Reelin'
& Rockin'
By
Dominic Horton
Since
taking voluntary redundancy from work my shopping habits have changed
for the better as I am now able to visit the butcher, the baker and
the candle stick maker instead of nipping over to Tesco Express in my
lunch hour at work. The produce I buy from small businesses is
tastier, cheaper and fresher than its Tesco equivalent and generally
locally produced. I also have the satisfaction of my pennies not
going into the sky rocket of Mr Tesco, though his firm seems to be
ailing a bit at the moment, according to reports in the newspapers.
Like a Tesco pork chop, the supermarket's Chief Executive Philip
Clarke is expected to get a grilling from investors at their
forthcoming annual meeting.
 |
| An ASDA "Whoops!" discount sticker |
A
trip to Worcester last week to attend the opening night of the
Literary Festival reminded me that when I lived there as a university
student in my early to mid-twenties shopping was not always a routine
affair for me. In my second year of studies anxiety and depression
had crept up and enveloped me to such a degree that I was virtually
debilitated so shopping was an horrendous and terrifying experience
where danger and threat used to seemingly lurk on every aisle and at
every checkout. Food prices currently are such that the danger of
visiting a supermarket these days is that you will come away with
scant change from an Ayrton Senna despite only buying so few items
that they do not even fill your basket.
Such
was my fear of shopping as a second year student that I used to try
and visit the supermarket as soon as it opened or just before it shut
so it would be quiet but even then it was poisoned with shoppers. I
would have loved to be able to shop in an empty store, so Supermarket
Sweep would have been my idea of heaven, just without Dale Winton
smirking at me with his gleaming teeth and Persian orange boat race.
Sometimes the experience of shopping was too overwhelming and I left
the supermarket without buying a thing, not even discounted basil.
 |
| The Plumber's Arms, Worcester by request of Toby In-Tents |
My
mental condition became progressively worse and demons moved in with
me and they used to live in the shadows of the high corners of my
room and swoop down like bats, hovering above my head, whispering to
me in hushed, menacing tones. I called the demons the Lords and
they used to control me. The Lords wore suits and their main
function was to be the voices in my head. I didn't know I was
suffering from extreme anxiety and depression at the time (amongst
other things most probably) or even that I was ill but I knew that
things were drastically bad and that I needed to seek help, from
somewhere, from somebody.
The
Lords and I decided to call an Emergency General Meeting to discuss
the crisis but we only just managed to scrape together a quorum as a
few of their number had nipped out to the local pub, the Plumber's
Arms, to torture other mental illness suffers drinking there. The
Lords had to do such bits of moonlighting on the side as apparently
their remuneration for being voices in the head was not very good.
When they popped out to the Plumber's they promised that they would
be back soon and that they would not have a pint but they had been
gone a while. All that malicious whispering in my ear must be
thirsty work so I guessed that they had got stuck into the best
bitter. The remainder of the Lords and I decided to plough on with
the meeting without them.
 |
| The opening night of the Worcester Litfest with the back of the author's head (my best side) in the bottom right of the picture |
A
motion was proposed that I should venture out into the daunting world
beyond the house to obtain help. The motion was passed with a
majority vote. It was not a unanimous vote as one dissenting Lord
(there is always one as they say) protested as he was concerned that
if I got better they would have to move on to be the voices in the
head of another poor soul, which he did not want to do as he said
that I didn't shout and scream at the Lords as much as other people
that they have plagued over the years. I took his point and treated
it as a back handed compliment but the other Lords at the meeting
shouted him down and said that above all else they didn't want the
union on their backs for negligence of a victim. They went on to
explain that even the voices in the head game had become increasingly
PC in recent years.
I
had previously seen a poster in the University that said that they
had a counselling service and I noticed that one of the counsellors
was a lecturer of mine, named Ellie, so I plucked up the nerve to
book an appointment with her as she seemed a bit less intimating than
most other people in the world. The Lords decided to stay at home
using the thin excuse that they had to listen to Gardener's
Question Time on BBC Radio 4 as
one bloke from down the Plumber's that they were filling with
trepidation was a horticulturist and they needed relevant subject
matter to torment him with.
I
didn't know what to say at first when I sat in front of Ellie despite
her kindness, empathy and humanity so I just decided to cry instead,
blubbering out the odd word here and there. The seat was a
comfortable one near a window ledge, which held a plant like an
aspidistra with stiff, pointed leaves. The sharp leaves of the plant
were digging into the back of my head but I was too helpless, timid
and overwhelmed to ask if I could move the seat so I just put up with
it. So to compound my mental cataclysm I was also being attacked by
an irritating triffid.
On
Ellie's suggestion I called my doctor who booked me in to see an NHS
counsellor but I had to return to Halesowen to do this. The night
before getting the train back I had just about as much as I could
stomach of the Lords and to block out their sickly voices I guzzled
down half a bottle of whisky and played Chuck Berry full blast on a
loop on my headphones. When I saw the counsellor the following day
she wasn't named Maybellene or Carol but I did tell her that I was
Reelin' and Rockin'.
The
counsellor found me too hot to handle so she referred the Lords and I
onto a psychologist called Dolf, who was a cheerful middle aged,
balding South African with a convivial countenance. Given the
graveness of my situation my first appointment with Dolf seemed too
light-hearted and I thought that if he was going to try to make me
better by just being jolly that it was not going to work. After a
string of sessions with Dolf he declared in his expert opinion that I
was sufficiently recovered so like a dove of peace he released me
back into the world. He summarised his thoughts with the brief
advice, “remember that you are a good person and be brave.”
“That's it?” I thought, as naïvely I expected Dolf to cure me.
After periodic courses of therapy over the years, it finally dawned
on me that I could not be cured, but that I could adequately manage
my anxiety. It was only recently that I began to realise the wisdom
and relevance of Dolf's concise words.
Despite
my best efforts I have never been able to completely shake off the
Lords and periodically they stop by to see me. But their visits have
become less frequent over the years and they have gradually been
replaced as the voices in my head by the utterances of the inmates in
the public bar of the Flagon & Gorses. On return to Worcester I
noticed that some of the city had changed. There were some new
buildings, others that had changed use and some pubs had closed down
or been re-named which is not a prudent move as we all know that
changing the name of a ship or a public house brings with it an ill
wind. But it was essentially the same old city and despite a bit of
mental tinkering and fine tuning here and there equally I am still
the same Dominic Horton. And despite all my flaws and shortcomings
I wouldn't change who I am for the world.
©
Dominic Horton, June 2014.
*
EMAIL: lordhofr@gmail.com.
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