Halcyon Days? Better keep your head down.

 

Were you ever bullied at school? I've been victim and perpetrator, both are inextricably linked. 

It's winter, 1969. A skinny twelve-year-old high school girl – let’s call her Judith - paces along the footpath next to the tram tracks. She's on her way to the bus stop around the corner; on that particular day, a very long block away. She and a quiet companion, Jill, in grey school tunics and blazers, are just ahead of a hunting pack of vixens from their class. Jill, stares ahead, solemn-faced, despite knowing she isn’t their target. The pack taunts and brays at Judith. 'Whaddarya? Cow! Think you're too good? Not so tough now!" Judith's hunched shoulders and white face betray her fear as she hurries along, hefting the weight of her enormous grey vinyl school bag.

The day before, their form 2 teacher had needed to leave the classroom. Before going, she’d handed a pupil, Laureen, one of Judith’s primary school friends, a piece of chalk instructing her to write on the board the name of anyone who talked while she, the teacher, was out of the room.

The class erupted into chatter once the teacher was out of earshot. Laureen joined in the fun, daring with her powerful chalk, cheekily writing names to peels of laughter and protest, then quickly dusting them off. It was fun. Unfortunately, Laureen hadn’t removed one name quickly enough. The teacher returned and on seeing it reprimanded the whole class and gave them detention the following afternoon.

As they left the classroom that day, Judith gave Laureen a harmless push. Well, Judith had been ‘going with’ Greg, whose name was left on the board and who’d been singled out for a vicious, undeserved telling off. As his girlfriend at the time, it was her duty to stick up for him. The detention meant they’d miss the dedicated school bus, have to walk a couple of blocks to the bus stop and get home an hour later than usual. So unfair!

Judith, twelve, oblivious, had poked a bear.

Next day, a miasma of menace swirled through the classrooms and the B block corridor where they had their lockers. It snaked around her. Now, Middlemarch, not Laureen, was the unwitting offender. How dare she have pushed Laureen who’d only been having fun? Who did Middlemarch think she was? She should be taught a lesson. “Hey, no one talk to Middlemarch, that’ll teach her; that’ll teach that smartarse bitch. Hey, let’s get her after school. Yeah!”

After the detention on her way to the bus stop, Judith knows she’s in for it. There’s no escape; no rescue. Jill is keeping out of it and daren’t draw attention. She’s brave even walking next to Judith. Judith is defenceless.

The pack was straining to give Middlemarch what she had coming.

One of the pack broke ranks and overtook Judith on the footpath. Brenda, with her sharpie swagger and hitched up school tunic, seemed to be walking ahead. Suddenly she turned. Smiling, she sashayed back and slapped Judith hard across the face with an open hand. Judith felt the sting on her teeth and her eyes filled with treacherous tears. Jill said nothing. Stunned, only faltering slightly, they continued their determined march towards the corner bus stop. Once there, Judith, heart racing, knees shaking, was backed up against the shop window. surrounded by vicious, slavering teen-girl delinquents.

“Throw down your bag and fight! Whaddarya? Chicken! Fight! Bitch!”

Clutching her bag, trying to look unfazed, Judith held her ground despite her trembling legs. She dared not move, waiting for the pack to attack and rip her hair out. Fortunately, sticks and stones didn’t break her bones but the words left permanent bruises. Eventually the bus arrived and Judith scrambled on, sitting at the front near the driver to avoid the scowling mob who’d sauntered to their usual back seat. With snarled threats and insults, one by one teen girls alighted at their respective stops. Judith’s was last and she was home free.

The threat passed and within a few weeks the pack, the curiously attractive rough girls, had another victim lined up in their sights. Anne hadn’t done anything, but she’d unconsciously entered no man's land merely by being in that school corridor at that age – twelve, thirteen - and somehow being noticed. Parting her hair ‘wrong’, wearing her school uniform wrong, being quiet, being loud, being dumb, being clever, looking at something? “Whatcha lookin at?” Who knew? Getting above herself, not quite understanding the vagaries of pubescent etiquette, Anne, too, needed to be knocked down. Judith, subdued, had watched from a safe distance across B Block locker bay as a mob formed, hoping for an impromptu bash-up before third period. Judith didn’t step in to help her primary school friend, Anne, whose blonde hair framed a face drained of colour while Sharon stood over her, berating her, wanting to fight. Judith was simply relieved it wasn’t her.

So here I sit, 54 years on, wondering why I’m attending the 50-year reunion of that high school where I formed those hellish memories.

Sugar, by Carly Nugent

I’ve just read Carly Nugent’s Young Adult novel, Sugar. Its protagonist, Persephone, aged sixteen, is initially bleak, confused, desperate, isolated and flat-lining with grief. A boy at her school has called her a cunt, she’s punched him in retaliation and they’re both suspended. She wants to understand why she deserved this appalling label from someone she barely knew and determines to find out. She also discovers a dead woman on a bush track and feels a connection with her. Persephone wants to understand what thirty-year-old Sylvia had done to deserve her death, believing this will somehow explain her own feelings of guilt. 

