asked. The Mauritian clearly disagrees with me on this point and will ask his family anything, no matter how daft the question may seem to me. His logic is he needs to know if he should worry, while I think its nuts to look for a reason to worry. I would rather use that energy on a rambling blog about life at the end of the world then waste it on worrying.
That’s what I say, but the moment I notice that the little “SKYPE” icon, that tells me my dad has switched on his computer, is not green when it should be, I begin to wonder if there is something wrong. I do believe I am turning into a worrywart and that scares me.
So to sort this conflict out in my head I have resolved that at any given time if there is any cause for concern about someone back home or at the end of the world, I will only ask for the information I would ask for if I was at home and I will tell those back home as much as I would tell them if I was there and not here. Thus insuring, in my rather long winded way, that I will receive and give more information then is actually required and I won’t feel like a worrywart anymore.
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