It only took two months to complete

I had left it undone for two months at least, which is obscene. I put the task off as it seemed non-critical in the face of larger global issues. In fact, I have long felt that tidying cupboards and drawers etc is best left to my close family members after my passing. I’m quite convinced that after writing that line there was a communal hiss of annoyance, “well count me out!” from my kith and kin around the world.

It’s not as if my belongings will attract rich pickings. In my case, anyone willing to tidy and address the chaos of my life will discover mostly loads of unused notebooks along with a hoarder’s collection of pens.  I will happily admit these two are my main weaknesses and despite already having a lifetime supply hidden away, the need for more ever beckons.  But back to my two-month lapse in tackling a much-needed task. I speak not about the drawers and cupboards but something much more personal, my handbag! Ever since I discovered the joy of a small backpack my handbag has literally become invisible. No more bags slipping down my shoulders or filling my hands. Now I experience the world free of this lifelong encumbrance. The blissful freedom is added to because the backpack also serves to straighten my posture. I’m not sure if I am developing a stoop or a dowager’s hump but either way the backpack makes it feel straighter. The only disadvantage is that out of sight is definitely out of mind. 

Today I tackled that forgotten task. I sorted out my bag.  I discovered boarding flight tickets and receipts galore. Official papers I thought I’d lost. An odd collection of passport photos. I think I’d become convinced that another set would produce a less horrendous result.  There were endless scraps of paper, chocolate wrappers, and handwritten notes to myself. I am a writer of to-do lists that are aspirational rather than achievable. For example, tidy my handbag had appeared on one list over four weeks ago. 

So why am I recommending it? Well, as a reflective tool the debris of your handbag exposes the personal state of your life. The chaos and confusion speaks volumes. Even one’s priorities in life become crystal clear. For example, I am obsessive about my phone and carry it everywhere. Not because others might phone me or I might need to phone others but because it records the number of steps I walk.  I now feel duty-bound to carry it with me at all times. Heaven forbid I do even five unrecorded steps! If I forget my phone I almost weep at the lost steps. Yes, you’re right - it is sad! I have even on occasion been caught by family members bounding from one foot to the other while watching TV and holding my phone, in a vain effort to boost my pathetic daily score. When I first downloaded the health tracking app it would send me little congratulatory texts. Like, 'well-done you’ve beaten your average daily step count'. Or tell me excitedly that I had walked the equivalent of London to Paris in the past week. Now, all that has stopped. The app is either sulking, disappointed, or knows me far too well to be willing to comment.

I carry some of my precious little notebooks in my handbag and at least half a dozen much-loved pens. Including one that will write on the moon. I kid you not. I have alcoholic wipes and a portable spray for these pandemic days as I am convinced that these hand dispensers in shopping centres are a source of contamination.  It is what everyone touches after all.  Masks are also a must. Who would’ve thought such things would be commonplace. This world is certainly unpredictable. Here I sit outside a café in Malta drinking coffee and remembering the last time I did this was December of last year. Spending all this time under lockdown really re-calibrated my personal habits. It feels really good to put pen to paper again. I have taken them from a very tidy handbag with a driving license, bus pass, personal cards, and currency all carefully sorted. I look around at others in the café wondering how tidy their bags might be with a righteous air.  I am then forced to admit that little amuses the idiot and what puerile things I pride myself on! 

But do tidy your bag. A dear cousin of mine had her house burgled and the police officer examined the atrocious mess of her bedroom and told her sympathetically,

“I’m so sorry that they have really trashed your place!”

 My cousin was thinking that it was actually tidier than normal, as the thieves had removed some of the contents. She didn’t say that of course! But it does suggest that at least with a tidy bag you can spot when something has gone missing and that is helpful right?  

There is also that peculiar feeling that when you tidy one thing, your bag, a drawer, a shelf that you have turned over a new leaf.   That having completed that one task everything else in your life becomes accessible and achievable in a strange way. As Confucius (551 BC - 479 BC) so eloquently pointed out, 

‘A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step’.

