Being There

There are moments when you’re called upon to undertake some deed. Many times, you may feel overwhelmed by your own inadequacies as you take up your position on the battlefield of life. 

I recall when six months pregnant being summoned to look after a lovely relative who had had a stroke while living in the south of England. Flying from Northern Ireland to the UK I managed to fill all six sick bags across the entire row of seats at the back of the plane.  I’ve never been sure why my pregnant self decided to be so sick. Even during morning sickness, much earlier in the pregnancy, my body had felt nauseous but had refused to regurgitate valuable food. In fact, in all cases of food poisoning in our family, usually the result of a takeaway, my constitution was like that of my dad’s.  While the rest of my sickened family cleared out their systems by one end or the other (i.e. vomiting or diarrhoea), our systems perversely decided our bodies could handle the toxicity and extract some useful nutrition from the poison we had ingested.  To this day I have no idea why my stomach decided on performing like something from The Exorcist but I still remember the horrified expressions of my fellow passengers fighting to provide me with enough bags to contain the huge quantities of carrot coloured lumpy porridge I projected.

I was also well aware of being under-qualified for the task ahead which would involve caring, cooking and moderate housekeeping. I decided to camouflage my deficiencies by faking proficiency in these areas.  This strategy consisted of

1.    Turning the vacuum cleaner on for half an hour a day so that my relative, who was bedridden, would be comforted by the evident housecleaning going on below. I must confess I did not move the vacuum cleaner just turned it on daily, downstairs. In my defence when I started this practice there was a definite improvement in my patient’s demeanour who seemed disproportionately happier and more grateful.

2.     My tasteless meals were presented as being lighter on the stomach and easier to digest. In fact, my farola (finely-milled semolina) pudding dish became a staple favourite as my relative mentioned she had never been served this their entire life. Either that or she was too polite to complain about the food served. Come to think of it that seems much more likely explanation.

3.     My sweet relative knew that other family members around the world were worried to death about her. So, a daily task of mine was writing letters to distant relatives and friends. She would dictate and I would write and subsequently post these missives. She would insist on praising my housekeeping skills, my cooking and my kindness in every letter sent. As she had relatives in almost every continent I felt at times I was undertaking a one-woman self-promotion of sainthood campaign.  At times there I would blush in embarrassment as I wrote my own praises. But even this letter writing seemed to bring the patient pleasure and the avalanche of responses that arrived in the following days and weeks brought welcome messages of love and concern that were sustaining as regular blood transfusions for my patient.

Thankfully she made a full recovery. Eventually, I confessed my vacuuming trick. When she regained mobility, I had to!  She spent the next month trying to tidy and clean her house and find where I had put stuff in her kitchen. These activities I told myself also speeded her long-term recovery.

She was always very grateful and thankful for my presence during her illness and the lesson learned for me was, even when poorly prepared and totally inadequate, just showing up on the battlefield wins you a medal of sorts. Sometimes it’s not about your abilities but about being there for others.  I can look back now and wish I had been more effective and useful but her sweet response to my incompetence taught me so much.  If we stop wasting time thinking about our inadequacies we can probably achieve so much more.

“Let no excessive self-criticism or any feelings of inadequacy, inability or inexperience hinder you …..”

 Riḍván Message 152, Universal House of Justice

My brothers are hungry too!

We had just bought our first house. It was a small gate lodge with a huge garden. It even had its own little forest in the corner. The kids loved it. This move to the countryside provided the three boys (all under 10) with the freedom to play outside. The contrast between our previous urban existence on a rough estate to this rose garden encircled cottage could not be greater.

We enthusiastically carted boxes of our belongings from the hired transport van to our new home. So involved were we with moving we forgot to prepare food. Our younger son, Daniel decided he was hungry and went off to explore our new neighbourhood. He wandered off to a row of pensioner's houses on a lane opposite. A friendly pensioner spotted Daniel and struck up a conversation with our chatty three-year-old who told him how very hungry he was. Andrew welcomed Daniel into his home and introduced him to his wife Vera, a South African. A lovely elderly couple who had spent their lives up to their 40s taking care of their ill parents. It was only after the death of their respective parents that the pair met at the wedding of a relative of Andrew's. They married and had one son.  Andrew worked in the nearby cement quarry for the whole of his life. In their cosy living room Daniel was fed and given a drink and even a bar of chocolate. At their door, as he left, the canny Daniel, informed them that he had two brothers as hungry as he was!  The generous pensioners filled a plastic bag with provisions for his brothers. Daniel returned to our house like a triumphant hunter gatherer.  We were shocked by his audacity and yet impressed with his initiative. When we went to thank these pensioners we found two gems. Both were as kind as they were wise. Andrew had built a huge conservatory, all home-made, with even an oil heater to heat it. Entering that quiet conservatory we would often find Vera working away at a massive jigsaw puzzle on a specially designed table while Andrew read his newspaper.  How many times we’d enter this serene place and be plied with huge quantities of tea and biscuits.

