Evening everyone,
Parents. You can't choose them can you. Once young people themselves they become known to you only as Mom or Dad. And every year we take forty-eight hours out of the year to celebrate and appreciate them as the people who taught us everything we know now. As some of you may know I love my father till the ends of the earth, but what many of you probably don't know and have maybe wondered why my mother is hardly mentioned. Well now I feel is the right time to tell you why; And just in time for Mothers Day!
The year was 1991. The first Starbucks opened in LA, the World Wide Web is announced to the world and Ötzi the Iceman is found in the Alps. But over eight-hundred miles away from the mountain region that would soon bear my initials a little miracle was happening and at just gone lunch time at a busy maternity ward in Bedfordshire a baby girl arrived. I was born to a soldier and his wife, and as I was handed to my first-time parents I opened my tiny eyes to the world making my father cry with joy. And to think that he nearly missed my late arrival for a bacon sandwich! Growing up was as to be expected in a military family and I always knew from a young age that things weren't like other families. My father would be away for long periods of time often missing important events like Birthdays and Christmas'. But I knew that he was needed elsewhere, helping out in war zones like Northern Ireland and the first Gulf war of the early 1990's and then again in later years when dictatorship in the Middle East ruled again. This left me alone with my mother alot of the time to which the majority of the time was pleasant but certainly not a time where I would look forward to being in her constant company as I always felt inside that there wasn't anything special shared between us.
The arrival of my brother in early summer of 1994 was a welcomed edition to our little family and as a result we moved to a larger family home in the quiet suburbs, close to family and soon to be life-long friends. With my fair hair and porcelain skin I was the apple of my fathers eye and a cutie no grandma could refuse, but with a new baby boy in the family I felt a little cast out and with this the feelings of discontent my mother emulated started to breed. Even as we got older, I knew that something wasn't right, the way she bonded with my baby brother was different to my experiences. As my Dad was away alot on weekends with the Army, he was always under the impression that the wife had something wonderful planned for the children whilst Daddy was away. On numerous Friday evenings my Dad was fed plans of girlie shopping trips and mother-daughter craft days before he went away and on numerous Sunday afternoon's he would be served up lies of what never happened. Instead, Mother would always take my brother shopping or on a trip out somewhere to visit friends for coffee whilst I was left at home alone, watching TV or browsing that new thing called The Internet!
Approaching adult-hood hormones ravaged my pre-teenage body and I became more aware of myself and my personality. I started listening to rock music, experimenting with fashion, make-up and hair-styles and generally rebelling against my Christian upbringing. At times I found myself completely intolerable to my mothers attitude, her mood swings and her manipulative games. As a teenager I found solace in music and socialising with friends but even that she tried to snuff out always cementing unreasonable curfews for no reason and finding constant chores to do around the house. Looking back I can see no reason for her acting in this way but what I do recall is the readiness for an confrontation and the argumentative streak. So many times my mom would promise me a weekend of fun and activities to bond over and so many times there would be a reason not to follow through. One day I think I just gave up hope and as a result stopped believing what I was told. Starting secondary school a hatred began a slow simmer.
I came home from one of my first weeks of middle school to find my mother home from work, crying and screaming at me to watch the TV. In a panic and not wanting to upset her further I sat on the floor of my childhood living room. It was the first moment I think we had spent together in a while and we watched silently, both captivated by what we were witnessing unfolding. The horror that we saw, the devastation that it caused and the inevitable consequences it would have on our family. The date was September eleventh 2001. I was less than a fortnight away from my eleventh birthday.
A year or so later, a crisp, brown envelope landed on our door mat that was to alter life as I knew it forever. The second Gulf war had been in progress for a few years but now with Saddam Hussain's power growing by the minute, Great Britain stepped in and after nearly all his working life in training for this moment my Dad left for war. People ask me all the time what it was like. Truth is I was accustom to it already. He had never been there on my birthday as long as I can remember apart from maybe one or two and had always been away for military exercises and camps so for me as a girl with a father in the Army I knew that someday the time would come that all the practise he had done in preparing for war would finally happen. Standing there at the huge green gates of my school with my beloved old man crouched in front of me in his combats a crowd of excited school children gathered a few yards behind me desperate to get a glimpse of my hero's attire. Without saying anything of importance I was told that he loved me and then left. Back to my classmates, I sobbed silent tears knowing that I might not ever see my father alive again and that all to easily he could come home dressed in nothing more than a white bag and dog-tags.
