Two Rooms One Lifetime

God

Chapter 1

I’ve had a perfectly wonderful evening.

But this wasn’t it.

Groucho Marx

Two rooms mark the beginning and end of a lifetime, within my lifetime.  If a cat can have nine, I’m allowed at least a couple. I haven’t had a near death experience or become born again, nor found the real me, (as I hadn’t actually lost the original one) but this has been more than an episode or chapter of my life, it is definitely a lifetime.

It is also a time where I received many unexpected life lines, catching and holding on tight to every one offered.

Two rooms mark my entry and exit; similar in many ways but total opposites in others. Not least, my hosts, one the state through special order only, the other a holiday company booked by choice.

The layout and furniture in both rooms fulfilled the basic needs of its visitors. They had the luxury of an en-suite and the décor had been styled floor to ceiling from the B & Q magnolia period. The vinyl flooring, was a symbol of the new environmental and recycling movement, where a layer of wet vinyl had been laid down, and the offcuts of a confetti factory scattered all over it and left to dry. No pattern, no design, no softness of carpet, just a hard wearing colourful floor made to hide scuffs marks and be washable regardless of whatever landed on it.

There was limited storage space, some shelves and bedside cupboards. The foam mattresses on the bed, resembled concrete slabs, hard to the touch but surprisingly ok for sleeping. They were covered in bed linen starched to within an inch of its laundered life, which was pleasantly cool but warm.

At the end of Room One was a window with no openings or curtains, just blinds fitted between the double glazed units. At the end of Room Two, a sliding door opened onto a patio, with an inviting panoramic view of the land unfolding before the eyes of the viewer. There were curtains and blinds hanging free, waiting to be opened or closed by human hands, be it sunrise or sunset.

Room One was stripped bare; with only furniture that you could walk to, sit or lie on. There was nothing you could pick up, tie up or free up; even the bed was moulded into the floor, the en-suite designed not to require a shower curtain and with just one towel, the only moveable object.

Room Two had all the luxuries of home, bedside lamps, curtains, and mirrors even a kitchenette with all its shiny and sharp utensils. There were pictures on the walls, a telephone, TV, table and chairs, wardrobes, coat hangers and a trouser press.

In Room One I was a patient - in Room Two a visitor.

The most profound difference between the two rooms was the Front Door Key. In Room Two it was mine to use as and when I wanted, lock the door or open it, stay in or go out.  In Room One, the door was permanently open, free for anyone to walk in or out, with the main door on the ward being locked and alarmed. Walking out of there through choice brought a thunderclap of running feet and shouts which corralled the walker back into the ward.

Two holidays from my life, one enforced, one by choice, one alone, one with a friend, one full of heartache and fear, the other full of laughter and love, one without freedom, one with complete freedom. 

My arrival at Room One in the summer of 2005 was the result of a collision between the worlds that made up my life. The worlds of my childhood, adulthood, motherhood, which had all hoodwinked me into thinking that I was an ok, normal and ‘able to handle whatever life threw at me’, kind of person. I had always said I’d love to have a nervous breakdown and a holiday for a few weeks, but I don’t have the time. The irony of the adage ‘Be careful what you wish for", is not lost on me. Mother Nature in her wisdom had decided enough was enough and that something had to stop and that something was me.

So with no travel agent, on-line comparison site or baggage charge (even though I had collected a huge amount of it throughout my forty five years), my holiday began. I was making my own way there which meant no queues or passport checks. It was all organised and I didn’t even realise I was going away.

Life was normal. I worked for myself as a Training Consultant, between my job, children and house I was a busy person and as it was coming close to the school holidays feeling tired and worn out was to be expected. The sleepless nights however, were more frequent, my level of aches, pains and clumsiness were higher and my racing thoughts were riding roughshod over any rational ones. The pace of my daily life was getting faster and faster. 