They grew amazing tomatoes and supplied us with jars of their famous chilli and tomato chutney. Andrew’s kindness was constant and in the years ahead brought only joy to all our lives. Andrew taught Daniel how to ride his first bike. They felt like a real family. I remember trying to move our caravan from the garden. It seemed an impossible task until Andrew flagged down a passing tractor driver who had the caravan hauled out in a matter of minutes. It was at that moment I realised what being part of a community meant. Andrew had been brought up in this part of the world. Gone to school here, worked a lifetime in this rural setting. When he flagged down a passing driver they were obviously going to help. He was well known in the neighbourhood and everyone seemed to know him and like him. Daniel had chosen well!

Years later we moved abroad but on visits to Northern Ireland, Andrew and Vera were a joy to catch up with.  Illness plagued Andrew. This huge man with hands like shovels had operation after operation. The cement dust from the years of quarry work troubled his lungs.  On subsequent visits we could see his decline. Slow but remorseless.  He was ever loved and his only son worked hard to make the house suitable for his now disabled father. Andrew was ill but surrounded by his extended family including happy young grandchildren. It was a good 15 years later from that first visit of Daniel to the couple that we got news that Andrew was hospitalised and seriously ill. Daniel sat beside Andrew’s bed during a visit as he wavered in and out of consciousness. Daniel whispered “Andrew is the first friend I ever made in my life”. It was hard to lose this good friend.

We never know the effect our lives have on others. But this couple graced their neighbourhood with their good natures. For my three sons Andrew raised the standard of what being ‘a good man’ really meant. Showed true nobility  can be demonstrated in times of laughter and in times of pain and illness. Just by their existence this couple made this world a better place. They engender hope in all of us that good people transform not just themselves but the wider community too.  They touch lives and sprinkle the gold dust of their kindness on all those they meet. When I see kindness in Daniel I am reminded of Andrew and his bag of goodies on that first visit. 

Nightmare quality of some experiences

A piece from an old e mail, found on my hard drive.

Hope all goes well with you guys.  I am recovering from yesterday and it all seems quite dream like.  Things in Greece have a disorganized feel to them that adds to the nightmare quality of some experiences.  

I had heard Harry had gone into hospital but I had celebrated his 69^th birthday in his home only a few days earlier and he had looked fine with a good appetite and a was a good colour and back on his feet able to get down the stairs.  He still had the urine drainage bag attached and I could tell he hated it but otherwise he seemed his normal cheerful self.  The bag had been empty in the morning and that had caused them to go to hospital the day before last.  The hospital did not seem to do much – how chaotic and appalling their disorder appears when some one is in real need.   

He was ordering in a Greek sweet that morning and then by the afternoon he was dead.  In typical fashion they don’t have cold storage here on the island and so burial is within 24 hours!  So yesterday afternoon we had the service in the German graveyard and several of his friends and family were there.  It was Daniel’s first funeral and not an easy one.   

The coffin was open and they had shoved two huge pieces of cotton wool up his nose.  The bearers were four really rough characters in tee shirts and underpants hanging out with ropes and surly countenances.  They work for the graveyard.  They lowered the coffin in opened as the Greeks have an unusual practice of throwing earth into the open coffin (just a few handfuls)!  Then the lid is put on.  It all seemed so horrific and rough and when the lid is on they immediately start shovelling earth in while everyone looks on.   

At one point, as the four shady characters raced off with the coffin to the graveside my friend Shirley urged me to run with her after them, saying we could not let him be alone with strangers.  I could see the four were very perplexed that no one was throwing themselves into the hole and fainting – a norm for Greek funerals.  But the ceremony, was dignified with the Lord’s prayer, Harry’s favourite prayer in German, beautiful music and lots of flowers.  At one point the someone started singing a song and everyone joined in and the atmosphere melted.  I could not wish a speedier end for Harry and despite the horrors of the funeral both Daniel and I were happy that he was in a better place.  As we drove home Daniel and I kept holding hands and reassuring each other.  Life seemed very tenuous all of a sudden.  Harry’s smiling face will be missed and his good nature.  It was the first time I felt my son’s strength, his stoic nature and his robustness.  How quickly they grow up and become bigger than us in every way.

      An American Indian elder described his own inner struggles this way:

      "Inside of me there two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time." When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied, "The one I feed the most." 

I tried to hit her over the head rest

The Greek driver was following us along the road talking to us as we walked along the pavement and I could understand nothing.  We had moved to Rhodes some four years ago and set about the task of settling into a completely different culture.  Our three boys attended Greek schools and after a painful transition period were all now fluent in the language.  My husband and I had not yet mastered it in any shape or form.  Our brains seemed reluctant to take in the new vocabulary and grammar in which we were surrounded. 

So bemused I asked Daniel, my youngest son, who I had just picked up from primary school, “What is he saying?”  Daniel listened carefully while the Greek middle-aged man repeated himself through the open window of his car, then he translated, “He says Daddy’s been knocked off his scooter and has been taken to hospital.”  The shock must have shown on my face as the Greek man started talking immediately in a reassuring manner.  Again Daniel provided a translation, “He says only his middle bit has been broken!”  Not the reassurance I had hoped for.  He offered to take us directly to the hospital and Daniel and I clambered into his small car.  He was very kind and tried to calm me by smiling and nodding. 

