Dear Gail

Dear Gail,

Let me tell you a little bit about my childhood.

I was glad to sent of to boarding school, it was very scary from the very first moment, but at least the physical abuse I received there was better than the psychological trauma of home.

You suggest in your letter that perhaps I could have, or should of, told my parents what was going on, but in reality that wasn’t an option.  As it would have only reinforced my father’s already low opinion of me. Although once, just once, I did try and sort the situation myself. Though at the time I wasn’t sure what I was doing I just knew I had to get out and there was only one way to do it for a nine year old.

I had a best friend John, were really were best friends and despite us being so different in our respective disabilities so that we could do little together except talk and play board games we spent hours of each day together.

But for me, darker things were happening in that place and the voice in my head was always saying “run. Run as fast as you can – Get away!”

I couldn’t though, either physically or by telling.  After all who would believe me? Who would care?  My father certainly didn’t because I was a constant reminder to him of his own failure, the “little bastard” that came from his loins, but surely couldn’t have.

Still to my shame nearly 40 years later John was my way out.

We had a fight and I beat the crap out of him.  In our childish way with both figured that if we could force the school to get both our parents involved, then we must be able to do something right?  Our parents sitting in the same room as the headmistress, they’ve got to figure it out! Expel us! Something!

It didn’t exactly go like that.

Things went to far and with the adult eyes that are writing now I can see how much I hurt my friend.  Parents did turn up, but not mine.  All I got was a phone call from my mother telling me that my father said he wasn’t going to come all that way for a little shit like me.  To be fair it wasn’t my Mum’s fault, she was probably just as scared of him.

So there I was in that oak panelled room that was reserved for parents. The Headmistress, John’s parents, John my ex best friend and me – just me.

There was lost of weeping and tutting and sad faces.  As the old cliché goes I had brought shame on me, the school … And everybody else since the beginning of the world … But you know what? Though I dared not show it, I was jumping for joy!

John’s parents tearfully announced that they had no other option but to remove John from the school and find him somewhere a bit more local where he could go home at weekends.

John was safe.  I wasn’t, it just got worse.

There is so much more I could say about the lifetime of problems and consequences that have followed my five years at boarding school. It would be enough to fill a whole book, not just a letter.

But do you know what? At the end of the day, I’m just tired of it all.  I can’t change what has happened. All the counselling in the world isn’t going to make me feel good about it or accept it. Or as one absolutely barking woman once suggested help me “Claim Victory” over my demons …

They never really got to me anyway, cause I was smarter than that.

“Evil flourishes when good men do nothing”

I hope this clarifies your questions.

Kind regards

Harry

Beige Shoes

I was sixteen I was super fit, confident and set to conquer the World.  I had been offered a try-out for the England basket ball team, which was due just about six months later, to represent my country at the Paralympics in Los Angeles.  So okay I have one problem I use a wheelchair.

In preparation I went on an Outward Bound course.  You know one of those things where you are supposed to tramp through woods, climb trees and swing on ropes?  Well in a chair it was a bit different. The woods weren’t quite so woody and the swinging from ropes was purely down to arm power, but there were lots of fresh faced volunteers to help, it was okay.

I met a girl called Sarah, what my mates called a walkie talkie, on account of the fact that she could walk and talk fine – she wasn’t disabled.  Anyhow, we got close, a bit of romance: hand holding, furtive glances, embarrassed smiles with red faces, it’s a quite a common thing when you are sixteen apparently.

Man was I happy!

Then two days before we had to go home reality came along and smacked me upside the head.  It was a lovely day, but cold because it was at the end of summer.  The weak dappled sun shone through the leaves.

My friends, Sarah, some of the volunteers and myself had spent most of the afternoon lounging about in a massive cargo net strung like a hammock some fifteen feet off the ground supported by the branches of two oak trees that stood right in the middle of the woods.

We laughed and joked, shared contraband cigarettes, when teachers weren’t looking … and Sarah and I were teased and taunted mercilessly in the manner that teenagers do every time we tried to hold hands in secret.  The afternoon was drawing in.  The others decided to start making their way back to what was laughingly called our accommodation, a group of huts, outside toilet and shower block at the edge of the woods.  Sarah and I hung back a little from the rest of the group until they were out of sight and earshot.

We craved some time together, alone.  Mates are okay but sometimes ….

… We followed slowly after a time, but it was a struggle on our own.

The narrow track that was just barely wide enough for my wheelchair, ran along parallel with a bubbling stream its waters swelled with recent rain.  I know Sarah was doing her best.

Smack upside my head.

Mud, nettles freezing water.

Can’t move.  Can’t see.  Can’t breath!

The panic though brief was real.  It was mad, I couldn’t figure it out.  I was stuck, I couldn’t move.  My arms, which could lift twice my body weight with ease just that afternoon, were useless; I couldn’t find anything to grip on to.  My eyes eventually began to focus and I could see the bubbles dancing towards the surface, those precious bubbles of air.

Muffled screaming.

Sarah!

Fresh panic.

No, oh no.

I struggled with renewed purpose. Come on! Come on damned cripple.

Move!

A gentle hand cupped the back of my head and lifted my face just clear of the water. A familiar voice shaking with cold and worry questioned me with my name.

“Are you okay?”

She pressed her face to mine. Warm salty tears mingled with the water drops on my cold gasping lips. I couldn’t speak.

“I can hear the others”

A lumbering teenager, clearly still not used to his growing frame, moved into my field of vision on the bank.

“Help us!” Sarah shouted. This was not a request.

“What about my new shoes?”

“**** your new shoes just help”

I looked at the offending new shoes. Huh, brown leather, well, more beige actually.  That kind of beige that your Gran used to wear.  And no not even leather. Plastic!

I have never had such clarity of thought again.

In that briefest of moments I realized that the world is made up of only two kinds of people: Those who would risk there very lives for you if need be and others who would just stand on the bank and worry about their shoes.

I also appreciate how fortunate it was that my life that day was in the hands of someone like Sarah because it was clear to me then that I was no longer invincible and that chances were I would have to depend on people
for the rest of my life with beige plastic shoes.


I was trapped under the weight of my wheelchair.  The ‘raging torrent’ was only two feet deep, but trapped on my back as I was, the depth was enough.  Sarah held my head above the water until my wheelchair was hauled
up the bank and righted.

I was man handled up the steep bank by the rest of the group, but not the guy with the beige shoes, and rushed immediately to the shower block where both I and my wheelchair shared a warm shower.

Shock took over the rest of the week.  I didn’t see Sarah till the next day and when I did she looked scared, her eyes said go away.  To my deep regret to this day I did.  I stayed well away from everyone.

I was angry with myself for my own frailty, for my loss of invincibility.  I looked inwards for the confidence that was always there to draw on that never let me down.  But it wasn’t there.  It wasn’t anywhere. I took to spending time on my own, just trying to figure it out.

Sarah?  We never spoke again.  A friend got her number, but when I tried it the woman at the other end said she couldn’t help me.  Bet her shoes were beige.

I never got to Los Angeles after all, but that’s another story.