Flying, seats, glasses, courtesy - missing links

On the plane from Malta to Belfast, I ended up on the last seat at the back of the plane. It serves me right for not paying for a specific seat in advance. I was just being mean, didn’t want to spend any more money. In punishment, I was right beside the toilet door and in an ideal position to study humanity queuing as it headed to relieve itself on a long flight. 

But as the plane took off from Malta I was more distracted by the lady at the window seat on my row who kept two glasses over both of her ears during takeoff. These were clenched with great force on either side of the head. I just could not resist asking her husband, who sat between us, why she did this. He told me that on previous flights she always had to suffer from pain in her ears for two days after each flight due to the change in air pressure.  One day a year ago a stewardess told her that holding two glasses over both ears on takeoff and landing would save her from this delayed pain. It did look strange but if it did the job why not?

I was a little concerned when we came in to land in Belfast because although I anticipated the glasses on her ears action, I had not anticipated that as the plane was actually about to touch ground she would take the glasses off and dramatically grab the seat in front with both arms screaming “I don't like this!” again and again. My confusion grew when her husband also grabbed the seat in front of him and screamed “I don’t like this!” repeatedly in strange unison with his wife. Wanting to do my bit to distract them, I asked the husband what he did for a living. It turns out he builds planes. I wondered what he knew about planes that I didn’t!

On arriving in Belfast Airport I was faced with the most annoying aspect of travel in N. Ireland - the transport system is not integrated.  The train lines actually run right to the airport but the trains do not run on this line anymore.  

Instead, the nearest working train station is only a 10/15 minute drive away in Antrim Town.  Perversely, the only bus running to this train station is every hour.  So you face an incredible wait unless you happen to be lucky and the timing is perfect.  You can catch a bus to Belfast fairly regularly from the airport but since my family home is north it goes against the grain to head south in order to go north.  There is consistency in N. Ireland in that the only other airport the George Best Airport is also not connected to the railway system.  This is even more perverse as the train runs to a halt called Sydenham halt hidden out of the way and a good walk from the airport.  I have no idea why in Northern Ireland our transport system is not connected to the rail service. 

It is either to annoy visitors or for the benefit of local taxi drivers who benefit greatly from this odd state of affairs.

Eventually, I managed to catch the early bus to Antrim and find myself on the train heading north. It is quite a new train and the carriages are surprisingly clean. However, the overhead information screen in each carriage is completely wrong. For some reason, it tells you that the forthcoming station is the one that you've just left. Everyone who is local seems to know this. Perhaps it's some kind of strange joke played on those strange to the country.

As I walk on the train looking for a seat I am aware of that UK phenomenon of booking seats. This involves people placing on the empty seat beside them their newspaper, their bag, their coat, their umbrella and any shopping they may have. All of this is a barricade to prevent someone sitting on the empty seat beside them.  

Fortunately, UK citizens are only bluffing. One simple polite request “Is this seat free?” will instantly get the response “Of course please sit down!” and all offending material is removed. I love the fact that their intent is obvious but their instinctive good manners require an instant surrender.  

I'm also shocked by their politeness. The default position is to apologise. Queueing is sacrosanct. One is never meant to push in.  Queueing for the British is a semi-religious practice. Apologising is also so ingrained that if you walk into a British person they will instantly apologise to you.  I find it so lovable and quaint.  It is only when you live abroad that such things make you smile so much.

Nose picking, B.O. and lessons to be learned

Dennis was dead by his own hand and even as I digested the news, the thought bubbled unwanted into my mind that I had never liked him. We met in primary school in the playground and his favourite trick was to run as hard as he could into unexpected victims. Pushing or pulling he seemed not to mind if you cut a knee as you fell over, or bashed the back of your head on the curb. His main satisfaction was in felling others. It was something he just could not stop despite repeated beatings from our headmaster. He was refused to be weaned from his favourite pastime.

