Dear old Oscar, that’s Wilde to you lot, once
said, “With age comes wisdom, but sometimes age comes alone.” So as time passes I do seem to accumulate
more wisdom, I even believe that I understand why the double top secret cabal,
preparing me to take my rightful place as High Chief of the Clan O Neill and
therefore the true King of Ireland, would make me write this blog. It’s not so much the writing of it that is
important but the responses it draws from you lot, The Illuminati. Many of you
will already be saying okay, it has to be that Colonialist again, what’s he
done now? So, see, even you lot are
accumulating wisdom. Colonialist hasn’t
really done anything that bad, not this time anyway. It’s the emotional damage he
causes that perhaps is the worst.
Here’s poor little old me, pouring my heart
out, explaining the trials and rigours I had to face, simply so that if any of
you poor souls had to face a similar situation you might be prepared. I’m only sharing information, preparing you
for what might happen, baring my soul to ease your pain should you ever need it;
meanwhile Colonialist suggests that I should have been committed to one of the
remaining nuthouses. I know; many of you
will be shocked to read that I was, but my time in the nut houses in Liverpool
has yet to come. I don’t mean I’m going
there, I mean I’ve been. The Florence
Nightingale Hospital in Liverpool, Fazerkerly secure unit and Ashworth high security
psychiatric hospital in Maghull. Where
else did you think an individual with a skill set like mine would end up?
It is quite obvious that the double top secret
cabal want me to understand that each and every one of you is an individual,
that you all have your own hopes, and dreams, and aspirations and that most of
you should be locked up. I can
understand complaints about bullfighting, as I am sure many of you can. Harming donkeys too is a shameful and
barbaric practise but I never, not even in my wildest dreams, expected to be
challenged to a willy measuring contest, by six of you. Especially with one of those six being a
female flavoured woman. Perhaps those
six, and the wimmen in particular, should be considered for nuthouse admission
rather than my good self. Not wanting to
be seen as a spoilsport I would suggest that venue should be the gentleman’s
toilets in the Philharmonic Rooms in Liverpool, deemed to be the grandest gent’s
urinals in the world. A pub in Liverpool
with a cathedral at each end of the street should satisfy even the worst
Heathens among you.
The toilets in the Philharmonic Rooms are world
famous; why they are famous I’m not exactly sure. They look like marble but are actually ceramic
and the best story about them is that they are meant to be exact copies of the
toilets from the Titanic. In fact there
is a suggestion that they were stolen from the shipyard while the Titanic was
being built. Highly unlikely as the pub
was built in or around the 1900’s while the Titanic was built, in Belfast,
across the feckin Irish sea, in 1911.
But why let a bit of geography get in the way of a good story. I’ll contact each of the participants
individually and arrange a suitable date, tickets will go on sale about ten
days before the event. I’m sure no
matter what the outcome we shall all wake up the following morning with sore
heads following a decent night of pillow abuse.
I suppose that is how many of us felt when we
were roused at six o clock on the Monday morning with the old two stroke razor
reverberating throughout the hospital. I
really did find my emotions swinging between two extremes. On the one hand I couldn’t stop laughing at
the memory of the Welsh preacher calling for the Lord and his angels on high to
sweep the ward of evil while at the same time feeling sorry for the poor old
fellow as his actions were only a physical manifestation of the turmoil within
his head. He must have been so confused,
but it’s hard to feel compassion for someone when you are laughing so
hard. The nursing staff weren’t really
trained for such a situation and they gently coaxed the old fellow back in to
bed. He lay there, or sat there, groaning
and snorting while I kept erupting into sporadic fits of laughter.
The second time he woke us all up it wasn’t as
funny. He was still as animated and as
manic but this time the staff manhandled him and his bed out of the ward where
he spent the remainder of the night parked by the nurses station where they
could keep an eye on him. It’s nice to
be woken from your slumber with a breakfast trolley being wheeled to the bottom
of your bed, very civilised. It’s not so
pleasant to feel absolutely exhausted after what should have been a decent night’s
sleep. Whether it was having your blood
pressure taken or you sins expunged there was always something happening. The morning routine began and in a way I was
looking forward to the day as it was a Monday, a working day. The routine on the ward would be back to
normal and something was bound to happen.
It was then that I realised that I had been in hospital
for a week, I could see my stay being extended, I held my breath when I thought
of those people who had said they had been in for months at a time. I didn’t like the thought of a long stay in the
hospital although I did want to get fixed or as the medics said, cured, not that
I was a side of bacon. The phlebotomist
came and went as did the girl with the towels and toothbrushes, the magazine
fellow, the sweet trolley, even the pill trolley made an appearance and then we
had Doctors rounds. If only we had been
in the Philharmonic Rooms and it was Adrian buying everyone a drink, I would
have looked forward to them. Only one of
the pretty doctors came to see me, she didn’t waste any time. “We’re letting you go home today,” she said,
at which point my mood lifted somewhat. She explained that most of my ‘levels’
were back to, or almost back to, normal and that I would be continued to be
tested but as an outpatient.
I allowed her to finish and then asked at what
time would I be ready to leave the hospital.
“Between two and three o cock,” she said, so I thanked her and began to
make arrangements to be picked up. I
sent Irene a text message and explained that I would be ready to come home at
three o clock that afternoon. I then
began to gather my stuff together and noticing that the bathroom was empty went
off to give myself a good scrub from head to toe. I was back on my bed pulling on a clean set
of clothes when a nurse approached me and explained that they needed my bed,
would I mind clearing out and moving to a waiting area. It was eleven o clock in the morning and I didn’t
fancy sat sitting in some high backed uncomfortable chair for four hours so I
asked her, in her opinion, what time I could leave the ward.
I was surprised when she said that I could
leave right there and then if I wanted but the only factor, that was beyond her
control, was my medication. I could always
leave and come back later for the medication if I wanted. My medication may have been outside her
control but it wasn’t outside mine. I
asked if I arranged transport for twelve o clock, one hour away, if that would
be okay, she said yes. “Aoife!” I called,
as the curtain was drawn back. Aoife
came in to the ward and stood beside me.
“Any chance my medication will be ready in forty five minutes my dear?”
I asked, and with a smile she assured me it would and went off to get it. I then sent another text to Irene explaining that
the plan had changed. I would be ready
to leave the hospital in one hour, as we lived a thirty minute drive from the
hospital, I didn’t think it would create any sort of problem. My escape wasn’t planned with military
precision, close, but no spot prize.
One hospital rule was that I had to have a porter
take me to the front door of the hospital in a wheel chair. This was hospital policy and I still couldn’t
walk very far so everyone was happy. He
turned up at a quarter to twelve as did my medication and without further ado I
left the ward. It was nice to get out in
to the sunshine and fresh air. The porter
took me to a bench near the front entrance and I sat myself in the sunshine
hoping that no one would notice I was wearing slippers. Irene is a very pretty woman so it’s very
difficult for her to think about things and remain pretty at the same time. So it was no surprise to get a telephone call
asking what was happening. When I
explained that I was sunning myself outside the hospital she got very angry and
started telling me off for releasing myself from hospital, for a hospital would
never ask anybody to leave. Thirty
minutes later they pulled up and loaded me in to the car but the telling off
continued. The hospital would never ask
anyone to leave a bed or a ward, it was all my fault. My fault!
I had been sat sitting in bright sunshine, relaxing and enjoying myself,
harming no one, yet I was being told off for it. As we drove off I began to miss the ward and
wondered if I shouldn’t have stayed for another week or two.
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