The old man in the house- Copyright Robert Fullarton 2014

The old man in the house-

Copyright- Robert Fullarton 2014

My three sons laid me on a bed, a little bed with broken springs that slumped in the center. Despite all this the bed, however has always been a great help to my condition, for my spine has become used to such low lying beds. I had been sick for years and the condition had deteriorated greatly, I had to sacrifice my work in the legal profession, tender my resignation, quit the ship and take my leave. My three sons would stand at the end of my bed and often pander about, dealing with the daily chores of a sick old man. They would wash my brow, give me three spoons of the toxic medicine and effectively deal with all the matters of my estate.

I had the strength to leave the bed, but my condition was frail. I would suffer an attack on any average day, I could only gaze at the world from my window, or imagine as best I could the days gone by, the days of self-control, youth and the wild-abandonment to my career and this cost me the love and affection of many people.

One day when my carer came to visit me…I told my story to him, he confided and I recounted the crises that surrounded me, for the first time in my life, I discovered that I had a soul and had decided whether it would do me any good, to confess my fears and my concerns to the good natured and attentive carer, that had been sent to me faithfully each week by the hospital.

He wiped my brow and sat beside me, preparing medication and the medicine into a sickly sweet teaspoon, a dose too much for me.

He was focused on the task at hand, but occasionally his eyes would stray to mine, from their focus.

“You know your sons are very good to you.”

“Yes, I know, especially Mark, the oldest.”

“Do you know how good you have it!”

“I once thought I had everything, but now I am more dubious about life now,”

“Are you frightened now, that you are sick?”

“I could bluff in life, once I had my energy and my senses. It was easy to make money, once I could use my brain and my resources. I think I am doubly afraid, for my health and my family.”

“Why are you afraid of your family? Are you concerned for them in any way?”

“I’m not afraid of them. I am afraid of my neglect for them.”

“I think they very much love you, they have doted on you, sacrificed time and work for your safekeeping,”

“I think its more duty than love on occasion and sometimes its love, more so than duty. You see I drilled it into them, the importance of duty in life. Told each boy, when the time came, to seek full and ample employment in the best sense, to grow up and to obey the duties of life and I was hard on them, especially when they were children, because trying to balance both a fully-fledged legal practice and the demands of a household, got my nerves in knots and shreds, Too much time for others, clients and acquaintances and nothing for self-reflection or artistic perfection- a phrase I once coined for a client. To be honest, I think that they are acting and they have been doing it for so long now that they perhaps do not even realise that they are acting in the first place.”

“Lie back and rest, why should a retiree worry about such trivial matters?”

“I cannot live in the world and let things just go on by themselves, they spiral out of control?”

“What spirals out of control?”

“The world does doesn’t it? Doesn’t it remind us that we are part of it, that we are spiralling too, in perplexity.”

“It need not, it is the enactment of an ancient sickness that goes on in the world, and it takes each man the light of his own conscience to guide him through the dark. If you are a man of faith then you get down on your knees and pray, if not then you wade through it all, you will have to wade through it regardless, but if you have faith then you have perspective.”

“Says who? Anyway what is a carer doing talking about the secret business of faith?”

“To care for you on your sick bed, to hear your testimony, to wash you down, to wipe your brow, I work voluntarily and often live for paltry pay, mere bread and water in comparison with most, but I made that choice and I certainly don’t regret it. Ahh! Youre feverish again, your temperature has risen. Just relax I will give you something to help you sleep. Plenty of hot lemon, fruit juice and plenty of sleep will do you good”, he said all this while he read his thermometer and placed it back in his medical bag.

“Why do you have a doctor’s bag?”

“It’s not a doctor’s bag, it’s an ordinary toiletries bag, but I filled it with equipment from my home. I am a male nurse, not just a carer. Yes, I do this work voluntarily, but I also work for the hospital just up the road, I do my time and get my wage. But I enjoy talking with the needy and sick, I enjoy hearing their stories.”

“Sounds to me like you are a priest hearing their confessions and performing the last rites on each man.”

“No, that’s not the way it is I am not a man of the cloth. I am bound though as a human and spiritually to break bread with these people, to sit with them and listen.”

“Break bread?”

“Yes, metaphorically, I seek a sort of communion with others, because I am moved to great feats of pity and sorrow and I feel so great and so deep for these people who are filled with fear and often loneliness.”

