The Best of Times, the Worst of Times Page 6

  Now I decided to go away, to escape, to give myself some space to think things through in a distant place. I wanted to get as far from Australia as I could, so my final destination became the island of Inishmore off the Galway coast, where John Millington Synge wrote Riders to the Sea. I have a photo of myself and the three little girls on the day I left. I am thin and unsmiling, neck ropey and strained, tired, tired, tired. The children look unusually neat, but uncertain, serious. I had to go. I knew, however, that I would be back. Nothing, however terrible, would ever persuade me to abandon them—I adored them.

  Saturday, 25th. Sitting looking over the North Atlantic Ocean in the Inishmore graveyard that dates back six thousand years. The grey tidal sand, the weed on the rocks, the silence but for the keening bird calls, the wind in the long grass. Nothing seems to matter here. I am too far away to care on this poor, desolate, barren, unspoilt speck of earth. Now the sun of early afternoon has gone and a ceiling of low cloud hangs over me. A light rain has begun to fall and a cock is crowing. The nettles have stung me and the bike has cut my ankles and its seat keeps pinching my bottom. A man has just ridden by on a wreck of a bike, a bag of what looks like liver swinging from the handlebars.What was it Yeats wrote when he visited the Aran Islands? ‘Even the gulls rising and falling as they fed, had that unreal look, that look of being beyond the ramparts of the world.’ Beyond the ramparts of the world. That’s where I am. That’s why I came here.

  I was away nearly a month and thought some healing had occurred. But the question of how things would progress once I arrived back home scared me. There were no certainties.

  September 6th. I’m feeling very unsettled, flat, see myself outside my body ‘making an effort’.How will I be when I get home? Will I be able to preserve and draw on the strength I have gained these past weeks or is that strength an illusion? I don’t know anything anymore. The Furies are tugging at me, pulling me into the abyss.

  When I returned home, I tried to be hopeful, tried to shake off the desolation that wouldn’t go away. Why couldn’t I ‘get over it’? What was so precious about me? Others would have moved on by now, I thought. I wrote a story about Ireland for Qantas and they accepted it. I put the new flight miles away for future use. I began a new term teaching creative writing at WEA as I had done for some years and, putting on a good face, struggled on.

  Monday, 10th. Terrible weekend. What am I trying to do? Desolate. Still feeling shaky and tired now. Relax. Is there some personality defect that I cannot surmount? I’m writing this while my class is scribbling away on the exercise I have set. Feel physically exhausted. Body and mind pulsating. I long to be out of it. Out of it.

  It’s so obvious. It’s clear as day now. Sure, I had my share of personality defects, but this was a deep, unrelenting depression that I could not struggle out of alone. I urgently needed help.

  I finally decided that the secrecy of my self-inflicted loyalty was killing me and went to see a doctor. He was a kind man, but not a psychiatrist. He arranged to see me, as often as I wanted, during his lunch hour. He was appalled at what I told him and gave me pills to help me cope. This went on for about a year. I took the pills haphazardly and wandered around half-stupefied.

  By then my Claudia was ready to start school and I decided to look for a job that took me out of the house more. Through word of mouth I applied, and was accepted, for a position as a guide at the Sydney Opera House. It was ideal, being shiftwork, so I could arrange my hours around the needs of the children. Once I’d learnt the spiel, I realised that it would not be very stimulating, but going every day to that glorious site in its unique setting was a privilege. I had only been there about three weeks when things came to a head at home. I told my husband the marriage was over. It had become unendurable. He left. Jessica was ten, Harriet was eight and Claudia was five. I had to tell three bewildered and devastated little girls that he would not be coming back, that I had not been able to make him happy. It was not until they were adults that I told them the full truth. Like a mantra, I repeated all the clichés about how he loved them and would always be around for them. To his eternal credit, he has been, and they love him dearly.

