It’s that time
again. Letter comes in. Visit the clinic. It’s getting on for mid-July, so I
forecast rain. In the week leading up to this appointment, I have to drop the
news on a carer. Once I know who that carer is. It’s holiday season, and carers
disappear…
They are replaced by strange faces on a
daily basis.
Unless…
They are replaced by the non-regular
regulars. These carers come in and cover other shifts so regularly that they
are unofficial regulars. I have no hope of seeing a regular face for the bulk
of the week. My one chance is to catch an unofficial regular.
Yes, I can phone it in to Carer HQ – located
deep in the Amazonian Zone. But I’d rather not. If all it takes is a quiet word
with a face in front of me, I’ll opt for that instead of a phone call.
The face in front of
me is an unofficial regular, and she’ll be covering the day of the appointment.
I explain the difficulty. Clinic visits are so far apart that, the last time
one was arranged, there was no clash or conflict with the daily carers coming
in. There weren’t any daily carers coming in…they popped in three days a week.
Eventually, that low frequency rose to
daily. The last clinic appointment happened on an off-day. This gave me added
complications, but I sailed through those at the time. Now the task is simple.
Can the carer arrive early on the day of the appointment?
Yes.
Sounds easy.
Anything could happen. Luckily, I was up at the crack of dawn…as was the
carer…and we had our rendezvous at the appointed time. Pills were out of the
way by then. All we had to do was run through the routine of heading up the
stairs to the bathroom. Then I’d tidy things downstairs and double-check I’d
left plenty of time.
A joke. We’re never
seen on time at the appointed hour.
The carer comes and
goes. I started arranging the big thing the night before. This clinic trip
involves a wheelchair and it is better to send the wheelchair down the ramp.
The alternative is to escort the passenger to the wheelchair out in the street
and then faff around in all weathers getting into the wheelchair. I prefer
option three: teleportation.
Strangely,
teleportation is off the menu for technical reasons of science and shit. (I
looked that up on the Wikipedia™, and I’m talking word-for-word explanations
here.)
Okay. For reasons of
science and shit, we don’t teleport there. The best of the worst options is to
get into that wheelchair first and then wheel around the house to the ramp. I
start with the ramp. It’s in two parts. Main ramp is heavy, metal, will slice
your fingers off, and barely fits at the front door.
Back door is no
good.
The other part of
the ramp is for the inside stage of the journey, up out of the house and over
the threshold to the exit ramp. And this smaller ramp is heavy, metal, will
slice your fingers off, and barely fits at the front door.
Back door is no
good.
I retain all of my
fingers after placing the ramps. It’s a long struggle with the seatbelt, but
the seatbelt is important. There’s no polite way of getting out of the house. I
offer a choice. Outside going forward or outside going back. It’s important to
offer a choice.
The cared-for
chooses wrongly and decides to go out facing the world. There’s a slight bump I
can’t control from where I’m hanging on, and you can hear the screams for a
mile.
But that’s it. We
are off, on time, and with no rain falling. It’s going to be close. The trip is
a weed-strewn affair, and I dodge Triffids at every turn. There is,
surprisingly, one turd of dog on the trip. Turd of dog is skilfully negotiated.
I don’t have what it takes to count insect turd, so we gloss over that
nonsense.
More options. This
open road approach, or the windy path. The road is chosen. Zero traffic, so we
are all good. The place is dotted with lowered pavements. First one we choose
is the worst-maintained in the whole country, of course.
Another scream for a
mile after the mildest of bumps.
Now the hard part. A
stretch of road. Empty. In clear conditions. Good light. Nothing coming. Steady
visibility ahead. We’ll see it coming, whatever it is. Or…find a lowered spot
of pavement, and transfer back to safety – the safety of a really shitty
pavement.
I take the risk of
sticking to the road, and I stay off the moor for fear of being bitten by a
werewolf. This happens out there in the wilds more often than they are letting
on.
