by Neil Rowland
She tried to interest me in herbal remedies and alternative medicines. This was before we finally split. For a period she succeeded in bringing down my blood pressure and stabilised my stress levels. Then she told me that she wanted a divorce. Nowadays I have a more detached attitude towards healthy living. Liz argued about the potency of alternative medicine, but it would have taken a bucket of St John’s Wort to improve my mood that day. She holds supplies in her health boutiques to keep the entire ‘new age’ population of Bristol high, until the Mayan end of the world. That place is a bouncy castle of tofu. But I’m running ahead of myself again - or bouncing ahead.
My ex-wife dropped business for the day to collect me. Then we set off to the metropolis together in her brand new coupe. This was our first prolonged encounter for months, if not forever, and the atmosphere was tense for a while. No doubt my health situation softened her attitude a jot. Our break and divorce had been acrimonious, even though I told myself there was no real conflict and that I was completely in the right about everything. Even in the courthouse, stood up in the legal chariot trying to defend myself, Elizabeth’s side of the story, her account of my character, was hard to fathom. But I knew she’d stopped listening to my version. There was never going to be another eureka moment for us. Perhaps only when our marriage had been dissolved, as the legal beaks put it, and the divorce decree was final and absolute; and how more final can you get?
Liz and I managed to survive an M5 gridlock together. Although she had brought our youngest son Timothy, aged eight, along for the journey, to save herself. She had allowed him the day off school, as if she didn’t trust the home help to skim his organic pizza into the oven. The trip to London was an adventure to him, although we didn’t drop into the official London Dungeon. Tim’s presence served the same function as a noisy fruit machine in a pub full of alienated strangers. It’s bloody miserable that such an image occurs to me.
Elizabeth said to me, while we were teenagers together, that I was her “whole soul in life”. No doubt you can hear young lover hyperbole in these declarations. But you tend to remember such beautiful things throughout your life. I remember thinking something very similar about her too. What a shame that the spell had to be broken. You may describe this as fancy thinking from a past day and age: old hippie daydreams as stale as last week’s rock cake. Certainly she gets claustrophobic and anxious that I am still living in the same city. She doesn’t enjoy the idea that I am only a short drive away; that I occupy the wreck of our old life, when she’s set about embarking on a new life. She would move back to her native Somerset, if it wasn’t for our kids, to be closer to her parents, in their quasi-military camp, if she could.
It took an emergency to make her share my company again. Yet we found a friendly vibe on the road, trapped in the congestion; we got along tolerably well. Obviously this was a genuine emergency, to which she responded with typical alacrity. I almost imagined us together in the past again, maybe going up to London for a big concert or a demo. I felt that our divorce had been thrown into the recycle bin. I could imagine that we still loved each other, that I was still her whole soul in life. But if you imagine life as a movie, then the past is hard to reshoot, too painful to view again, even as a nouveau vague kind of movie. We’re the same cast, with the same experiences, but we’re estranged. There’s no emotion that vanishes as absolutely as a woman’s love, I’ve found. Women’s love will always be a mystery to us. Do we have any influence over their feelings at all? Better try to move mountains.
She tackled the challenge of London’s road system, faced the labyrinth of the capital city, to take me to the east end hospital. Small wonder then, after these stresses, that I arrived at the entrance of the institution like an ashen spectre. What sensible, still healthy person would have rated my chances?
“Almost there,” she assured me.
I wheezed. I saw grey all around me; sky, fog, concrete; invading every sense.
“Step carefully,” she advised.
This was an exhausting hike. Forty three yards had turned into a marathon. I was ready to blow out of here.
My ex-wife supported me to a chair and then to a trolley, left me there as she negotiated with the receptionist about my stay. If I didn’t yet want to knock on heaven’s door, I was doing a fine impression as a visitor. But I still remember Elizabeth’s touch. She pretty much held me under the armpits at one stage. It’s been a long time. We’ve been through a lot together over the years. Not even she can forget that.
Liz watched philosophically, balancing on a toe with her arms crossed, as I changed into a pair of pyjamas. These were standard issue, undersized stripy PJs, leaving an area of calf and forearm to view: except who was looking or bothering. Suitably or otherwise attired, they lifted me over on to a steel frame bed. My ex-wife was not obligated to keep me company during these uncertain minutes. I thought this would be a strict porch-to-porch driving job for her. Outside the ward window, another London rush hour was apparently gathering, like a finale at the coliseum. But she decided to stick around for my benefit, rather than to make a quick getaway, as I’d assumed. She realised that her supporting presence was worth more than a course of treatment. She didn’t have to say anything. You can’t erase all the good memories from a life together. Time seemed to slip away peacefully. Bad memories felt trivial in the drift net of eternity. She could have walked out then. She could have headed back west. She might have returned immediately to her new life. After all, she’s a big girl now.
She stuck around because she felt sorry for me; she even pitied me; this drained and breathless shell of a man. Not because she was still my girl, after all. She wanted to see that I was properly cared for; tucked up in bed. But that didn’t infer any renewed affection or love. In that regard the lights had already been switched off. But were those bad motives? I can’t accuse her of stitching me up, can I? Cynical self-interest is hardly likely to get a man into the heart hospital, if you see where I’m coming from.