  I never demeaned him in front of the children and I think that is why their relationship with him is so strong today. It was my unfortunate but loyal friends who now had to bear the brunt of my overwhelming rage and grief. It was as if all the years of bottling up my feelings had caused my insides to be polluted with pus that I had to vomit up lest I be poisoned. Like the Ancient Mariner, I bailed up anyone—those who wanted to listen and those who did not—and spilled my guts, particularly at night on the telephone, when I used the gin to get the maximum effect from the Serepax. I was losing control.

  I slept very little and ate even less. I usually fell asleep at about four in the morning and was up by seven to get the children to school and go to work. For a time, the Opera House guides were my salvation. There was a frenetic type of gaiety there. AIDS had barely been recognised yet, and many of the young men were gays who were revelling in the first flush of gay pride and, indisputably, promiscuity. One young man carried The Joy of Gay Sex under his arm as he led his tour groups around the Opera House. He wasn’t going to let any opportunities slip past. I read it and goggled in innocent amazement. He was one of the kindest young men I have ever met. He’s dead now.

  The children loved it that I worked there. They would come down on the bus after school if I was working late, run and play around the water’s edge, come around on tours with me, do their homework in the Green Room and, if I was ushering, as I sometimes did, they were smuggled into performances. The other guides spoiled them with treats from the bars and made allowances for me if I had to change my shifts because of them.

  But the depression did not lift. The miles I walked on the seven or eight 50-minute tours a day exhausted me. Sometimes, at the end of a tour, I could not remember having done it all. I was unhealthily thin but could barely eat as I had no appetite and my sense of taste had gone. My stomach constantly churned with anxiety. I swallowed pills like lollies. I had no idea where I was going. I only knew I had to hang on because of the children. They were the only thing that mattered. I tried to keep up a good front, hoping they didn’t know how desperate I felt. I was afraid I had ruined their lives.

  December 2nd. Are there the words? Sisyphus … forever to push up the hill and forever to fall down again. I pull away. Ashamed, guilty at my inertia. Can see from the girls’ faces they can’t understand what is happening. Neither can I! Their energy, busyness, innocence mock me, assail me with despair. There are no words.

  I became good at compartmentalising myself. There was the work me, the mother me and what I now think was a pathologically grief-stricken me. The last me came out of her dungeon late at night or when the children were away with their father. All the real or perceived hurts of the past overwhelmed me and I was so angry I could have killed. Someone? Myself? I was an ugly and unstable person.

  Saturday night. Drawn to the box with the tablets. So afraid I might pick it up and take them all. Desolation. Will it never end? Will I end it? Oh, God, help us all, we legions of frail and frightened human beings.

  Without my sense of love and responsibility towards the children, as well as the steadfast loyalty of a handful of dear Penelope & Jessica Rowe friends and two aunts by marriage who refused to be put off by my behaviour, I would have killed myself at that time.

  Jessica: I knew something was terribly, terribly wrong but had no idea of the extent of Mum’s despair. I’d lie in bed and hear Mum sobbing herself to sleep each night. I was ten years old. My bedroom was right next door to hers. Night after night, I’d creep out of bed, walk quietly along the floorboards in our hallway and press my ear to Mum’s door and listen to her weep. I was so unsure about what to do. Shocked and scared, I couldn’t bring myself to open her bedroom door. But at the same time I found it almost impossible to tear myself away. The sobbing, such a sound of desperation, was so different from
the mother I knew in the daylight hours. At other times in the middle of the night, Mum would be on the phone, talking to people. I’d press my ear even closer to her door, straining to hear what she was saying. Who was she talking to? I could only just pick up snippets of her conversations. I could hear fragments, ‘When did it start?’ ‘But he’s really like that.’ ‘No, No, No.’ It didn’t make any sense to me. I was determined to grab on to anything, any clue, to help me work out what on earth was going on. Eventually I would give up trying to make sense of these bizarre conversations and sneak back into bed. I’d wrap the pillow around my head to try to block out Mum’s voice. When that didn’t work, I would curl myself up into a tight bundle, willing her to stop that strange talk. It was impossible to go to sleep until I knew Mum had stopped crying. The voice I was hearing on the other side of the door did not belong to the mother I knew when I woke up. She gave me kisses and cuddles and looked after me. Who was this scary, crazy woman on the other side of the bedroom door?

