Thursday 20th October
The days fall away and the night never ends. In this desert of pain I started to plan my suicide – well, sort of – a mini-suicide. The full Monty cannot be an option; I have three children, young adults now, who I know love me. I could not have them carry that around for the rest of their life or, for that matter, see their father as I am now so I have to try and recover or die more honourably in trying. It should be a close-run thing. A mini- suicide – give up my home, my animals, my possessions and get the Hell out of here and dive headlong into the most uncertain future, quite possibly on the streets of London and death by damp.
There is much in common with the real thing, a failure to comprehend the end of such a strong hope, the abandonment of life and in this case a reckless intent that could so easily produce the same result and a similar I told her I would do it element.
Oh, yes – there’s a woman; there always is for a man like me. Never did a man fall in love so inadvisably and that is saying something. I am not going to try and describe or explain her – not yet anyway – or how a girl who is not the prettiest, not the most glamorous I have known, someone I know to be duplicitous, vituperative and mendacious, has brought me to this. As I typed I paused a few words ago and my left hand shook, a fine, fast little tremor that made the rest bar on this cheap keyboard rattle. Oh, yes – there’s a woman.
A day of trials and tribulations. So awake previous night, feeling quite positive making plans to get away however unlikely and pitfall strewn. Wasn’t going to sleep so I gave in to a pill at one in the morning. Woke late by my standards – 7am, amytriptolene head, but came round, felt OK and exercised for first time in about ten days. There is not the time to take dog out before scheduled call from DWP. It didn’t come, of course, or the second promised for the next hour at 10.30am. Give up, guilty about the dog. Disconsolate – hangdog I can’t resist calling it..
Careful to miss the pub at the top of the hill when I take out the bounding Labrador. I call it Fate for that waits for me there.
Two and a half years ago if I had not wandered in to listen to the music and met a gangster turned Motown despatcher called Lennie – everything may have been so much different – I could be happy now maybe. My dad’s oft-repeated maxim comes back to me - if my aunt had balls she would be my uncle.
Scrubland site where a working man’s club once stood – brick and concrete strewn – three mobile phones stolen in two months. The last pick pocketed just here when less than a week old. This is not a town for a good guy to get drunk in. You have to be nasty to drink successfully here.
The heart, the only muscle that contracts without stimulation; the parasympathetic Vagus nerve slows it to a rate consonant with situation and feelings like a central heating pump attached by a wire to a thermostat. Up and down as things go hot and cold, right and wrong, triumphant or beaten, content or frightened. All through culture, every century, every race has thought of the heart as repository for our emotions and as you feel the pain seemingly radiate away from where you think it lies, it is easy to see why. When particularly bad I feel as though a shotgun as blown a hole clean through my chest. Coruscating chains resonate in their wheals.
Then I traverse the wooded laneway where I came face to face with the man I wanted least to see in the World, the dog bounding ahead. Fate waits for me there all right. Then it all floods back, the positivism washed away and I’m back to running imaginary conversations. Trying to stop with admonitions Stop! She’s not here! or Something else! Try telling yourself not to think of something and see what you think about next.
Home to discover we have lost the lead. 99p but you have to go into town to replace it. Walk around the other way – four and a half hours of thinking about what I have told myself not to think about. Never found the lead.
A friend who often feels s I do, Michelle, half my age, (I’m older than her father!) has leant me a book on dialectical behaviour therapy. I am not one for self-help tomes generally – always consider myself too clever, but some of this has made some sense. There is a meditation technique that works quite well for me. You imagine a white light warming the top of your head and then let it slide down your body. I remember my anatomy from those years ago when I was going to be a useful member of society, the blood flow to the scalp. The brain like some residing alien in a robot to get around, the Circle of Willis arteries, cranial nerves, the jaw and its muscles, our old friend the Vagus, the wanderer, insinuating into the chest cavity, the muscles attached to shoulder bones, lungs full and empty, body wall strap muscles, alimentary organs all folded and in my case usually empty, liver fighting its chemical war against cheap, strong cider, kidneys, muscles in still strong limbs, blood vessels, I know every lie and deviation after all these years. Sleep! Sleep – please God from a man who does not believe in God; one who lights a candle most nights for a woman who will not see its light. Chase thoughts away with a sharp cry of nothing! – the dog disappointed each time I go up stairs. Should I give him away to the landlord of the pub on the other side of the hedge today? It is not fair to an animal, to bring him into such an unhappy house, one mourning the loss of its owner’s heart, to give him confinement with the paily loitering knight.
It is evening now, a Thursday. They’ll be in one of the music pubs, dancing together, she moves for him while he looks on appreciatively, her face close to his as she talks animatedly under the latest dance tunes. She told me there was nothing in it, he’s married – Does he know that? Aren’t we all? I see how he looks at her as she turns – I know the look, I’ve had it for three fucking years. Go down to the bathroom and there is the dog lead beside the WC. Nothing! Nothing! Nothing! – Nothing!...... ad infinitum.
4am 27th October 2011
It’s 4 in the morning, resisting an obvious quote from Leonard Cohen or Paul Simon – it is not the end of December and I am not crapped out and yawning. Her birthday has passed, I saw it through with lots of the cheap, strong cider – still drinking it now. I want to say I miss her but can you miss something you never had? Seems so.
Been playing my Fender Teleaccoustic but can hardly seem to lift a tune from under these old fingers. Of course every song I have written in the last two years is er… out of bounds at the moment. I am supposed to be recording a demo expected by some v well known acts but I would have to stay here to do that so it probably won’t happen. One more occurrence of ruining your life for love of someone who does not love you.
I gave the dog away – I know the young couple who have the pub will give him a very good life and he will have people around him all day but we miss each other at this time at least. He tries to follow me home if he sees me. Bless him. I can’t be happy but he can and I have to give him that chance.
I sent only a card – a present would be over-bearing. The card probably was in her view. I said, I wish you every success and happiness in the year ahead and down all the days. If ever you need me or my help I am on the end of a phone line for you wherever I am – always.
Was it too much? Probably. What can you do? Who wants a heart-broken man? Who wants a self-made fool? Who?