Persephone is the only child of Demi, also struggling with grief since the death of her husband, Persephone’s father in a car crash, twelve months earlier. Persephone had collapsed at his funeral and was subsequently diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. In her grief, Persephone conflates both events. She feels responsible for her father’s death which she irrationally believes she caused. Diabetes is her punishment.

Demi and Persephone are temporarily providing refuge to Iris, a nurse and her son, Steven, both sheltering from a violently abusive man. Nugent sensitively examines the dangerous attraction of such 'love'. 

Through these and other characters, Nugent deftly explores grief, teenage angst, domestic violence and relationships...

And did I forget to mention WHAT IT'S LIKE TO LIVE WITH TYPE 1 DIABETES? This was the thing for me. Diabetes is as much a presence in this narrative as any other character. Author Carly Nugent, herself living with Type 1, nails what it is to live with this dark passenger, with whom I've travelled now now for more than forty years. If you've ever 'sympathised' with someone's diabetes - 'oh, you poor thing it must be awful!' - or casually dropped some remark like 'my friend's dog died of diabetes' or suggested that a person with diabetes should eat lemons or cinnamon because it cures diabetes or... I could go on with a whole conference full of crap that I've endured over the years, you should read this book. Let Persephone enlighten you.

Not only is Persephone dealing with one of the hardest things for anyone to suffer, the loss of her father and all the other issues that beset any sixteen-year-old, she also has Type 1 diabetes as a constant companion. Diabetes, the needy child who never grows up and moves out, constantly ready to potentially kill you if you don't keep your balance on the tight rope, a metaphor which Nugent uses in Sugar.

I've often been grateful that I wasn't diagnosed until I was twenty-five. I had my own demons during my adolescence and diabetes would have been the perfect weapon against my family or myself. Type 1 diabetes is best held in check by obsessive routine. Even so it's a constant challenge. Nugent seems to encapsulate all of this in Sugar, where each chapter begins with a blood glucose value. For me, this added another layer of tension, knowing what I know. I was desperate to advise Persephone and save her, so real was she. 

I was totally immersed in Persephone's world. The characters were credible, the story beautifully written, including a great exploration of the power of the 'c' word. I could see the bush tracks along which she 'escaped' with her dog, Hermes. I've read books and seen films about Type 1 diabetes, but this is the first I've read that really connects with my own experience of living with this particular chronic illness.  

Warm regards, Carly Nugent. If I could have found you on social media I would have dropped you a line.

Correction: the dog's called Berenice, not Hermes 😊

Still putting the P in procrastination

 I sit at my desk ostensibly to do this week’s German homework; meine Hausaufgaben – my home tasks. Focusing on homework, when I eventually start, is mindful and has led to me swanning confidently around Berlin, interacting quasi-fluently with the locals.

I sit at my desk to work and I’m instantly distracted. Through the window my garden courtyard in the sun winks; beckons. But if I go out there I won’t get even halfway through my coffee before I’ll be disturbed by needy weeds and a lawn begging to be mown. At least pulling weeds I’ll be absorbed for the ninety minutes or so before my back requires rest and ibuprofen.

Sit at my desk, side-tracked by Blu-tacked notes and cards.

In front of me, a photo -card hangs on a lanyard. Al W. Athlete. Basketball. Australia. World Masters Games. 2017. My Al W. husband; beautiful human. Lifetimes ago. Tears.

Another card: RAIN. An acronym.

Recognise what is happening. I’m ruminating on Al; what’s befallen him. For no reason other than it was written in this chapter of the book of his life.

Allow the experience. Crying. I cry. I allow myself a few seconds of tears.

Investigate with interest and care. Life sucks. Parkinsons Disease. Lewy Body Dementia. Why wouldn’t I cry? I’m crying for both of us. Al doesn’t. He shrugs. Why him? Why not him? He said that when he got prostate cancer too. Not long after those Masters Games.

Nurture with self-compassion and care. Yeah, yeah. Poor me. It’s okay to cry, but crying doesn’t really work for me. Doesn’t provide any catharsis. I’ve stopped now anyway. I’m regularly astounded by my adeptness at putting one foot in front of the other. And weeding.

Another card: how do you eat an elephant? Bit by bit. This prevents overwhelm in my German language learning.

Another: perfectionism is the mother of procrastination – as is looking up quotations about perfectionism. Rather than writing that novel, memoir or even blog post. Too true.

Up high another card reads: Das ist mir Scheißegal. Quite a coarse German expression which I quite like. Google translates as ‘I don’t give a fuck.’ I think it sounds better in German.

Nietsche is there on another card:  …ce qui ne me tue pas me fortifie. That’s French for what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.

Now about that homework.