What about Timothy? How was my youngest son coping with this trip? Quickly his excitement at new adventure turned to fear. What was his Daddy doing in the hospital? We had tried to explain something to him along the way. This was a real hospital after all. This proved that Daddy was really sick. His sensations were complex, but the overall signal was difficult to misread. Even at his age.
“How long you staying, Daddy?” he enquired.
“That will depend,” I said.
“The doctor will try to make Daddy better,” Liz added.
“So when you getting out of here?” Tim returned.
“When they finish my check up,” I assured him.
“After the nurses help Daddy to feel better again.”
“Can you watch telly in here?” Tim wanted to know.
“Sure,” I said.
“There’s a football match today,” he informed me.
“Should be a good game.”
“Daddy needs to rest.”
Liz meanwhile was looking for a second opinion about my health. Didn’t she notice all those junior doctors already sharpening their pencils and knives?
But I wasn’t anxious for a quick prognosis. I’m not a complete hypochondriac. They explained to me that my heart was messed up. Was I able to conduct an operation on myself? I would venture into that night and hope that it was just a temporary occlusion of the sun.
Liz had to leave me to the surgeon’s nimble fingers. ‘Visiting hour’ is no longer so strict, but the evening was drawing on. The artificial lighting on the ward grew harsher. The nurses propped me up against hard pillows; folded frayed sheets across my lap. No doubt I was a pathetic sight and my family was not unaffected. Tim threw his arms around my neck at the last and refused to leave. Liz had been looking out of the window at the traffic; she checked her watch, walked over and kissed me on the forehead. They had to go. I felt a dreadful sinking sorrow
at this moment. I felt more desolate than I had ever done. When she pulled Tim back, found his hand and they walked out of the ward. She didn’t look back.
My guard was down. Hospitals, especially the old models, are not joyful institutions. You don’t go there to have a good time. They are not holiday centres under a dome. I considered a private room, but finally that wasn’t a smart idea. In grave danger you have to establish relationships: especially divorcees. That’s what is important in a perilous situation, in the face of a sharp or blunt instrument. Call me a sad hippie who sings along to All You Need is Love, but trying to insulate yourself from a life threatening situation only makes the experience worse.
Having said that, I soon found the dangers of taking a brotherly loving approach to life, within this environment of frail health, physical weakness and - we should be honest - people taking their last breaths. You still have to look out for yourself in the end.
I made friends with the guy in the next bed to mine. Our amiable alliance developed after I had settled in: except you can never settle in or wish to. The chap was bursting to talk with me, to share his burden. He was a retired head teacher from Swansea. To my mind he was a smashing guy. I was glad to share the hospital experience with him; to go shoulder to shoulder in the battle against coronary disease and an early bath. Owen was twenty years my senior, but acute angina is a powerful equaliser. It has the potential to bring generations together, like many serious conditions or afflictions. I can see this guy vividly right now: Owen Hopkins, a gangling bony man, upright in the bed, with a thin, trim moustache and sharply parted hair; every inch the traditional headmaster. The kind of man I would have rebelled against as a youth, except that disease had turned us into comrades: we were transformed into socialist skinny dippers.
“Apply yourself, boy. You’ll come out smiling,” he told me.
This became his encouraging catch phrase to me, even as he came back from another gloomy interview.
Over those days we became friends and neighbours. In our real lives, carrying our individual briefcases, we might not have got along. In this dismal place (for all the fresh paint and flowers) we had to sleep side by side, wake side by side and take our medicine together. We allowed ourselves to be lulled into this routine. During the long days we would chat, reminisce; at night time we became conscious of our mutual fear; as we heard each other’s awkward breathing and unhappy bodily grumblings, in the brittle half-dark silence; infringed upon by the street lighting and the capital’s never-stopping traffic hum (as if the angels or the devils were busy preparing to take us).
Until one afternoon they wheeled him away into the operating theatre. This was to be his day - his big hour. But he died during surgery. A particularly worn out heart, apparently.
That evening I blubbered myself to sleep. Just as if I’d lost my own father again. I got back in touch with my inner child. Owen hadn’t been a well man, I should have realised, with that ghostly pallor and untimely atmosphere. Maybe I really had been thinking about my own father. But then we cardiac patients were “all in the same boat,” as Owen kept reminding me.
Through this acquaintance I learnt that it’s risky to get too friendly with them. The cardiacs I mean. You may grow to feel a lot for them, to soften the feelings of isolation, but the danger of sudden loss is increased. In the end it was like losing a mate in battle. You’re bringing more down on your own head. You can only learn through experience, but there are some you should avoid. I had to follow Owen Hopkins into the operating theatre a few days later. Would this be a recurring nightmare? I could be attached to the same machinery, with the same surgeon. The nurses coaxed me out of this depression, aggravated by the empty bed to my side; until some other guy came along to take the head teacher’s place.