Even when we reached the hospital he followed us in, directing us where to go after consulting a nurse.  We were shown into a tiny cluttered room filled with about eight people milling around, smoking talking.  There on a trolley lay Vessal in absolute agony and as I reached his side he asked in trembling tones, “Can you put your coat on me?”  He was freezing and beginning to shake with tremors.  Medical experience has shown that so many people die of shock after accidents and this can be prevented by two basic techniques.  One keep the patient warm and two don’t leave them alone.  Keep talking to them, reassuring them and keep them warm.  Almost instinctive things you’d think of doing yourself but no one in this hospital seemed aware of them.  I took my coat off and wrapped it around him.  Daniel fell to his knees sobbing at his father’s side.  The man who had opened his car door and knocked Vessal off his scooter, found this intolerable and tried to console Daniel by dropping to his knees beside Daniel and telling him his father would be alright.  Daniel however, was inconsolable and my heart was beating in an uncontrollable fashion.  Everything was going wrong.  I shall not go into the gruesome details except to point out my husband had a fractured back and had to lie flat on his back for eight long weeks.  The complexities of Greek hospitals and the endless queues and pieces of paper required defy belief.  May my worst enemy be spared the experience of a Greek hospital!

Vessal eventually, was home at last but under strict instructions to stay in bed prone.  He spent most of the early weeks on heavy painkillers which were hard on his stomach but did keep the pain at bay.  I’m not awfully good with sick people.  Always previously, Vessal would joke that my limit on sickness was three days.  After three days my sympathy would run out and the message conveyed implicitly was “Die or get better but don’t linger!”  Now, my patience was really to be put the test.  I was having to cover my husband’s teaching hours as well as my own, cook, clean etc for everyone.  Life became a tight routine of chores that required doing and there was little time to dwell on the situation.  It could have been much worse we told ourselves. 

Then, as life so often does, it actually became worse!  Vessal became completely deaf.  It must have been all the lying down, but both ears became blocked.  He couldn’t hear a thing unless you shouted.  A kind of paranoia set in were he was convinced we were plotting against him.  This seemed strange but was followed by an even worse phase in which he sank into a deep dark silence.  This frightened me more than all the previous states.  Life requires effort and will power.  None of us can go on without either of those.  I decided to get his ears fixed at all costs.  The isolation deafness brings had worsened things, but no doctor would treat him at home.  So I arranged an appointment with the closest ear, nose and throat specialist I could find.  We arrived by taxi at the surgery and after a short treatment Vessal could hear.  The genuine delight on his face was a picture. 

The last task was to get him home safe and sound.  We waited at the taxi stop and waited and waited.  By his stage, Vessal was almost passing out with pain, leaning against a nearby tree.  At long last a taxi came but before we could get in a Greek woman jumped in front of us and opened the taxi door and jumped in the back seat.  I told her this taxi was ours and motioned for her to get out.  She refused, even when I said in poor Greek my husband was ill. In a haughty tone she replied, that was not her problem.  My husband, meanwhile, carefully wedged himself into the taxi beside her, unable to lie down on the back seat and told me just to get in so we could get home as fast as possible.  Reluctantly, I clambered into the front seat beside the taxi driver and gave him our address.  As he moved off, the woman gave her address and told him to go to her address first.  I was really mad at this point and told her she was a bad woman.  Unfortunately, I did not change the adjective to suit the gender and ended up saying that she was a shit woman. 

This triggered utter rage in the Greek woman and she began shouting insults at me in fluent fast Greek.  I knew enough to understand what she was saying but was woefully incapable of responding effectively.  It is at such times you realise the weakness and sheer vulnerability of not speaking the language you need.  On and on she raged in aggressive tones and I lost it.  I just lost it.  Eight weeks of sickness, pain, hard work, fear and anger exploded and I tried to hit her over the seat.  I know it is unforgiveable to resort to violence.  She dodged back to the corner of the taxi door to avoid my blow and her demeanour changed from one of shouting fury to sheer fear.  The taxi had high seats and so I could not reach her easily but tried to hit her between the gap on either side of the headrest.  I swung from one side to the other trying to reach her and she like a demented puppet in the back seat tried to avoid me.  At one point cringing up in a corner hugging her mobile phone to her chest like a comforter.  I was livid and intent on smacking her and oblivious to the taxi driver and Vessal’s shouts of remonstration.  The taxi driver stopped, we were at our flat, and an injured Vessal crawled from the back.  The taxi driver put his arm across the gap between the seats to stop me reaching the woman and shouted “Ok, Ok”.  Reluctantly, I got out and the taxi drove off with a very subdued passenger in the back.  As I helped Vessal limp slowly into our apartment, he kept muttering, “I can’t believe you just did that!”  Neither could I.