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Making Allowances
Chapter 4, Part 1
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So,
there we were, trying to pick up the pieces. This was just the beginning of a
traumatic, forgettable, but nevertheless important period, as subsequent events
would prove. We made up a bed at the end of the
front room, as Dad was having severe difficulty in walking and would have found
the stairs impossible to climb. It was indeed fortunate that the bathroom and
loo were downstairs, and that Mum and Grandad were always there to help out if
he needed them. It was clear that every basic
movement was causing him pain early on. Mum slept downstairs on the sofa for
several months so that she could turn him. He was basically a prisoner on the
ground floor. He was quick to discard the walking frame, but found walking with
sticks painful and extremely tiring. Nevertheless, he would try to get outside
for a little while every day, as a ritual, to breathe the country air, and
remember that he was still alive. He had suffered severe concussion,
and we had been told to expect variations in his behaviour and his mental
well-being. So this was to prove, although in the early days of him being home,
he was so tired and pumped full of drugs that it would have been very difficult
for us to detect whether any change was due to tiredness, or his medication. He did, all the same, seem to realise
just how close he had come to being killed. Mum would remark that, when he awoke
early in the morning, and felt the daylight breaking through, he would always
say quietly. “Thank you, God. Thank you for
another day.” He was not a churchgoer, but he had
his own sense of faith, which I am sure provided him with the comfort
and strength he needed in the days that followed. He would certainly need it. If
things were bad, then they were just about to get a whole lot worse. For the
previous eighteen months, Dad had been working as a sales rep for a chemical
company that specialised in animal health/medicine type
products. Within a few weeks of the accident, the company was taken over
by a bigger rival. As part of the new company’s rationalisation plans, Dad was
made redundant. Even then, the heartache was not
over. Dad learned that the Insurance Policy he had taken out to cover this type
of eventuality, did not cover him. The policy had been designed for
equestrianism and not horseracing, it was the word “racing” that made a
subtle yet crucial difference. There would be no pay-out. So, he was crippled. And now we were
broke. was tough. We were all tired, cramped
and under pressure, with a sick person to care for. My mates were busy doing things
that youths did, I was busy trying to survive. One evening I caught Mum in tears and
demanded that she told me what was wrong. She had just managed to scrape
together enough money to but my youngest sister a second hand bike, when an
unexpected bill arrived which would take all that spare cash and a further
twenty quid. It was about as much as she could take. That night, I lay in bed cursing our bad luck. I hated the Racing Game, for all the misery it had brought us. At the time, in the height of my anger, I was even annoyed with Dad for following it so blindly to his virtual self-destruction. We had few visitors at that time, a
few loyal friends dropped in now and then, but mostly we were left to our
own devices. Perhaps people just felt awkward about the arrangement, I don’t
know, but I did it a little ironic how a man like Dad, with so many
acquaintances and associates, had so few friends. I was growing up myself, and
struggling with my own identity, I started to form questions about things that
needed answers, but I had no-one to turn to. There are certain things that can
be talked about with mates, but the more personal and profound matters need a
father figure. Most days, mine would sit, almost
catatonic in his chair, staring at a book or the TV, slowly disappearing into his shell. I
couldn’t bring myself to heap my emotional Paradoxically, with the passing of
time, as his physical health began to show signs of improving, socially, and in
terms of communications, he was going the other way. His bruising and lacerations
eventually faded, his posture began to improve, his gait anyone had bought him for a long
time. From a mental point of view, the
picture was very different. It wouldn’t be fair to say that he was
deteriorating, but his behaviour, in general, was becoming more erratic and
difficult. He would have blackouts, which frightened him. He had become very
forgetful and at times irrational, yet more and more stubborn and argumentative.
I wondered if he was having trouble
coming to terms not so much with what happened, as what he was left with.
Suddenly, there were no cast-iron certainties any more, not even his own
well-being. It was like your first cautious, wobbly yards when learning to ride
a bicycle, never being certain how far you were going to get, and ever-mindful
of possible disaster. Who wouldn’t be irritable in those circumstances? He would often remark that one day,
he would recover sufficiently to renew his licence and have one more ride. At
first, I would remonstrate with him, but it would invariably end in a vitriolic
argument and eventually I thought better of it than to confront him. If that’s
what kept him going, let him believe it. There were times when I would wonder
if it was worth trying to communicate with him at all. It was a bit like Russian
Roulette. It was completely impossible to detect Nobody can deny that Dad was very
badly shaken up, and probably suffered some neurological damage, as a result of
his accident. I am sure, nevertheless, that much of his subsequent anger was
borne out of frustration, in going from a very active life, to one in which the
simplest of tasks now required so much effort. He so loved his sport, that he
must seriously have wondered if he would ever play any type of sport again. I
too was to learn how that felt, and I struggled in a very similar way. In many
ways, this is the cornerstone of the tale I have to tell. As the months slowly passed, Dad
progressed physically. He was now able to drive, which certainly was a turning
point. Although he made few trips out, at least he knew now that he could do so.
Things must have been rather better than we thought, because Mum found herself
expecting another baby! In a wild “Russian Roulette “ gamble, I said that I was surprised
that Dad stayed on long enough………….. Fortunately, this turned out to be a
better day, and he laughed too. Even in these dark times, there were
flashes of sunnier horizons. I took nine “O” Levels and passed them, Dad was
delighted. He was very keen for me to stay on into the Sixth Form and sit
“A” Levels. He wanted me to go to University. I was happy to sign up for two
more years at school. Those two years were similarly
turbulent for Dad, for me, and the family. He
continued to recover, although he was
still in much discomfort. The blackouts grew less frequent, and
his general demeanour became much calmer, but just when you thought you had
seen the last of his big explosions, something would happen, and off would come
the lid, again.
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If you would like to contact Richie, please email him at: richie@baylands.fsnet.co.uk
© Copyright Richie Phillips. No unauthorised reproduction allowed. |
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