Restoration in the Here and Now

At the end of my marathon day in the orthopaedic clinic, I decided against walking and, instead, took my weary self, plus florescent-yellow arm-cast, home via the London Overground.

The early evening rush-hour had begun, so both the platform and the train were packed. Magically, a small crowd parted to let me on the carriage and two people spontaneously stood to offer me a seat. This must be the effect of the High-Vis colour, I thought with some surprise. Seemingly, my new cast had a power, which my purple cast did not. While I floated home, the child within was laughing as she imagined what it must be like to have the power of Wonder-Woman. The grandmother without maintained a cool dignity. Dignity, however, is not my forte. Once off the train, I crossed the park and was nearly home when I was stopped by a man, who pronounced loudly in an American accent,

‘Oh! My! That is quite a beacon you’ve got there!’

He clearly expected a response but all I could do was to grin sheepishly. Oh! No! What have I done? I should have stuck with purple! I thought. He proceeded by introducing himself and I, keen to show that I really was capable of conversation, eventually described how I had recently written about my inability to cope with ‘the thing that had happened to me’. I was then treated to a synopsis of his bio and, thus, discovered that he was an opera singer with a side-line in teaching people how to set up their own web-sites.

‘Call me’, he said, handing me his card. ‘Since you like writing, I can help you start a blog’.

I reached my empty house vainly trying to suppress laughter. If a yellow cast could cause this much to happen in little more than one hour, what would happen next.

Thankfully, the new cast did its job; the pain decreased and I visited the Chinese manicurist again. This time, I discovered that her name was Tina and that she was from Vietnam. Tina raised her eyebrows at my yellow cast but kept her full opinion hidden behind the language barrier. She clearly presumed that I would continue with the same yellow nail polish but when I picked the purple from her shelf, her solemn face began to smile. While I held my right hand under the drier (it was only the hand with the cast that received the benediction of nail polish), Tina took my left hand and massaged it. There was no else in her studio, so she had time, time enough to administer what I took to be a token of caring respect. Nothing was said but we exchanged a glance. It was a glance between a young girl and an old woman; an ancient look that bestowed a mutual sense of blessing.

I had already discovered that wearing a cast was not dissimilar to walking a dog. Other cast-wearers would share a rueful smile for we, like dog-owners, were in the same club. I liked this sense of camaraderie and it wasn’t long before the inevitable happened. I was in the supermarket queue when I saw that the young boy next to me was sporting an identical yellow arm-cast.

‘Hey! We are twins’, I said with enthusiasm.

He gave me a cool, appraising look and replied, ‘Girls should have pink’.

‘Boys should have blue then’, I retorted.

Determined not to be entirely outdone and clearly destined to become a barrister, he garnered his logic and pronounced firmly,

‘But you ARE a girl’.

‘Thank you, Darling’ I replied with feeling, while the teenager within whooped with delight.

My younger alter ego had become unusually active since my operation, something I noticed even more when I went for my next adventure – a pedicure with Tina. At first, I thought that I would have to find a chiropodist to deal with my toe-nails but then remembered that I had seen an ancient chair at the back of Tina’s studio. It looked a bit ‘Heath Robinson’, being a cross between a Sweeney Todd cast-off and an early prototype for the British Airways Business Class recliner. Tina’s partner helped me on board. I have to call him Tina’s partner for want of name, status or any other form of identity. Partner has a smiley face and his role appears to be one of offering tea. That day, however, he had other ambitions. There was a low buzz of conversation between Tina and Partner, which barely registered with me until I noticed that she gave him a dark, daggers-drawn look as if to say – ‘Don’t you dare’! Partner was humming nonchalantly and fiddling with something that I, half-tipped back in the contraption, could not see. A moment or two later, I felt a stab in my back. This was quickly followed by a thump, a rolling thump accompanied by further stabs. Partner came into view with a mischievous yet triumphant look on his face. I understood and shifted my position so that the massage-cum-torture could be better directed. Meanwhile, Tina, who was not best pleased, scrubbed vigorously at my heels so that years of hard skin flaked off unceremoniously in all directions.

The twenty-something within valiantly tried to imagine that the studio was a sun-blessed island in the Indian Ocean where the melodies of birdsong sent delicious shivers through the forest and that she lay in a luxury hammock, pampered by a posse of obliging servants. Grandma, however, knew better. This was definitely South London whose melodies included the chatter-chatter of Pakistani traders trying out Del-Boy impersonations and the clarion call of Africans on mobile phones, determined that their grievances should be heard across the Sahara, phone or no phone. And this was no hammock. I submitted myself to my fate for I could do no other. With my feet off the ground and tipped well back, I was a prisoner; shackled as much by a pedicure as by the yellow cast itself.

Once the massage and scrubbing were over, Partner helped to extricate me and I found myself bounding home on baby-soft feet, wondering why I had never done this before. It wasn’t difficult to see that it had taken an operation to metaphorically throw a tree across my path, forcing me off target, obliging me to think laterally and sending me off at a tangent. The thirty-something within was taking it all in her stride and was dragging Granny in her wake. In less than six weeks and hemmed in by the narrow confines of my own neighbourhood, I had enjoyed sparkling encounters with a Jamaican overseer, a Vietnamese manicurist and an American opera singer – restorative experiences each and every one.

Meanwhile, I was counting off the days and the half days desperately looking for release from my manacle. In preparation for Freedom Day, I took granddaughter for a girlie session with Tina and we both had our nails painted green, traffic-light green for get-up-and-go. The next afternoon, I was glad to see that Sarah was in the clinic. She removed the cast and let me take it home as a memento. However, freedom came at a price. My arm was swollen, stiff and tender and it was now unprotected from the outside world. I was a bird with a broken wing but, without the cast, no-one would give me space, no-one would offer me a seat on the train. I would simply disappear into the crowd as an invisible granny with an equally invisible, yet ageless soul within.

However, there are two little people in London for whom I am not invisible. I like to think that I am Super-Gran to them. Tomorrow, we will jump on a bus together and head off to see the river of blood flowing out of the Tower of London, or, to put it in more adult-friendly terms, the cascading flood of ceramic poppies commemorating the start of the Great War. Genetically my grandchildren are half-German and are, thus, living examples of the restoration that has come about between former enemies. Sadly, implacable enemies still exist in our world and we can only hope that time, lots of time, will bring healing.

I too need time; time before this old bird can fly, time before I can drive again, more time before I can resume a so-called normal life. This was a summer plagued by pain but also peppered with unexpected pleasures. In six, short weeks, or rather, six, very long weeks, the writing imp had exhorted me, nay, had impelled me, to type. The Silversurfers website offered a platform and, in so doing, became a crucial part of my restoration. Before I sign off from this plaster saga, I must pause to say thank you and to raise ‘Three Cheers to the Silversurfers Community’.

And, by way of postscript, I should also add that I am meeting the tall, dark, handsome opera singer for coffee next week. The forty-something within is already in a flutter – what colour should she do her nails? All that Grandma can say is – if the past few weeks are anything to go by, there can be no knowing what might happen next.