Back me up, Dave
There was a point in the past, before my daughter was born when I came truly to believe that I had lost my grip on reality, or gone completely around the twist.
How else could I explain how I saw things?
What person would truly treat the person he professed to love in the way I saw myself being treated? If it was impossible that I could be treated in this way, and yet I saw myself being treated this way, or if being treated this was was perfectly normal and my reaction to it was abnormal then either way I was on the verge of being certifiable.
Before we married, when he apparently couldn't bear the idea of us parting but wasn't yet ready to migrate we struck a deal to stay in Europe for a few years before settling in Australia. I made it abundantly clear that I had no intention of staying in the UK for the long term and that he had to be prepared to move. He said he was.
And yet here I still am, all these years down the track, lumbered with the only man in England who would not grab the chance for a life Down Under (even if reality turned out to be not all beer and barbies, afterall).
He would tell me something and stick to it long after it had become abundantly clear that the truth was otherwise and he would do so with such a determination that it seemed impossible he could be lying. A liar would not lie such a stupid lie, one in which he could so easily be found out or exposed, so he couldn't be a liar.
That was the sort of logic with which I tortured myself.
Inevitably this process was corrosive to my soul, to my self-esteem. It took an exceptional catalyst, a huge effort of will and a modicum of luck to drag myself back up from the abyss without hitting rock bottom. The baby came along just in time. Simultaneously I found myself at work in a supportive and encouraging environment from which I could draw new reserves of confidence and hope.
I had been reduced to working as a secretary (with all due respect to secretaries, many of whom are bright and hard working and vital to the well being of the organisation within which they work, but it was a step backwards for me) but for an immensely open minded boss who could see that I had things to offer the organisation but needed to be placed elsewhere to offer them.
He floated the move to the fee-earning side and I ran with it. Without his support and his knowledge of the workings of the Firm the move might never have happened and I'd probably not be alive today to write of these things.
He and the others around me helped me believe in myself again. While off on maternity leave I went on my voyage of discovery around the house. I found the documentation relating to the share sales and knew that I had not been going insane. With this proof acting as cement everything has held together ever since, through all the difficult times.
In the midst of the pregnancy and early months at home we took in a guest, one of the Fat Bastard's drinking mates who had been kicked out by his partner. His name was Dave. He was (and hopefully still is) a very short and very pugnacious Northern Irishman. He and the Fat Bastard went drinking every evening when they were not working the night shift on the way home from work at the pub in ______ over the road from the railway station.
One night he came bursting in, charged up the stairs to the lounge room and ordered me to say not a word. A short while later the Fat Bastard came in and up the stairs.
"See, I beat the bus" or something similar Dave said to him in a mild tone and we got some rigmarole about the bus journey.
The moment the Fat Bastard stopped talking Dave laid into him at the top of his lungs in that distinctive Ulster accent of his.
"You lying ******* ******** ****** (etc, etc). I saw you get out of the taxi round the corner. You're a lying ******* ******* **** (etc, etc). Why do you ******* do it?" and so forth and so on for quite some time.
The fat bastard just stood there at the top of the stairs in the door way leading to the lounge with the blank resigned look he adopts when he's getting the truth aimed between his eyes.
I lent Dave £300 just as he was leaving us, I think to get things sorted with his partner, and I never got it back. Right now and as much as I could do with the money I'd forgo it for a few words from Dave to confirm the gist of the above story and let me know what squalid story or stories lay behind the anger. Come in Dave, all is forgiven.
How else could I explain how I saw things?
What person would truly treat the person he professed to love in the way I saw myself being treated? If it was impossible that I could be treated in this way, and yet I saw myself being treated this way, or if being treated this was was perfectly normal and my reaction to it was abnormal then either way I was on the verge of being certifiable.
Before we married, when he apparently couldn't bear the idea of us parting but wasn't yet ready to migrate we struck a deal to stay in Europe for a few years before settling in Australia. I made it abundantly clear that I had no intention of staying in the UK for the long term and that he had to be prepared to move. He said he was.
And yet here I still am, all these years down the track, lumbered with the only man in England who would not grab the chance for a life Down Under (even if reality turned out to be not all beer and barbies, afterall).
He would tell me something and stick to it long after it had become abundantly clear that the truth was otherwise and he would do so with such a determination that it seemed impossible he could be lying. A liar would not lie such a stupid lie, one in which he could so easily be found out or exposed, so he couldn't be a liar.
That was the sort of logic with which I tortured myself.
Inevitably this process was corrosive to my soul, to my self-esteem. It took an exceptional catalyst, a huge effort of will and a modicum of luck to drag myself back up from the abyss without hitting rock bottom. The baby came along just in time. Simultaneously I found myself at work in a supportive and encouraging environment from which I could draw new reserves of confidence and hope.
I had been reduced to working as a secretary (with all due respect to secretaries, many of whom are bright and hard working and vital to the well being of the organisation within which they work, but it was a step backwards for me) but for an immensely open minded boss who could see that I had things to offer the organisation but needed to be placed elsewhere to offer them.
He floated the move to the fee-earning side and I ran with it. Without his support and his knowledge of the workings of the Firm the move might never have happened and I'd probably not be alive today to write of these things.
He and the others around me helped me believe in myself again. While off on maternity leave I went on my voyage of discovery around the house. I found the documentation relating to the share sales and knew that I had not been going insane. With this proof acting as cement everything has held together ever since, through all the difficult times.
In the midst of the pregnancy and early months at home we took in a guest, one of the Fat Bastard's drinking mates who had been kicked out by his partner. His name was Dave. He was (and hopefully still is) a very short and very pugnacious Northern Irishman. He and the Fat Bastard went drinking every evening when they were not working the night shift on the way home from work at the pub in ______ over the road from the railway station.
One night he came bursting in, charged up the stairs to the lounge room and ordered me to say not a word. A short while later the Fat Bastard came in and up the stairs.
"See, I beat the bus" or something similar Dave said to him in a mild tone and we got some rigmarole about the bus journey.
The moment the Fat Bastard stopped talking Dave laid into him at the top of his lungs in that distinctive Ulster accent of his.
"You lying ******* ******** ****** (etc, etc). I saw you get out of the taxi round the corner. You're a lying ******* ******* **** (etc, etc). Why do you ******* do it?" and so forth and so on for quite some time.
The fat bastard just stood there at the top of the stairs in the door way leading to the lounge with the blank resigned look he adopts when he's getting the truth aimed between his eyes.
I lent Dave £300 just as he was leaving us, I think to get things sorted with his partner, and I never got it back. Right now and as much as I could do with the money I'd forgo it for a few words from Dave to confirm the gist of the above story and let me know what squalid story or stories lay behind the anger. Come in Dave, all is forgiven.
posted by Enyo @ 12:56 pm
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