“Did God give you that power? Or do you really think you can just walk in there, bend the rules, love mere strangers in the world, listen to their confessions and take away their pain? It does not concern your job whatsoever does it?”

“Now sir, I think you are going a bit too far and I am afraid this conversation is getting a bit too deep for my liking.”

“Its not deep, nothing is deep enough! Nothing reaches or touches me, don’t you know that’s why I have been unmoved by love and pity for nearly 30 years now. I merely do my job, I skim the surface, no matter how rough the skin may be. We are both educated men, I am a solicitor and you’re a medical graduate so let’s not dilute the sentiment and pretend, I have done that for most of my life. I have been very good at telling huge fat lies for a living and now I am dying- even if the prognosis has not been made final- finally I am afraid and am aware that there is much more than this and I am guilty of a horrible crime, I have neglected the one you pray to. Yes, I have I did not place my hope on him, but merely indulged on the empty bones of the world’s legacy.”

“Youre feverish, I can tell, your tone, your look and ranting behaviour tells me everything. I have no authority in this matter, I am merely here to comfort you and assist you in any way. Your eldest son Mark sent me and I don’t want to get involved in your affairs.”

“You’re not involved, so don’t be so concerned and worried. By the way did you ever hear of the play King Lear?”

“Yes, what about it?”

“Well, I believe myself to be a dying king with a legacy or a kingdom to give away, only I don’t have three daughters, I have three sons in this case and it will be a matter of apt decision making for me to decide what will be left to each trustee. I might be persuaded to leave a greater portion of the estate to my favourite child, but then again I might not leave them a thing. I could write a final testament and offer my estate to the nearest charity in need of the capitol my estate delivers upon its dissolution. “

During the final days of my employment, my active participation in the work load diminished over a period of four years, when the symptoms commenced and my strength began to dissipate over time. I had to rely upon my medication to survive each day, and I relied solely on my medication. By the end of the day after all the odds and ends of my practice were fulfilled, I was utterly shattered by a sickness of the nerves and the spirit. After one night, after one particular attack when I was bedridden, a little earlier in the day than before, I began to think to myself and started to believe that I had a soul, it came like a hideously marred dove from out of the darkest night and to tell you the truth my life has been one big extension of the night! But what was, is or could be a “soul”? I had never given much thought to the unseen world or thought of non-physical phenomena before.

Every time I began to think of my money lying in the dark vaults of the local bank, my body went cold, but every time I visualised the lives and presence of my three sons then I would be filled with resolute warmth, for I did it in a spirit of love, a thing I could rarely do in my days of health and power. I had played the cynic for most of my life and often laughed in the face of compassion and exposure- especially for those who exposed themselves for the care of others and were at open risk- sacrifice to me seemed absurd. Why would one sacrifice his own blood for the neck of another? Why would we sacrifice our only life for the stragglers of the world? There had to be some divine irony, some paradox that reached above the mere appearance of things!

These were the type of thoughts that ran through my head at the time, because, before the end these thoughts belonged to a selfish and rather nasty philosophy that was on show and in popular demand right through the world. It ran through almost every echelon of human society and only a few minorities on the planet resisted through a conscientious resistance of belief and good will towards others.

I had sought to make peace with my neighbours, for I shook off my former disposition and sought to make peace with everyone. One of my neighbours had built a wall over the boundary running adjacent to our property, separating his family from mine. I found this act to be rather irritating, but on the whole I ignored his anti-social activities and simply moved on with my own life. A good legacy I have come to believe is worth more than a mound of gold, this is imperishable.

I am reminded of this vision, this dream that haunts me night after night, like a siege that bombards my conscience and wakes me in the night! There is a father who comes home from work, with a suede coat and a briefcase in his hand, he removes his hat very gracefully unto the coat stand. One could look at him, with his face of dismay, his delicate and graceful demeanour, his hypnotic green eyes of emerald turned downward and believe he were an angel. But he will never hug his children, never once will he even give them a kiss on the cheek, or show them the most humane of embraces and as the youngest son waits on the stairs for the father to come and embrace him, he watches bewildered once again as this stranger in his life, comes and goes and walks back out the door as the winter snow engulfs him and the boy can see the snow taking him in the moment and the man disappears once again into the shadows.”

I wept the bitterest tears of all and lay back into my bed…..”father! father! where art thou!”

and into my sleep I went and wandered….FATHER!