Empty Chairs

Empty Chairs

Christmas,
a time to remember
a time for those who are gone,
and those who cannot be here –
those familiar dear faces,
with the now vacant chairs
we miss those we have loved –
the absent and dead.
So raise glass with a tear
"God please keep them safe
those who cannot be here."

Annie Elliott

Asked if I ever had a hero, someone I looked up to in my youth, someone admired, I usually say no. I had one or two 'good' teachers, who taught well and whose lessons have stayed with me. One especially was the English teacher at Caludon Castle School, Mr Bennett, who gave me a love for Milton, but none were inspirational as role models. I had no school-boy 'crushes', I did not admire the athletic ones or the high achievers, for each one of us has some gift – why should one be favoured over another? But some people I did admire more than others: Victor Daniels who gave me my first freelance work, with huge encouragement; Sir Allen McClay, founder of Galen Pharmaceuticals and Almac Sciences, who took me on board as a pharmaceutical medic in 2003, and with whose companies I have worked ever since; but both these men are now dead.

Now too, we hear the news that Sister Wendy has died today. She I never met, but only admired from afar for her television series on art. The Sunday Times slated her once in a review, calling her an "old bat-like figure, fixated on Freudian imagery', to which I wrote a vigorous defense. The letter was published, and I had a treasured reply from Sister Wendy saying my words "assuaged the hurt". I thought that was a lovely phrase, and assuaged was a word I never used, but is now for ever associated with her memory. Alas, she stopped broadcasting after the criticism, for she was genuinely modest, and retreated to her caravan in the grounds of her Norfolk nunnery.

Another word I learnt, probably when I was but eight or nine years old, was from The Eagle, when Captain Dan Dare told Digby to press three buttons "simultaneously". This was a word never used in our household, or by any of my friends, and I had to look it up. I think this as much as Milton was the foundation of my love for our English language, its wonderful vocabulary and rich rhythms.

I think most of my heroes, even now, are fictional: people like Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls. He was everything I admired: a true professional and the best at the job he loved; loyal, trustworthy and honest. Even his enemies said he never told a lie; and even at the risk of losing his greatest bet, he won it with guts and integrity. A true hero.

Happy Christmas, and Peace Throughout the World

Ann on Christmas Day 2018

Happy Christmas!

Happy Christmas Day to all, and an especially happy Christmas to darling Ann, for all her support throughout the year, her special strength and nursing care over the last few months, and who acts as unpaid editor for these jottings.

This year, we have a Gay Pride Christmas Tree, chosen specially by Edwin, to celebrate human rights throughout the world (my interpretation!)

The burning witch within is well alight now - yesterday was my 14th treatment with DXT, with six to go. The burning is evident from the pain and dribbling, but at least it has a purpose. In Starbucks afterwards, someone rushed forward and gave Edwin a massive hug, while Edwin tried desperately to remember who it was. He was the former manager of Costa in Haverhill, where Edwin had been a regular customer. He'd been moved to Brighton but was now back running Starbucks in Addenbrooke's. "Get Edwin an extra grande latte with caramel shots," he ordered, "and charge it to the manager's account." Edwin didn't like to say that he also wanted a second drink and food for two, so we ended up having our snack at Costa. On the way home, we stopped at Wandlebury to walk the dogs. It was warm, bright and clean in the clear woods, and wonderful to take the fresh air after the stuffy treatment rooms of Addenbrooke's.

Edwin then told another 'story. A post-grad friend of his is currently doing some teaching, when a friend of hers requested that she accompany her to the STD clinic. Walking in, she was certain she would be confronted by a room full of her own students. Far from embarrassed, she told Edwin she would just be impressed by how mature her students were, and how sensible to be careful of their health.

Christmas

Today,
is His day,
named for Him,
A day of remembrance
for his Father's gift,
not wrapped up
in pretty paper and string.
I will stop for a moment
to remember Him.