Soon enough we are in the wilds. Away from
houses and twisty paths and roads, we disappear under the edge of the woodlands
that surround clinics all across the globe. Dogwalker says hello. There is a
chance to return the greeting, but the cared-for was distracted by the dog.
The trip is quick
enough that we’re on time. Me, the cared-for, and the wheelchair. In we go.
There’s a duel as a motorised wheelchair comes out while we head in, but I use
driving skills to avoid the crash. Then it’s the assault course of doors before
we reach the combination clinic.
Ever since the amalgamation, the clinic
space has been shared with drug addicts. You see a younger type of customer in
the waiting room. Those clients head left and we go right when the time comes
to split up. Telephone chatter from reception tells me the doctor isn’t even
in.
Well, what did you expect? That we’d be seen
on time? The telephone chatter shifts, and the receptionist reports that A
PERSON is ready to see another person now. The person share’s the name of a
computer game character. We’ll just say LARA CROFT for reasons of anonymity.
I was raiding a tomb recently, with Lara
Croft. Not sure if the game would operate well on my computer, I downloaded the
sample that lets you play the start of the game. Computer games are there for
me on occasion. They are late affairs, when almost all of the caring is done
for the night. If I don’t feel tired and I haven’t an early appointment to see
to, I’ll finish nightly routine and then game on a bit after midnight.
Well, I raided, I tombed, and the game
worked. But I knew I wouldn’t have the time to play the full thing…so it could
wait until next time. Whenever next time is. I’ll buy it eventually. Fit it in.
Winter is a time for raiding tombs, not summer.
I stare out of the window at weather that
refuses to break into rain. Okay. I can go with that non-flow. There is water,
though. I stare at the table. The table has a small jug on it. Paper cups. She
won’t want a cup of water, will she?
The young couple sitting amidst the other
cluster of chairs? Boy and girl are the only customers here. Until the arrival
of a more familiar duo. No, I don’t know the new people. I recognise the
pattern, though. Younger person (carer) and older person (cared-for) come in
and say hello to my mother.
She acknowledges them. Maybe she’s just
tired, but she isn’t very interactive. That can be the sign of a crash, an infection,
or the hard reality of being awake all night. The older man offers my mother
water after complaining about his floating head…a side-effect of the pills.
My mother foolishly accepts the water. The
older man’s arthritis kicks in, spraying rain across the table. He retreats to
the toilet for paper to mop up the mess. The drink is handed over in passing.
My mother samples her drink and makes a face. Apparently, she expected milk.
Even though she saw the water being poured.
Routine. Expectation.
According to plan, just then, going by
routine, the doctor walks in. I have to time this right. He checks in with
staff and marches to his office at the end. It’ll take him a short while to
fire up the computer in there. I wait for the arthritic man to return. Arthritis
inevitably slows him. Now I can head to the toilet and ditch the cup of water.
I am back in time for the doctor’s reapparance.
We get through it. I make a note of the return appointment and consider the
weather we’ll face then.
After that, we
reverse the film and make our way (mostly) back the way we came in. No young
couple. Arthritic man is gone. There are two new faces in the chairs. Familiar
patterns. I stare at familiar patterns on the walls and floor and wonder why
hospital décor is chosen to be as sickly as possible.
I’m offered a detour inside the clinic almost
immediately, but I stick to routine. A phantom whistler dawdles behind us and
vanishes. She’s more chatty on the way home. We near a fence with foliage
sticking through and she trails her fingers against the leaves.
I seize this interactivity and change the
route slightly to take us closer to plants. Not jaggy plants. I steer from
those. But she likes trailing her fingers along plants, and naming them, or
talking about other things. It doesn’t rain. Instead, the sun pokes out from
behind giggling clouds.
Strangely, we are almost overcome by jungle
– and crap pavements – very near the end. But we survive the ordeal and I
assemble the ramps again. This time, the inner ramp sits under the outer. I
struggle to make it indoors. Next time, I’ll remember the more efficient method
of getting back inside – hire four sturdy wrestlers to carry the wheelchair in.
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