Mortification

Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:28:40 +0100

By Rebecca E Small

He is gangrene of the soul;
He is what he is
He deserves all he gets
As in time we all do.
He has got it!
We may have it coming,
Just wait and see…
Be patient. Live life as it comes!

Chapter 1

The sun is bearing down on my head as I drive quickly through the main thoroughfare. The warmth spreads over my body making me feel relaxed and at ease. My home town is so far from me now yet once was very much my life. Looking around I see the same tired faces that I saw as a young boy, faces that I swore would never belong to me. The constant striving showing on their faces in lines and creases. I smile to myself and preen my self esteem; I have escaped this ‘hell hole’ of a rat race. Aren’t I one lucky sod!

Turning up the music I sing to my favourite tune, feel the breeze on my face as Bill Withers sings; it is indeed a Lovely Day. The Money in my pocket swells the pride in my heart, my fortune makes me a somebody; someone who is loved and needed. I am indeed the best somebody I know!

I become engrossed in my self-adulation and suddenly the world turns black…..

The lights are bright and the voices are hushed as I am lifted onto a stretcher, what has happened to my lovely day? I try to understand how I have got here, but to no avail. My body feels heavy and weary, I can see faces and hear voices but no one looks at me, they are working and I am part of their work. I am talking to them but they totally ignore me. There is no eye contact; I cannot seem to communicate with them, why won’t they respond to me? I try to move my arm, a muscle, any bloody muscle will do but my body fails to comply. The day was so good and I was so happy driving in the morning sun and now look where I am! Realisation of my predicament hits me and I am filled with horror. How the fuck have I ended up paralysed in a hospital room?
I force myself to disengage from this living nightmare and go into a dream like state. My world has turned black again and in the distance all I can see is a strong bright light. Pain racks my paralysed body, I question my existence and realise my life is coming to an end. I don’t wish to enter the brightness as it can only mean death is upon me, yet the light is almost ethereal and I feel myself being pushed towards it. I struggle, trying with all my heart and soul to resist the end but convulsions carry me forward to my demise. I hear tortured screams as the light gets nearer and I come to the conclusion I am entering my hell. I give up my struggle to resist and allow myself to be pushed into oblivion. As I crown the bright light, relief sweeps over my tired and weary body, the shock forces me to take a deep breath of cold air and my eyes open wide. I am scooped up by big hands and slapped onto the warm skin of a woman I somehow recognise. My eyes engage hers and at that moment we bond and everything becomes clear. She is smiling at me and all I can see in her face is her love for me. I love her; I have always loved her for she is my mother and all I can do is weep. She places me to her ample breast and I suckle the sweetness that is my life force and my food. This is surely not the end of my life. This is my birth!

My mother conceived me in her eighteenth year; she was a rough, brash girl, the eldest of twelve children. Since being able to walk herself she helped rear the ever increasing family. She had no life as a child or as a teenager and longed for an escape. The only means of escape for her was to get a bloke and a place of her own, away from the chaos that was her life. Jill, my mother, had been seventeen when she met my father. She was running wild and running away from all the kids and mayhem in her home. She had the life of a mother and all the responsibilities that go with it. At sixteen she had been a ruddy complexioned girl; at seventeen she turned into a young woman. The puppy fat disappeared, her skin was peaches and cream, her hair that had once been red became a shiny auburn and her figure was that of an hour glass. Jill was transformed and the local boys loved her as she revelled in her new found prettiness - they offered her love and affection for just being herself. Then she met Brian – my father.

My mother and father fell in love immediately and within two months they were inseparable, and four months later, to her dismay, my mother found herself to be pregnant. Brian was forced to do the honourable thing and at the age of nineteen was to be husband and father, their parents were appalled! Jill and Brian were married by means of a special licence at the local register office. The December day was bright and crisp and the wedding photographs taken by family and friends showed two young lovers with all the hopes of the world almost within their grasp. The wedding party retired to nanny Flo’s front parlour where sandwiches and cups of tea were plentiful. No references were made to the shotgun ceremony, only good wishes for their future.