Annie Elliott

At Christmas, it is time to remember empty places at the table. There are so many now (though some of them are missed for the wrong reasons, and with pleasure rather than sadness.) The Great X is determined to come and see me and will visit on my birthday. For the first time in 41 years, Lucy will not see her mother over Christmas, and the Great X will not be with her grandchildren. It is at Christmas that we especially miss our loved ones: parents, brothers, sisters, children. We remember the old times, the times past. We remember the fractures and disagreements. Following divorce from the Great X, each year on this one day, I felt torn from the children one inevitably leaves behind with divorce. For years afterwards, Christmas day was always a day of depression for me, and I could only slink off to bed in the afternoons. I still miss them, of course, the memory of their youth and happiness, captured in my book "The Magic Quilty". But now I go to bed not from depression – for they are fully grown with children of their own – but from illness. This year, alas, I feel too sick to take delight in food or chocolate, but the memories survive. May God bless them every one!

Drones over Gatwick

The news for the past few days has been filled with pictures of tired travellers frustrated by a single bit of plastic waste polluting the sky above Gatwick Airport. The police have arrested one couple, although it is now claimed they may have had good alibis and are released from suspicion.

Drone spotted near Gatwick?

Yet one drone was supposed to have circled the control tower to taunt the ATC people working up there. For all the hoo-hah, we have not seen one picture released showing the drone. Are there no cameras amongst these people? Usually we are overwhelmed by these poor quality pixelated pictures. Indeed, one story is claiming there was no drone! It was all in the imagination of the public!

Either way, even assuming the story is true, and the police do eventually parade someone without an alibi, we are told that "it is not terrorism", and the culprit(s) will only get short sentences. If the perpetrators were crying to their god as they brought disruption to the skies, they would have been accused and prosecuted as terrorists. The crime should be on the deed, not the religion or creed of the perpetrator, therefore it is the deed itself that should be deemed terrorism, even though the perpetrators may prove to be white environmentalists. The ultimate disruption to our integrated way of life is the same; the consequences for tens of thousands of travellers is the same chaos. Let the punishment be the same. These are terrorists, and shall be brought down, as they brought down so many flights. We are fortunate indeed that there has yet been no life lost from drones. The warnings are in place – let us trust that the responses are equally ready.

Death is in the air

Dead Flowers to mark the solstice

Yesterday, 21/22 December 2018, was the turning of the year, usually marked in our family with a small celebration. I always believe, marking as it does the ending of the year, that the winter solstice be of greater importance than its summer cousin. And believe me, 2018 has been a right bad year. So, despite knowing Ann always thinks of cut flowers as 'dead things' (see: pacifying-pilot), today I bought a bouquet to celebrate the death of the year, complete with Lilies-of-the Valley, white roses, and gypsophila to mark the passing of the year. I told Ann, "I know you don't like dead things, but I've bought you some flowers," and explained their symbolism in this case, but she didn't seem to believe me, saying "Only you could buy me something I don't like!"

It really has been a stunningly bad year for so many of us. Now we hear the announcement that Paddy Ashdown has died from bladder cancer. It was only one month ago that I wrote to welcome him to the BCB (Bladder Cancer Brigade, see: paddy-ashdown-joins-BCB). He was one year older than me, but he must have had stage 4 - that's the stage where they just say, "go home and keep warm."

Yesterday, too, Ann's friend Sylvia fell and damaged her wrist sufficiently for me to agree she should get it X-rayed and may need to visit A and E over Christmas! Her son-in-law is now so ill and debilitated with pain from the cancer of his face and DXT that he is wishing he were dead. Now, to add to catastrophe, comes in the report of a tsunami in Indonesia with hundreds dead. Another poor Christmas for so many.

Friendship

We are suffering here

while other lives go on,

we welcome not New Year

to pin our hopes upon,

instead, we live each day,

with friends we hold most dear

who offer their support

to share this pain we bear.

 Annie Elliott

This year has almost seen the death of Brexit as well. A satisfying article by Julie-Burchill in The Telegraph today, "Not even a Christmas miracle can save the sanctimonious, obsolete and Orwellian BBC". So many of us who voted 'out' are derided by the powers that be as intellectually lacking. The great campaign of fear that drove the remainers was one of the convincing arguments for me voting for Brexit. I hate being told what to do, and the more people try to scare me into something, the more I wish to rebel and oppose. To be coerced into remaining in Europe is the opposite of freedom - we heard not one word of all that is good in unity; there was no plea to higher causes or to the harmony of peaceful coexistence, or the sharing of historical ideals. If I had pleaded the Brixit cause, it would have gone very differently. Thank you Julie-Burchill.