With my strong maternal instinct and a personality I hoped would brighten the darkness we were all in as a family but to no avail as my mother sunk into a fast and heavy depression leaving her completely incapable of caring for her young children and leaving me to step into the shoes. I cooked and cleaned, sorted out the washing and made sure that my brother was always dressed ready for school with a full packed-lunch for the day ahead. I ironed the clothes and sorted the bills into piles of ones that could wait and ones that could not. Looking back I feel that this is where I taught myself to create a facade of perfection, despite the distance from truth it was. After dealing with depression at the time and also later on in my life, those memories are one of the fewer things I don't begrudge my mother for. I can't imagine how hard it must have been however I feel that despite all of that the role of a parent should always take centre-stage and for motherhood never to be put on a back burner. It wasn't until a few years later after speaking to friends and family that not only was my mother in a dark place but I too was in the grips of my first ever experience with depression without even realising it. Shut off from family and friends I think it was during that time I left my childhood behind and became who I am today.
After nearly a years tour a man returned home to his family, a mere shell of what he once was. After a few hours with him snuggled on his lap as I always had, I knew he would never be the same man who left me at the school gates. Post-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder had stolen life from him as he knew it constantly keeping him on edge. I remember once being in the car driving with him when a swift crack of a passing branch caught one of the window's. Without thinking my Dad frantically started searching for something, patting down the doors and the area around the drivers seat. He was looking for something. He was looking for his gun. War had turned my beloved Papa into a nervous wreck jumping at any crack, pop or bang. They talk of the hundred-mile stare and even to this day I can catch my Dad doing it. Just thinking, remembering, haunting himself with images of war and conflict. He has never spoken about what he saw or experienced but I cannot imagine that there would be much good to tell.
Life deteriorated after that and as a family we separated, going off to do our own thing and only meeting around a dinner table at night for dinner whereby nothing of much importance would be said. Laughter rarely happened during those years and as the frequency of arguments between my parents escalated I was aware that their marriage would never last. At twelve I started to notice a huge distance between my mother and father. My mother had a new lease of life and a bounce in her step. I started to notice that mother would spend longer looking in the mirror; Prettying herself, doing her make-up, sorting her hair and generally making more of an effort. But this was not for my Dad's pleasure. No. She would venture out of an evening starting off once a week, only to be increased as the years passed by, to go for coffee or drinks with friends, to go to meetings that never existed and see friends she hardly ever saw. Watching helplessly as my Dad slipped deeper into PTSD but desperately clinging onto the marriage by bring gifts of chocolate, flowers and other romantic gestures to the table that was otherwise empty apart from himself. It was clear how much my father loved his wife of over a decade but it seemed she had other things in her sights, including men.
For a few years whilst I was at high school my parents tried to put a brave face on and pretend but the cracks were still there and the gaps were getting bigger. By the time I had finished my exams and graduated from compulsory education it was plain to see that it was the beginning of the end. The torture of watching my dad struggle with the uncertain faithfulness of his wife was sometimes unbearable for me also and being old enough to understand and listen and watch the story unfold was all the more eye-opening for me as a teenager. Although life and boys had somewhat passed me by it wouldn't be long before I was attracting the affections of a Rugby playing High school student now know as Mr. Ginge, my first ever proper boyfriend! But less than a week into what would be a year long relationship with Mr. Ginge I was told the news no child wants to hear.
In true Mother style I found out about my parents divorce in the car during a blazing argument with her. Turned out my father had an affair when I was nine and the marriage had never recovered although I have always said that the affair was not the only thing that contributed to the marriage's demise but also the fact that we were a military family whereby my father was away alot and also went to war, coupled with my mother's fleeting mid-week escapades all contributed towards the broken home statistic I found myself in. I still remember her screaming to me in her shrill tones and then quietening her voice just enough to make the impact of her words all the more earth-shattering. "Well your father and I are getting a divorce!" She said matter-of-factly in a abnormally calm voice. It was then that my world crumbled. Without my father there I knew life would not be worth living. What was I going to do without him to take the edge of her cruel demeanour? Who was going to save me from her wrath? But they were the least of my worries as the divorce lawyers and solicitors were rallied up the evil was only getting started.
* * *
To Be Continued ...
* * *
'Til next time, Love A.Lou xx
No comments:
Post a Comment