Their married life began in a bed-sit, although it was no place to bring up a child it was a place they could at last call their own. Mom discovered the stark reality of life within two weeks of her wedding day when Dad beat her black and blue. Struggling with morning sickness, afternoon sickness and every other sickness going she was trying her best to cook and clean. Dad was faced with going home to an awful dinner and a night of boredom while his mates were off to the local for a pie and a pint or two. He was responsible now, not single and care free and he felt the world had a grudge against him. He opened the door and walked in to see the cause of his newly found demise standing at the small cooker. He had fucked up big time. How he hated her for trapping him! Jill turned and smiled at him – a smile that somehow pushed him over the edge and he felt the compulsion to make her pay for what she had done to him. Less than ten minutes later the filthy whore with the bastard child inside her lay face down on the floor bleeding and silent while I swished and swam in her warm embryonic fluid. I could feel her sadness and pain, her humiliation and rejection, for they were mine also. With the smile knocked from her face Brian sat in his chair feeling much happier and began to read the paper.

As I grew in the warmth and protection of my mother’s womb her sadness deepened. I was yet to be born but already knew fear, sadness and pain. My months of foetal growth were haunted by the sounds of my mother’s sobs. When her time came I did not want to leave the safety and warmth of her body and venture into the unknown hell that was my mother’s life. The first things I see are the beautiful, warm and loving eyes of my mother and the first few hours of my life belong solely to us – my mom and I, and all I feel is love and contentment. Months of pain and heartache are melted by love and pride.

Noises disturb my regressive thoughts and my non moving body awakes to clinical sounds. I am lying in the hospital room again staring at the bright lights and the smells of clinical substances permeate my brain. How have I come to this? A forty year old man covered with white sheets. Oh God I pray – someone please help me! The passing people in hospital gowns watch over me in my paralysed state. Laughter echoes around the white tiled walls and a radio blurs out one of my favourite tunes, and I instinctively begin to sing the words “I am a one in ten a number on a list”. This is surely me! No one hears my words or my cries for help and I feel myself slipping into the darkness once more.

I am a child once more eating home made egg custard, the saliva dribbling down my chubby freckled chin and this is pure bliss. Nana Dia hums as she washes the dinner plates. My grandpa Joe smiles at me and seems to launch across the room and hug me to him, tears sliding down his kind and caring face. He holds me to him tightly and I feel as though he will never let me go as I struggle to swallow my last mouthful of egg custard. I am the eldest of four children myself now and I am four years old. My body aches as my grandpa hugs me as I am battered and bruised; my body is covered in purple and red angry stains and my clothes are rags. But here in his arms I am safe as he is my protector and a beautiful man; my grandparents’ house is heaven.

My dad was their youngest child and their most troublesome. He had been the last to leave home and since he had left my grandparents had known their first bit of peace and married bliss. The home is full of love kisses and cuddles. Grandpa releases me from his arms and goes back to the rocking chair by the glowing fireplace, slowly undoing his pack of Woodbines. He puts a cigarette to his lips and inhales deeply from the white stick that hangs from his mouth. Nana Dia hums as she walks from the kitchen and her shoes click as she crosses the quarry tiled floor to where I sit. She ruffles my auburn hair, smiles at me and continues past towards grandpa. She plonks her ample bottom on grandpa’s knee, planting a swift kiss on his furrowed white brow. “What is to be done Joe?” she asks grandpa, “leave it to me” is his reply.

I fall asleep with a full stomach on my grandparents’ sofa, the sleep of a child untroubled by life’s worries. The sound of arguing startles me and as I become fully awake I make out the distinctive shouting of my parents and I hear my grandpa order them to calm down. Mom is hysterical, I am scared and shaking and need the toilet, but I have to go through the kitchen where all the commotion is taking place to get to it, so I hold myself. After a few minutes of wonderful silence I catch sight of the door swinging open and I turn to see my father’s angry face as he storms towards me. He grabs my wrist and yanks me through the door into the kitchen and I am dragged past my loving grandparents. I am forced to make a swift yet unwelcome exit as I am pulled along the back yard, my feet barely making contact with the shiny blue bricks. Urine is now flowing from my full bladder and wets my grey shorts. I want to stop the flow but as I sob it just gets worse and urine cascades down my legs to the floor.

Mom is waiting down the street; her hair a mess, clothes filthy, stockings laddered gripping the handle of a bloody big pram with three scruffy babes thrown in. She is crying, the tears dripping from her wobbly chin and fear in her eyes. I am thrown into the pram landing right on top of my baby brother, our Tommy. I lie there motionless, terrified to move, my urine soaked legs are on top of my sisters Ruth and Beth. We are propelled down the bumpy street to our house, Tommy lying fast asleep, his head covered by a knitted yellow bonnet; his face chubby and red with encrusted snot around his nose and mouth. He smells awful! I sob and sob for what is to be.