  These dark nights came soon after Mum and Dad split up. It was a lonely, sad time. I felt so lost and confused when Dad left, because I had no hint that there was any tension or trouble between my parents. There was never any fighting or loud, angry voices. I had no idea that things were going so wrong for my parents. I thought they were in love. Dad showed me how much he loved Mum when he painted a big red heart on the wall he was painting in our new house. As he painted over the heart, with more paint, he told me his heart belonged to Mum.

  I was blissfully unaware of any strife between my parents even when Mum headed overseas to catch up with friends in Ireland. A part of me thought it strange that she was leaving Dad behind, but she explained that someone had to be around to look after us. When Mum returned after a few weeks, I was excited to hear her stories of Ireland, the home of our ancestors, and to listen to the Irish ballads that Mum would play loudly on the stereo. I found myself singing along to the mournful tunes, as Mum gave me a condensed version of the history of Ireland. I felt protected and safe in my little world now that Mum was home again, oblivious to the pain and sadness that was about to fall heavily on to our family.

  I’ll never forget the day Dad left us. He took my sisters and I to see Star Wars . The three of us were so excited to be going to the movies. Then he dropped us home and said: ‘There’s something I have to do.’ He never came back. We were sitting on Mum’s bed, asking when Daddy was coming back. Mum had the awful task of telling us that Dad wouldn’t be coming home. Harriet and I started crying. Claudia, the blonde, sunny baby of the family, started singing to us: ‘When you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands. When you’re happy and you know it, and you really ought to show it, when you’re happy and you know it clap your hands.’

  We were all crying, as our five-year-old sister tried to cheer us up. She didn’t have the words yet to describe how devastated we felt. Claudia didn’t understand what it meant —that Dad would not be coming back home. She remembers thinking that if she was really good and happy then life would return to normal and we’d be happy again. This little girl thought if she was perfect it would be enough to glue us all back together.

  Soon after this disaster, I decided to run away. I thought if I disappeared that would be enough to make Dad come home, look for me and then I could persuade him to stay. I walked out the front door, wearing my backpack. Inside it was an orange, my Barbie doll and a couple of books. As I headed towards the end of our street, I started to feel very scared. Boy, this was a much longer walk than I’d expected. Thoughts started racing through my head. ‘What if Mum and Dad couldn’t find me?’ By the time I got to the end of the street, I had changed my mind. Perhaps if I just prayed really, really hard, Dad would decide to come back.

  I started asking Mum, why, why, why did Dad leave us? I wanted to know the answer. She would explain that they had stopped loving each other, but they still loved us. It didn’t sound like a very good explanation to me, but it was the line Mum was sticking to. Thankfully, our parents never played the blame-game, or used us as pawns and bargaining chips—even though it must have been hard to resist the temptation.

  We settled uneasily into a routine of staying with Dad every second weekend, and having dinner with him once a week. Holidays were usually split between the two of them. Pretty soon, we had to start sharing Dad with his new girlfriend, Lesley, and her son, Angus. I wasn’t happy about that at all. I felt I’d lost my father, and I wasn’t ready to be sharing him with anyone. Naively, I thought if I was really awful, Lesley would go away and then Dad would come home. It became my mission to sabotage every outing we had together. First I would sulk and refuse to talk if Lesley asked me a question. If that failed to get Dad’s attention, crying seemed to be another good option. Then I became very clingy with Dad—I had to sit next to him, he had to hold my hand. No, he couldn’t hold Lesley’s hand. That would be enough to get my tantrums going again.

  Looking back now, I cringe at my behaviour. But, at the time, I was so angry at the disintegration of my family. I wanted Mum to be happy again. I didn’t want to hear her tears each night. So my outbursts became the only way I could cope with this awful, terrible situation. I turned into an angry, unpleasant little girl who found screaming and crying was the only way to let out all of this hurt and despair. I wanted Dad to know how much pain he was causing his girls. Thank goodness my antics didn’t frighten Lesley away. She and Dad have now been married for twenty years. She’s a wonderful woman.

