As a teenager in the 80s, my sister embraced the Goth subculture and I tagged along.
Wearing almost exclusively black clothes and dark, heavy eye makeup, we were fixtures at nightclubs that played music by bands like Bauhaus, Siouxsie and the Banshees, and the Cure.
Regulars to these haunts weren’t known for their sunny personalities, and most had a sense of humour that matched their eye makeup. My sister and I fitted right in.
It’s in this context that I find myself thinking about optimism.
I let the heavy makeup and monochrome outfits go as I matured and morphed into a happier, more upbeat version of myself.
In the past decade, though, life threw me (way too enthusiastically, I think) a few curveballs and I’ve had to become more familiar with grief than I ever wanted.
Losing the four people closest to me, two of them in the last two years, has felt like bereavement overload, which manifests either as a surplus of emotion, or none at all.
Either way, it’s a battle to believe in an exciting future again and imagine a life that isn’t defined by loss and grief.
I don’t think anyone would have been surprised if my response to this overload had been to regress and become an adult version of the little goth impersonator I was as a teenager – rarely smiling and preferring brooding introspection over interaction with others.
We humans are resilient creatures, though.
Something in me keeps going, reaching for a future that is somehow better, and one less likely than being lost to sadness.
I’ve learned that grief isn’t a straight road, devoid of the occasional side road leading to happy diversions.
It can look like irritating fellow commuters by laughing loudly on the train with a group of friends (without whom you’re unsure how you survived before) and later being brought to your knees by sorrow in the bathroom at work.
At times, I haven’t been far off from lapsing into my younger, gloomier self. Just this year, I’ve faced mornings when getting out of bed felt insurmountable, a feeling of futility weighing me down.
On one such morning a few months ago, I reached out for help on a WhatsApp group I’d created to keep my husband’s siblings updated when he was ill.
Called “numerous weirdos and me”, I’m certain that at times, this group has been my life support.
On this occasion, all three hopped on to help lift the weight and I was advised to try re-watching Tom Hanks in “Cast Away”.
There are some universal truths about hope and optimism in this movie that completely eluded me the first time around.
Stranded on a remote island after a plane crash, we watch as Chuck, the character played by Hanks, veers from hopeful to pessimistic, inconsolable to optimistic.
His story illustrates the difference between positivity – hoping for something without doing anything to breathe it into life – and optimism – working towards the thing you’re hoping for.
Optimism in the face of grief can involve doing something as inconsequential as getting out of bed every morning, but it can feel revolutionary.
Like Chuck on his remote island, I don’t want to accept despair as my home.
Leaving here isn’t easy and sometimes, I have to call in the cavalry (in the form of family or friends) for help. But like Chuck, I’m optimistic:
“I know what I have to do now: gotta keep breathing, because tomorrow the sun will rise. Who knows what the tide could bring.”