Northern Ireland reminds me so much of my roots. Sitting in the waiting room in the haematology Department I get chatting to an 85-year-old fellow patient. Our conversation was triggered by a much older man nearby getting his blood taken in a treatment room. Being wheelchair bound and extremely deaf, every exchange with the staff is audible to all in the waiting room outside. His medical records indicate he was born on the 10th of February and the nurse treating him comments that her father was also born on that day. He asks loudly, “but what year was he born?” The nurse answers with, “1933” and his response to that is, “Sure, he’s only a young one isn’t he?” Or to be more accurate what he actually said was “Ach sure e’s only a yungon ainy?” But I shall spare all of you any more of the deadly Northern Ireland dialect.
The people in the waiting room smile in response, feeling much better about their own age. The man beside me is also a young one born in 1933 and informs me he is the youngest of a family of eight. His elder sister never married and lived until her 97th year, a lovely kind woman he tells me. One of his brothers was in the military and died in his 50s, this was accompanied by a sad sigh of loss despite the decades that have since passed. We talk of places and family. His name is Anderson and I also have family members called Anderson but he comes from a different area entirely in Northern Ireland called Cookstown. I told him I have a relative who ran the pharmacy in Cookstown for years and suddenly I realise the unknown person beside me in Northern Ireland is invariably either related/lives beside a relative/or went to school with a relative.
The communication goes deeper and we share our relief at the rescue of the Thai youngsters from the dark deep water-logged cave. In such moments humans show their compassion and unity in longing for their safe rescue. All of us have become invested in these young footballers. Their release is a joyous relief. Of course, we are picky about our investment of emotional attachment. Thousands drowning in the Mediterranean pluck few heartstrings but a tiny toddler face down in the surf of a beach breaks through our intellectual defences. Likewise, millions facing desperate conditions in Yemen don’t make it onto our newspapers. Instead, the infantile posturing of the self-important gets three-inch high headlines. The worst humanitarian disaster facing humanity at present is considered of little or no impact importance in this perverse world of ours.
My 85-year-old fellow patient is struggling to maintain his garden these days just like my mum. They are both suffering from the present hosepipe ban. The younger gardeners manage by using watering cans but for the over 80s they just have to watch their flowers wilt and fade while their lawns grow brown and die. He tells me he was the last child born in his family and was 18 pounds at birth*. He’s a nice good-natured 85-year-old, well dressed and well spoken. I tell him he’s lucky to have been brought up in a big family surrounded by loved ones.
Then, he says all his brothers and sisters have since died. The last he lost was a sister 12 years ago. He’s all alone now. No brothers or sisters, his wife gone and his only son lives abroad. I had idly thought that the lonely were usually drug addicts or alcoholics who had systematically broken or abused every family relationship until they were homeless with no one left to care. I had not factored in that death in old age is equally effective in breaking all the loving bonds that unite families. Gradually death casts aside all the mooring lines that attach you to others. Drifting off, these individuals are unexpected alone after a lifetime of being loved and surrounded by kindness. They don’t expect it and have no time to acclimatise to this new brutal reality. They have all the social skills that life in a loving family cultivates. They’re good-natured, long-suffering, grateful for all the special souls that have shared this journey with them. But suddenly they bereft and alone facing hospital visits and treatment alone. There is no one to share the bad news with. It fills my heart with sudden sympathy. They cultivate a new kinship with those in here to get blood tests regularly and most seem to know each other. Suddenly, as the conversations develop the noise levels rise and it makes me feel Northern Irish. That characteristic chattiness and love of a good gossip binds and quickly unites us. They’re talking about football now anticipating the big game tomorrow as one man in a wheelchair is wheeled out of a treatment room and placed beside us. As the consultant passes back into the treatment room he points out to the nurse that “We seem to have a leak here!” Horrified everyone notices that the man’s wheelchair is parked in a puddle of urine that has dripped from his chair. The consultant closes this door, the nurse rushes to get cleaning material and we are all left in awkward silence.
Into the humiliating silence, people unexpectedly begin to share tales of their own humiliation. Some are really cracking tales told in commiseration for the chap in the wheelchair. One character, Jesse, a middle-aged man in a red tracksuit says his bowels stopped working a year ago. He was given fibre gel, lactose, senna etc and growing arsenal of stuff designed to give him a good ‘pull through’ as my grandfather would call it. All to no avail in Jesse's case,” I was blocked up as if by cement!” He explained. “They give me everything short of dynamite to get me going but all failed. After three weeks I felt my innards would explode if no relief came. I was swollen like a pregnant pup and the pain was awful. I could barely sit and standing was not much better! Anyway, unknown to me my doc arranged for me to be hospitalised. They took me on board this ambulance for a 10-minute drive to the local hospital. I didn’t make it. Eight minutes into the trip, my bowels finally decided to get going after being on strike for three weeks. There was I, in the back of an ambulance, having the bowel movement of the century. I apologised to the wee lass with me in the back of the ambulance and the driver and the nurse who helped clean me up on the ward later. I thought I’d be mortified beyond belief! But you know what, I was rightly relieved and grateful too! It’s not until you can’t do something that you begin to appreciate the miracle of anything.”
It was a cracking tale that had us all laughing in stitches. Even the poor guy sitting in the wheelchair in a puddle started giggling. The nurse came back into the waiting room mop and bucket in hand. First, she sprayed some disinfectant on the floor and then carefully mopped up the urine, moving the wheelchair to get underneath. Then she left and the humiliation was back in the room. Everyone knew he was sitting in soaking clothes wet and uncomfortable.
We were rescued by a white-haired lady sitting opposite who shared her story of humiliation. Once she’d been a deputy head of school and had gone in to talk to the headmaster in his office. While there she felt an unexpected urge to fart. While not been able to avoid passing wind she did manage to do so silently, “silent but deadly” she informed the riveted room. After the conversation was over she left the office happy that she had got away with the unexpected gust without being noticed. A few minutes later she realised she had left her handbag in the office and returned to the office knocking briefly before entering to retrieve her bag. There, she found the headmaster with the office window open using a large newspaper to waft out the offending smell. She said, “I didn’t know where to look, I actually put my hands over my eyes, I was that ashamed. I left the office without saying a word and thought suicide was my only option!” In the silence that followed we all howled in mirth. The room was full of riotous laughter and good humour. There are true comedians skilled in tales to bring you back from the edge of despair. Sharing their own humiliation turned an unmitigated disaster into something else for all of us.
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* I found this almost unbelievable but then found out afterwards that the record for "heaviest birth" is currently held by Anna Bates, who gave birth to a boy weighing 22 pounds in Seville, Ohio, on January 19, 1879.