In my first day at school, Dennis wet himself. The Headmaster’s wife, Mrs Harris, raged and locked Dennis in the cupboard off her class where the sewing baskets were kept. There Dennis howled for the full two hours until break time while Mrs Harris lectured us all on bladder control. I'm not sure what the rest of the class learnt or Dennis but those two hours taught me that people with grey hair in buns wearing respectable expensive clothes could be vicious beasts deep in their hearts. Every cry of Dennis that soared over her demands, that we sit straight, remain silent and colour in our drawings, left me with a lifeline horror of colouring in. I knew with every crayon stroke that all of our souls were being coloured by the cruelty of that situation in ways that would linger for decades.

Perhaps the soft play dough of young children hearts makes every such event traumatic? Not that Dennis endeared himself to anyone. His spontaneous acts of violence continued unabated in the playground and even grew with each passing year. I complained to my father about his behaviour and he pointed out that Dennis was from a dysfunctional home. I had no idea what that meant but learned that Dennis was being brought up by his grandmother, an eccentric woman whose hair was as wild as her language. 

My father claimed our dog Monty could identify people with unusual tendencies. In their presence Monty would change from a placid ever good-natured Labrador into a barking aggressive hound. He wouldn't bite but barked as if a bear had entered the garden. Dennis's grandmother got by far the worst reaction from Monty and so I reckon dysfunctional was something dogs sensed that we humans had to guess at. It didn't make me dislike Dennis any less.

The headmaster Mr Harris would regularly throw Dennis over his shoulder and carry him out of the class after slapping him hard across the face and knocking him out of the school seat. Beating Dennis seem to be the main educational response to any misdemeanours.

He seemed to search for ways of annoying others. Not just by pushing but by laughing at other’s discomfort. A Kindergarten child was crying in the playground for her mother. She was tiny and vulnerable in this new world absent of parents. I overheard Dennis telling her she’d never see her mother again! That was what school meant. She was so distraught at this news she cried hysterically until she wet herself. At which point, Denis ran to tell Mrs Harris of the incident. Horrified we watched as this tiny girl was frogmarched into Mrs Harris’s dreaded cupboard as punishment. Her cries were far more tragic than Dennis’s as fear rather than humiliation fuelled their volume. I remember I broke four crayons that day pushing the nibs deep into my paper, digging into the white sheets in huge red stripes until they snapped. Why on earth do people think childhood was the happiest days of their lives? Was their childhood so good or what followed so awful in comparison?

In my last few years of primary school Mr and Mrs Harris retired and there were speeches of gratitude to these two monsters. Even the local MP came to sing their praises, mentioning their love of children and dedication to others. When Mr Harris died I remember the same MP weeping real tears copiously while reading a piece from the Bible during the service. I sat in church watching the whole pantomime, thinking what must God think of all this? None of it made any sense to me.  Not the cruelty, nor the adoration of abusers nor the incessant nose picking of Dennis who sat beside me during the service, stinking of BO. The horror of it all was mixed with the smell of pee, the memory of warm crayons between my fingers and bitter injustice burning in my belly.

Towards the end of primary school the girls all grew into giants while the boys remained the same height. At least, that's how it seemed to me. With only brothers at home I knew how to fight and dealt out  instant justice to those I felt due. Any time Dennis played his cruel games with kindergarten kids I’d hammer him. When he pushed others over I punched him hard. It never stopped him behaving badly but it made me feel good. As if at last I could play a role in fixing things. He became my pet project for world betterment. I couldn't control Mr and Mrs Harris but I would try with Dennis.  To his credit he never held any grudges against me. I think he was beaten so badly by adults all round him he viewed our exchanges as just rough child's play. At times, on some strange level, we were close. I watched out for him in the playground and rather than resenting my interference he felt a bond that I was ashamed was one-sided.   

In the secondary school, he attended, my mother taught him Maths.  She used to bring a complete clean uniform, shirt, tie, blazer trousers, socks and pants to school for him each day.  Whenever, he had an accident she would bring him the clean set, from her room, to change into.  Two years into secondary school the wetting stopped but she continued to supply him with new clean clothes when his own were unclean. 

