Stop The Fucking Cavalry

December 1979:

Walking home after window-shopping the post-Xmas sales. Late afternoon and it had been raining, so it was dark. I let two cars pass, then crossed the road. Somehow didn’t see the third. Glimpsed headlights from the corner of my eye. Half ran, half leapt for the kerb. The driver slammed on his brakes.

A jump-cut in my memory. The car must have caught my leg and swept me off my feet. I landed face first on the pavement. Tried to break my fall with my hands and lost the skin from my knuckles. Could see the tendons in my fingers. Front teeth cut through my bottom lip and broke. Left cheek scraped raw and pebble-dashed with grit. Right leg stiffened and purple with one enormous bruise.

No bones broken. Simple maxillo-facial surgery sorted out my scars. A few visits to the dentist and my smile was restored: crowned with porcelain. I remember he had a colour chart to match the exact shade of yellow.

One of my back teeth cracked beyond repair and required extraction. It broke in the process and the root was left behind. Despite a double dose of anaesthetic, it proved too painful to remove. So the dentist left it. He assured me it would erupt of its own accord and be more accessible.

All my girlfriend had to say was ‘ouch’. We parted company soon afterwards.

November 1980:

I thought I had a bad case of diarrhoea. But it persisted and I started to suffer heavy blood loss. At its worst, I was rushing to the toilet every two hours, night and day. I couldn’t eat and lost two stone in weight in two weeks.

Most people suggested it was delayed shock from my accident. My GP said it was colitis and referred me to a specialist. I was so ill, I doubt I would have lived to keep the appointment. The consultant visited me at home and immediately admitted me to hospital.

I was treated with a cocktail of drugs, diet, topical steroids and a constant drip to restore my fluids. All they succeeded in doing was to stabilise my condition, at best. When they took a biopsy from my bowel, I bled so much that I needed an emergency transfusion.

As my brain started to shut down from oxygen starvation, I saw a swirling corridor of light. Not a reassuring sight. Like staring into a waste disposal unit. I feared my ‘self’ would be shredded. There was nothing at the end but oblivion.

Yet, I survived. In the outside world, John Lennon did not. As I languished in my hospital bed, the ward radio played endless tributes and Christmas songs.

The biopsy revealed pre-cancerous changes. The diagnosis was ulcerative colitis or possibly Crohn’s disease. ‘We won’t know for sure until we open you up,’ the surgeon reassured me.

I consented to an ileostomy: the complete removal of my large intestine. A crude but effective ‘cure’. If I didn’t have a colon, it couldn’t be ulcerated.

At this time, I had a further cull of friends. It was disheartening that some had not even noticed I hadn’t been around for a couple of months. One girl in particular reacted badly and seemed almost nauseated by what had been done to my body.

But there was another girl who stayed by me. On the eve of my operation, she was so distressed that I ended up comforting her.

October 1981:

Reader, I married her. We moved to North London and I settled down to career and family. Got a job in local government and became yet another commuter. Whatever ambition I had possessed to be a writer was abandoned. Whenever I tried to delve into the well of creativity, I encountered that swirling void again.

I put it all behind me. Except, each December, when Christmas songs played on the radio, I was reminded of my mortality. If Jona fucking Lewie sings Stop the Fucking Cavalry one more fucking time…

June 2005:

Through the Friends Reunited website, I was contacted by one of the girls I had dumped. She saw things differently from me. ‘You were a sensitive, artistic young guy. Skinny, pale and scarred. A lot of women find that look attractive.’ After surgery, I had felt like Frankenstein’s Monster. If only I had known.

Also, after twenty-five years, my broken tooth began to erupt as predicted. I made an appointment to see the dentist, but had to postpone it. I was now a Manager and had to chair an important meeting in Manchester.

Two weeks later, I walked up the hill to the dental surgery. Passed the Tube station on the way and noticed a small crowd, but thought nothing of it. The extraction was routine. I was soon on my way home again, doing a Marlon Brando as the Godfather impression with a mouthful of cotton wadding.

The television showed news of several explosions on the London Underground. Accounts were confused, but I realised one of the bombs had been on the Piccadilly Line. The Line I took to work every morning. I could easily have been on that train.

Of course, the service was so regular that I could just as easily have been on the train before or after. One of my colleagues was not so lucky. He died at Edgware Road.

It would be too simplistic to end this piece with a few fatuous words about Fate or Destiny. I do not believe in those concepts. I can describe a series of events and connect them like a dot-to-dot puzzle. But the line is imaginary.

I quit my job and started writing again. Everything I have described above is true. But the writer imposes patterns upon chaos and perpetuates the lie that everything is somehow significant.

October 2010:

It will soon be Christmas again. And I will be reminded that it all ends in nothingness.