My turn came around. They gouged tubes of sugary liquid into my arms. Enough dope to make Hendrix’s eyes bulge. Then they wheeled me out to the carving table, as they made private jokes. My surgeon stepped forward out of the lights to re-introduce himself. His voice was full of brandy and Havana cigars even under the bandana over his mouth. But would I ever experience such luxuries again myself? But he tried to make me feel like a privileged passenger, invited to look around the cockpit; until he snapped thin rubber gloves over his long fingers.
As they prepared knock-out drops I was terrified; witless. Even the lovely faces of the nurses seemed as remote as lost love. This was to be my first trip to the theatre. I was following the muffled conversation, their quiet rustling movements around the space, with the small clatter of preparing instruments and equipment; ready for the operation; which was to be a triple bypass. As the show got on the road they dropped me they dropped the house lights into darkness.
The girl was rubbing my wrist; watching me kindly, saying: “You only need to relax. You only need to...”
I returned from this state, you might guess. Consciousness shakily returned like a rainbow across a soap bubble. They’d shut my brain off for a few hours; put the old grey matter on ice.
There were tubes up the nose, tubes down my throat, tubes from my stomach to drain away excess blood and other detritus. Sever a man at the chest, hew out a couple of his ribs, tear out veins from his arms and legs, then you’re going to leave him in a sore mess; even if you have repaired and unblocked main arteries and valves in his heart. It’s still the main approach to chronic disease - you smash a person to pieces to replace a broken component. I couldn’t jump up and shake their hands to thank them, even if I’d wanted to.
For all this discomfort - which increased and gathered as the anaesthetic diminished - my operation was declared a success. Gradually I set about the process of trying to recover from this trauma. Post operational agonies began to touch me, in cunning sword points. I had the agony of soreness, around torso, cicatrised by surgical cuts; aches and pains, pulled stitches, clicking ribs snuck out of place and then rubbed back together again.
But if life is just a temporary trial, then the vacation had been extended. I could breathe again, if not very freely. I’d got my second wind. The specialist couldn’t tell me how many years were left. But that wasn’t my first thought.
Angela came to collect me for the return trip. Maybe Liz couldn’t afford to lose another day. Therefore our daughter tore up the motorway in her idiosyncratic Renault Clio that I’d purchased for her as a birthday present. After a few weeks at Big Pink (that’s what we call our house in Bristol) I was beginning to take the stairs again; contemplate a walk along the street, do a bit of gardening. At first I took up residence in my leather armchair, listened to album after album, and caught up with my paperwork; but I could stretch myself and felt more comfortable with every passing day.
Big Pink was a total heap, though Angela finally dragged a bath towel over the grimy windowsills and made other hasty tidying actions. My mate Bob had come around to do some gardening in my absence. That’s Huntingdon, not Dylan.
Even my complexion began to recuperate. I would no longer get a character part in Doctor Who. Everybody was happy to see me back in circulation, including (at first) Lizzie; fussing over me, panicking when I made any exertion. The off-beat had been corrected and I could return to the regular thump of my life, private or otherwise.
My kids’ ideal of personal liberty dates from that hospital stay. My holiday getaway with Corrina was also an encouragement. When I returned from hospital I was more or less housebound for weeks. But they were exploring the boundaries of independence away from their parents. I recovered from my own type of degeneration, and the young generation was flourishing.
I was so relieved to be alive that my family radar was switched off - at least, at first. For that period I was not so anxious about checking up on my kids, finding out where they were going. I didn’t try to seek Corrina out. The house became my own again. I had enough time and room to recover from my op. I was alone then except for visits from the doctor and my business pa
rtner.
Chapter 4
But there I was battling against the crowds like a released statue. How can that latest episode be explained away as trivial, so that I could sleep with myself tonight? If my heart surgery hadn’t been a success, where else could I turn? What were my other options? They might ask me back for another heavy gig at the theatre; a five hour Springsteen type of epic. The thought of being cut again is hard to accept. I want to believe that I’ve been born again.
Then I’ve never been prone to anxiety or panic attacks. Most likely those experiences are distressing enough, yet my experience in the mall was different. My heart had kicked into full gallop like a spooked mustang. I didn’t know if my nag would keep running until it was exhausted or dropped death from shock. So I was forced to go along for the ride and find out.
While my heart was bucking, herds of healthy people were breaking around me. This was worse than getting trapped in a crowd of football fans, while attempting to leave the stadium after a capacity game. Most likely my face is bloodless and perspiring, so that I resemble a crazed zombie, out of doors at the wrong time of day. I don’t take any notice of angry words or expressions as, in my desperation, I crush toes and push. I’m no longer in the same reality zone as these guys. I’ve been put back into the cardiology department waiting room. How in hell did I get here?
There’s a history of heart trouble in our family. That’s what the GP often enquires about isn’t it? So there’s a history in my family, such as A J P Taylor might have written, or even Gibbon. The assessment of blocked arteries and damaged valves didn’t arrive as a complete surprise. At least I was still alive to hear the diagnosis. Really I should have recognised the symptoms earlier and not allowed death to leave even an autograph. After my fortieth birthday I became more conscious of the risks, recalling my notorious family history. In response though I just decided to run harder, thwack the ball harder, even as it returned from younger opponents with extra speed and cunning.