We now live on the local council estate, a nice three bedroomed mid terrace house with a garden. The house may be nice but it is not a home; a home is a place of love and love has never lived here. The pram gets parked in the back yard and we are all physically removed. Beth and Ruth are placed in the play pen in the living room; Tommy onto the mat in the middle of the floor; as for me, well my father drags me upstairs by my arm and throws me to the floor in the bathroom. He puts the plug in the bath and turns the tap on. When the bath is half full he turns off the tap and I am thrown fully clothed into the stone cold water and my head is held down while my father repeatedly calls me a dirty bastard. He grabs my hair and pulls my head from the water, and as I gasp for air he screams at me “pissed yourself did you? You won’t do it again in a hurry you dirty bastard!” I want to die, I don’t know what death is but I want no more part in this, I want to be free. He pulls me out of the icy water and shoves me into the back bedroom still clothed and soaking. This room has no contents or furniture, no carpet, just floorboards. I lie shivering, cowering and praying as I fall asleep to the sounds of shouting banging and disruption from downstairs.

I awake with a start to what sounds like steel crashing onto stone. Panic grips me and I realise I am no longer the cold, wet child but the man lying motionless in the hospital. Everybody around me is busy, all ignoring me. I remember my trip back into the past of my mind; things that I had wiped from my memory are haunting me as I lie here. How I wish I could make my god dam muscles work and just walk out of here. Someone will come and talk to me soon, I know, but at the moment all I see is the coming and going of people walking about laughing and joking. I wonder why I am here and just get glimpsed at occasionally? My lifetime is passing before my eyes and all I am able to do is look back, remembering.

Comments

Sombre

Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:07:56 +0100

Black,Black, Black
Frosty morning sunlight:
Red, purple pink
Flowers scents the air..

Crying, mourning and sobbing.
Chill winds bite
Icy hands reach and touch your heart,
Tearing soul from body.

Black cars snake...
Causing a procession:
Cold body encased:
Rememberance and respect.

She was a lady -
Quite simply the best.
Now she's gone
Peacefully at rest.

The procession it winds....
Slowly through the town.
People stand still, stop and stare

The ground is wet
Many tears we have cried
No one understands
Our Mother has Died

Comments

PS3 Widow

Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:40:43 +0100

Well here I am again and I feel a moan coming on or even a rant! PS3's who invented them? For the last 3 weeks all I've seen of my partner is the back of his head! As he lives the dream of being a Formula 1 driver. Bless! It's only a little moan really No Coronation Street for me just Bahrain race track. At least he's speaking to me (roll a fag, looles). See even little 'ole me as her uses - lol.

I can feel my revenge coming on :XX" class="middle" border="0"> Shh I'll take over the kids PS3 and create chaos on the race track . Formula 1 her I come!!!

Comments

Valentines Day

Thu, 14 Feb 2008 17:10:39 +0100

Well it's Valentines Day a good day for soppy sods! My postman arrived with my Valentines - 1 from the gas board another from the nice friendly bank manager and a picturesque 1 from the Orlando Tourist Board!

Other than that I received 2 from my 'Long Term Partner' 1 loving, 1 sexy ahhh! I'm all for this love and romance as long as its followed by earth moving sex!

Comments

40 something continued

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 18:28:28 +0100

My birthday was a few days ago and I've just realised I don't feel any older - hooray! My birthday was spent watching the craters and cracks appear on my ageing face, but alas they are no worse than they were last week. Under scrutiny I have noticed a few (lot) of grey hair but all that is signaling is I need to buy a colour!One thing is true though I hate being old and feeling 17. I'm rude a little crude and 47 - it just doesn't go! I wonder when I'll grow up and behave myself. When will I become responsible and mature?

Comments

Work

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 17:37:02 +0100

Well what a lovey day and now I've just finished WORK!

Fag and coffee in my hand and I'm happy! Work for me is the local pharmacy and it's grrr - great lol if you know what I mean ( it pays the bills - well some of 'em ). Work keeps me out of trouble, it stops me spending money I don't have and it cuts down the fag and coffee intake all good things I suppose. The best bit is having loads of customers to talk to though! Because I can talk for England - no exaggeration!

Comments

Happy 40 something!?

Tue, 12 Feb 2008 23:10:01 +0100

Today's the day I start my blog - so what can I write? I could fill your heads with wisdom and good cheer - or more importantly tell it how it is!

I'm at that stage in life where you wonder what's it all about - (Alfie) if your old enough to remember that ditty!

Comments

Then Shit Happens!

Mortification

Sombre

PS3 Widow

Valentines Day

40 something continued

Work

Happy 40 something!?