Pain – Of Glass & Paper

Gnomes 2

I am now certain “they” are out there, and getting closer. Can their intentions be good? All day, unless I play, I hear muted shuffling noises, little sardonic giggles, low whistles. They are mocking me, taking advantage of my present confusion. The terrace may be swept clean for now, for how long?

I could try to trap them, but would it be wise? What I really want is them to go away, to leave me in peace, to let me recover my mental health. And then this: I fear they are acting on orders. I dare not imagine on whose orders, horror. Today the rain stopped, the air is clean and colder. I savour an instant of silence. Perhaps they fear cold. Perhaps they are busy tormenting another poor soul. I have wondered if they feel threatened by beautiful sounds, by music. Or is it just that, when I play, my mind is off the hideous creatures? This is it: I must try harder not to be obsessed by them.

… Last night I saw her, the red-dress temptress. I recalled, vaguely, our first encounter, although I don’t remember where that was, other than it wasn’t here, but in the city. The temptation was pointless, for I am too tired, too overwhelmed by all the changes, the fear, the pain, to be interested in anything, or anyone. Only the music, and the clouds can now move me. But I tried, foolishly, to find out. About them. She pretended not to understand, and she disappeared quickly. Of course, they may well be her creatures. And this was a bad omen. I have been found, located, “they”, and their mistress or master, know where I am hiding.

But I won’t give in. I have weapons, and reliable friends. I am not finished.

No change, just pain #fivewords

Weekly Writing Challenge #137

Archangels_in_Emly

The Devil really has few tricks in his bag: so there is no change, just levels of pain, another turn of the screw, in full view of the world…

But something is on the move: an army of Archangels?

Image: Archangels in St Ailbe’s Church, Emly. From left to right: Gabriel, Michael, Raphael, source

A quiet spirit #fivewords

Inspired by the Secret Keeper’s weekly writing prompt#108

tumblr_oud9qxmqdo1rkh6xoo1_540

He kept seeing himself, in his youth, through dreams that did not have the shape of memories, in a role of a quiet spirit, an observer of his past life. Only near dawn, did the spirit at last morphed into himself, an old man lying in pain, aspiring to peace…

Picture: Gaston Xhardez, “Création”, photomontage, 1958 – via les-sources-du-nilles-sources-du-nil.tumblr.com

Pain #WritersWednesday #fifty

Immobile, his thoughts a long, grey meandering: pain boosts his melancholy – a writer’s block in reverse… For there is much new to express, and so many ways to exercise style!

For sitting is now a torture, slow and methodical, preventing art for art, but still imagining horizons ready for discovery.

#BlogMeMaybe: May 8 – May I tell you something about myself?

Guilt

Crash

In “On Writing”, which is also a concentrated story of his life, Stephen King describes how, while on a walk, he was run over and nearly killed by a mad driver. I too brushed with death in a car accident, some twenty years ago. And it was my fault: a brief loss of attention, tiredness, the usual story: that evening I should not have been driving at all. But I don’t not want to tell you, reader, about the circumstances. All car crashes are, in some way, due to one main reason: being there at the wrong time. What still interests me about that crash is the way rehabilitation came, the slow journey to recovery, mental and physical.

First there is a sense of guilt, of utter responsibility: the other driver I could have killed, his family, my family, my employer, whose car I wrecked, mankind in general. And of course there is the pain, the multiple fractures, the painkillers, the gloomy hospital wards, what one reads, or thinks one reads, in other people’s eyes. The first year is plain hell: guilt, pain and remorse. Concentration is impossible, there is always a loop back to that instant: the fraction of a second when it happens, when all goes dark. Sleep, normal sleep, is an old memory, now is the time of awake nightmares, restarting anew every night.

In the second year rehabilitation is merely a dream. But there is at least a chance to start exercising again, slowly, to walk, to read a bit. The shame is there, the fear of being damned, the total loss of confidence. There is also the realisation that “going back to normal” will not happen. The new normal is this: not only remembering, but having the accident constantly in mind, as a tune for ever imprinted in one’s skull, never escaped from. Another year goes by, work has changed, real world events unfold, people die. Slowly the awareness of the triviality of one small incident grows.

And then new habits are created: the daily life become a series of small exercises, attempts at recreating an order. Over a decade the body adapts, the pain is still there, but diffused, some strength comes back, and with it some confidence. And, today, I think I was just plain lucky.