Please add any comments if 2018 has been bad for you too

Mail to: Grandad.John@2from.com

Society for Acrimonious Divorce S.A.D.

Alan, Ann's cousin, added to his observations about difficult divorces. We know so many people who are going or have been through problems with divorce, he is considering starting a special group to meet and compare problems. It is to be called S.A.D., or the Society for Acrimonious Divorce. He plans to charge a small fee as a fighting fund, and members shall gather round the bar of their local pubs to discuss tactics in warding off the evil ones. Members can contribute towards Jamaican obeah if they want their Great X dealt with.

Two friends came round today for coffee, Robin and Yvonne, who live in Tilbury Juxta Clare. They are the parents of Sam, Mary-Anne's husband, and always full of interest and fun. Today they were telling about Robin's cousin, Paul, who had to have a cataract operation. He worked as a signwriter, but his sight was so poor he had to put stencils of the lettering on van sides, to paint through. After the operation, he could see well enough to paint directly as he used to. Another relative of Robin lives in Southend, and after his cataract operation his sight was so good he began to take walks to the coast to eye the girls in bikinis. He had forgotten how much he had missed seeing, and wanted to make up for lost time.

They were reminiscing about Tilbury Hall, when the lady of the Hall used to hold the Christmas Carol service in her home if the church was too cold. Yvonne described her as speaking in a voice that 'made Prince Charles sound common!' Now the Hall is enclosed by a high fence and the owners have shut out casual walkers with a locked gate across the old footpath. The new lady of the house is a chain smoker, who has a private helicopter and plane so she can continue smoking.

Please add any comments if you have been through an acrimonious divorce

One down one to go

Some good news this morning - I had a scan of the lymph glands in my neck, to check for any spread from the melanoma of the ear, and they are all clear! The doc didn't even find one big enough to biopsy. So that front's looking good – one cancer down, just the bladder to go. As a second bonus, I love to listen to Bach Before Seven each morning, as an oasis of peace before the madcap day begins. This morning it was Céline Frisch playing the third of the 48 on the harpsichord, which is the best way they should be played. Absolute bliss, joy and beauty.

We have Ann's cousin Alan staying with us this week. He's always interesting to talk to, full of stories and usually they're about strange things that have happened to him. His current saga relates to his former second wife, Iris, whom he's trying to divorce, though without much success yet. Iris is from Trinidad, the larger of the two Caribbean islands comprising Trinidad and Tobago, and he and she both starred in a TV programme about retiring to a dream home, when they looked at a potential house on Tobago.

Iris seems to be intent on dragging out the divorce for as much as she can screw out of Alan. This seems to be something she is professional at, as it's her third marriage, plus a number of commercial interests she has sued. They were only married for four years, and the divorce looks like it will take longer than the marriage lasted.

Alan's new girlfriend is from Jamaica, and very strong on obeah, or Jamaican voodoo. We think he may be leaving the Trinidad fire for a Jamaican frying pan - she's already referring to him as "her fiancee". She has organised various exorcism rites to rid Alan of the evil spirits within his soul (meaning Iris). Now she has asked if Alan would like Iris "dealt with". However, Alan has said only if it resolves the drawn out divorce – but a definite no if it involves anything violent! As Iris was his second marriage, the way it's progressing, for Alan too it's going to be one down and one to go!

Some other patients

My treatment was delayed as I waited whilst an ealier patient was wheeled through on a bed for his treatment. He was in a bad way, with bags attached that had blood-stained fluid collecting in them. He took a good half an hour for the treatment to his bladder.

Cancer

How hard to watch
                      the weakening limbs,
the sagging flesh and creasing skin
of a once strong granite stone
now cancer scorched
through to the bone.

by Annie Elliott

Another patient came in to sit with me, an American with a scared bald head from his chemo. He said, "what do you say when people ask how you are? I tell them, 'I've got cancer and I'm dying, how are you?'" I had no ready answer to this, but I know what he meant. He has a lymphosarcoma of the pelvis, with blood-spread secondaries. It is strange and sobering to know that most of the people waiting with me are at least as ill as I, indeed many are at a more advanced stage.

Another day, another cancer.