  My parents splitting up forced me to grow up. Before, I used to be a nervous, timid, shy little girl, happiest clinging on to the back of Mum’s legs and hiding behind her if other people came up. When Dad left, I felt I couldn’t be this frightened girl anymore. It was time to show my younger sisters that I would look after them. I thought this might take the pressure off Mum. Maybe it would be enough to stop her crying at night. So, after school, when the three of us walked home from the bus stop, I would piggy-back Claudia when she was too tired to walk anymore. I would also take Harriet’s hand to make sure we all got home safely. There was a book I used to read called Big Sister, Little Sister. In it, the eldest girl took care of her sisters. I was going to be just like the girl in the book.

  Chapter 5

  ‘But I don’t want to go among mad people,’ Alice remarked.

  ‘Oh, you can’t help that,’ said the Cat.‘We’re all mad here. I’m mad.

  You’re mad.’

  ‘How do you know I’m mad?’ said Alice.

  ‘You must be,’ said the Cat,‘or you wouldn’t have come here.’

  —Lewis Carroll

  Jessica: About a year after my parents split up, Dad and Lesley took my sisters, my step-brother Angus and I on a skiing holiday. I decided not to sulk this time. I was too excited about seeing snow for the first time. About four days into the trip, the manager of the lodge came rushing down to our hut. I heard him telling Dad to phone home straight away.

  ‘Oh mate, there’s a strange message about a fire at the girls’ house. You need to phone your ex-wife.’ Dad 64 quickly went up to the manager’s office, while I was left standing outside the door of our room. The word ‘fire’ kept rushing around my head. Was Mum all right? I kept looking around for Dad, and the minute he walked out of the office I ran to him, ‘Dad, Dad, what is going on? Where was the fire? What about Mum?’

  Dad wasn’t very clear on the details. He said that Mum wasn’t well, and we should head home. I had visions of our house being a smoking, blackened wreck. When we got home, there was just this singed circle on the back fence. Mum wasn’t there. She was in hospital. What was going on? It turned out the fire started after a motorbike was left on the back fence. I think this small incident was the last straw for Mum.

  My sisters and I went to stay with Dad and Lesley and Angus. Dad explained that Mum was in hospital because of a ‘nervous breakdown’. I wasn’t sure what that meant. Of course, we wanted to see Mum straightaway. That first trip to hospital was like an adventure
. I had to take my sisters on a bus and train to get there. We all felt excited, embarking on this long journey on public transport all on our own. To stop the bus you had to reach up and pull the cord, but I wasn’t tall enough to reach it. I was frightened about having to stand on my suitcase to reach the cord. But being the eldest, I knew it was up to me to get the bus to stop. As I climbed on to my case I felt my face getting hotter and hotter, my hands were sticky as I reached for the cord. Phew, I managed to get it, without falling off my case. My sisters were looking up at me. I gave them a smile and grabbed their hands as we stepped off the bus. Suddenly I felt very grown up.

  I wasn’t anxious about seeing Mum. At the age of eleven I didn’t understand what ‘psych hospital’ meant, so there were none of those loaded feelings and emotions that many people feel when they visit a mental hospital for the first time. The hospital looked similar to the one I’d been to when I had my tonsils out. The main difference was that there was no medical equipment around. So I wasn’t frightened when I knocked on Mum’s door, with my two sisters standing just behind me. When Mum opened her door, she looked pale, but she was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. I thought she couldn’t be too sick, because she wasn’t in her pyjamas. I couldn’t wait to show off to Mum how well I was looking after my sisters.

  ‘Oh Mum, guess what? We got the bus and train here. It was really exciting. Dad said he would come and pick us up. Is that your own bathroom? What’s that outside your window?’

  I was too busy chattering away to notice that Mum was just lying on her bed as the three of us charged around her room. I had no idea how sick she really was. I thought she was just having a rest in hospital. After about an hour, Mum walked us to the front door of the ward, as we waited for Dad to pick us up and take us back to his flat.