We went our separate ways then, Dennis and I. His grandmother was still a visitor to our home occasionally and treated with good humour. On a family outing, with her in the car, I can remember my father parking outside a huge palace of a house with elegant rhododendrons on either side of the drive. He managed to convince her that his relatives lived inside this massive mansion. She was impressed beyond words and later when he told her he’d only been joking she roared with laughter that was too loud and too long.

Years later, Dennis joined the police. My mother was stopped by the police one night in the Glenshane pass. The officer that peered through the window was Dennis. She said he looked smart and proud in his neat new uniform. He had thanked her that night for her maths lessons in secondary school and told her she'd been his favourite teacher. Dennis we learned even had a girlfriend. Then, out of the blue she dumped him for someone else. 

On a rainy night in his new car, high in the mountains, near our village, he put his police revolver to his head and blasted his life away.  When I heard the news I felt a physical ache within. His ex-girlfriend went on to marry three other men in the years ahead, breaking more hearts no doubt in the process. I wished he had been able to know she wasn't worth it. Not worth one second of the life that should've been his. Too many young men seem to take their own lives in despair and betrayal. Alone in the dark their anger turns inwards with no other bond to hold them in this world.

Dennis had really tried. He'd come through so much in his short life. None of us had ever really understood him. I still hear his cry from the cupboard and can only pledge to be more kind to the souls around me. Some journeys are so tough you can't imagine or know how bereft of love and kindness such lives can be.  If we did, I hope we’d all be different to each other.

I am pretty odd to start with

I have been alone far too long and am beginning to become even more odd than normal.  This will be of some concern to those who know me, as I am pretty odd to start with.  Yesterday I jumped on any bus and travelled as far as it went.  Got off at a village and walked and walked until I grew tired and found a bus stop.  The time schedule showed that the bus would come in 45 minutes.  It is a given fact that I am unable to wait at bustops.  I’m not sure what it is that gets to me about waiting below those signs.  It occurs to me that these 45 minutes will never be returned to me but are totally wasted.  Suddenly, life seems short enough without the loss of these 45 minutes.  As usual, I cannot wait and proceed to walk to Rabat, a good 3.5 kms away instead.  

Today I jumped another bus this time to a place called the Golden Bay on Malta.  It has a secluded sandy beach on the far side of the island.  After ages the bus drops me off and instead of enjoying the beach I go to the Radisson Hotel and eat at the Mokka a ridiculously expensive restaurant on a balcony overlooking the bay.  It had been rated quite high on trip advisor.  I had the cheapest thing on the menu Ceasar Salad and water.  It came after a huge delay and it is the first time I had this salad without chicken and without crotons.  As you might suspect without these it becomes lettuce and cheese.  In fact it resembled a child’s idea of making a cheese sandwich with lettuce instead of bread.  It is far too posh a place to complain and even when they charge 5.50 euros for a bottle of water I have to act as if that is fine instead of tearing my hair out and screaming – “what a rip off!”  

On the way back by bus I kept falling asleep.  For some reason, when asleep, my leg would slip forward and kick a very dignified Maltese white haired gentleman.  I would wake up and apologise and then fall asleep again and do the same thing.  He was very gracious and when I said how sorry I was he just smiled and waved his hand dismissively.  I proceeded to kick him five times on that journey but his good nature never wavered.  Got home and went straight to bed and sleep an hour – talk about exhausted.  

Yesterday I noticed I had begun to talk to myself.  Not long speeches but short invigorating comments – like “you can do this”, or “never mind, another day!”  But today, I noticed my talking to myself has become much more convoluted.  Long segments of a good talking to, the kind of thing you would say to a demented aunt who has pushed you beyond your limits.  This I have to admit is not a good sign.  Rather worrisome, I think.  Even worse, there is no one to notice.  Three weeks of being alone has done something to my brain and not a good thing.  Thank goodness incoming troops are arriving on Tuesday.  I do hope I have not reached an even worse state by then, my visitors may not even get a word in.  I could be giving parliamentary-like addresses for hours by that stage!