Like the racing cars on a Scalextric track, that had got stuck in the groove. I was zoning in on the crash barrier, picking up speed until I careered into it, smashing through it, cartwheeling in the air, landing, bouncing and tumbling to a standstill.

In real life it was a policewoman that brought me to a halt. I was driving late at night and was pulled over, and as the police officer came to the door, I burst into tears and couldn’t stop. I can’t remember what was said, only her kindness at putting me in her car and taking me to the station. I don’t remember anything else until my sister walked in to collect me in the morning.

There must have been a moment of lucidity, however, in that time, for me to give them her phone number. Other than that, my usual clear mind was a bubbling quagmire of rotted memories, a mental quick sand, where I was rapidly sinking.

When my sister arrived, I was hiding behind the door in the station office and wouldn’t come out. The police officers were trying to encourage me out but my sister knew from years of experience that I was crap at hide and seek so she just needed to come in and get me. She did, and instructed me, as only a big sister can, to get up and come home with her. Like a good little sister I did, my brother-in-law taking my car home as I went with my sister.

Even at this stage I didn’t understand what was happening, I was still under the impression that all was ok, she however, knew otherwise. In the car on the way home, I was a human version of the nodding dog in the back of her car, talking to her one minute passing out the next, then bouncing back up again.  Tempting as it must have been to drop me on the hard shoulder to play hide and seek with the cars, she didn’t, bless her, and brought me home. My niece was there to greet us and I remember the joy at seeing her. We chatted - rather, I rambled on and on while they tried to get me to lie down, to rest.

I didn’t want to go to bed and I couldn’t rest on the settee so we tried to lay out in the garden. The sun felt delicious - all ten seconds of it, because I was up and walking about again. Eventually they played their trump card and said it would be better to go up to bed because the kids would be back soon and will worry. I was up those stairs like a rocket.

My bedroom was a good size double room at the front of the house, bright and light with fitted wardrobes running along the length of the wall opposite the bed. The wardrobe doors had panels in them and once in the room I traced each individual door, each individual panel, mumbling and talking to myself. I opened one wardrobe to take things out and then the other to put things away. I stacked up, racked up and measured up, various personal things in the corner all neat and tidy covering them all with a throw. I stopped only when my children came into my room and I spoke calmly and perfectly lucidly to them.  When they left I dropped onto the bed and zoned out, only to bounce up again and complete the military styled inspection of my bedroom.

I put a pair of pants, a summer dress, toothbrush (no toothpaste or any other washing kit!) and a packet of chewing gum in a little handbag - for someone with enough baggage to fill a plane, I was travelling light.  Changing out of my clothes, and removing my makeup I donned my pink stripy pyjamas bottoms, put on the matching white t-shirt top with a bear on it asking for a hug, then laid down on the bed knowing my time was coming. 

I was now strapped in the Scalextric car, the door locks were on, no one was at the controls, and the ejector seat was jammed. The bend in the track was looming up fast, I could feel it, taste it, see it, and was about to fly off it.

Having always suffered from migraines I was used to head pain, but this was beyond my normal endurance. Every cell in my brain was boiling, and the heat, pressure and resulting pain was excruciating.

When my boyfriend arrived, although relieved to see him, he had to approach the bed like a lion tamer, step by step until he could sit on the end of the bed. His mere presence in the room put too much pressure in my head, just as a balloon bulges when you press it on one side, I felt my brain press and bulge against my skull. It was beyond pain, an agonising electrocution as the voltage was constantly being turned up.

He said I needed to go to hospital and I said I know the game was up. I made him promise me that he would not let them medicate me; I did not want any medication. This I was adamant about. Why, I don’t know, we weren’t a family of pill poppers and I am not anti medication, but this was crucial to me. Promise not to let them medicate me. It was a plea, a demand and a last ditch attempt to have some control over my life and he, like any normal person in times of crisis, made a promise he knew would be broken. This was serious and help, in whatever form, would be given.  Seconds later I heard the sirens of the ambulance