So there I was, leaving my latest employer for the last time today, when I bumped into an old friend.
“I’ve been reading your stuff on that Black Dog,’ he said. “I know where you’re coming from. It makes everything so hard.” And off he went, back to his highly paid, highly important job at the nearby MOD behemoth.
So it’s not just me then, I thought, although not for long because there are millions of us.
I’m wondering if people are getting sick and tired of reading this mental health stuff, especially mine. I’m trying to write whilst I’m in the middle of a pretty unpleasant phase of the Black Dog whilst quitting one employer (today) and starting with another (tomorrow). And then not telling anyone else about it, unless they read my website! Mine is not a painted smile when I’m smiling because not all of everyday is black. There are times when I almost ‘forget’ the bad bits until I stop smiling.
My old friend did tell me a bit more than that written above, actually. His successful and lucrative career has been achieved at some cost. A broken marriage, separated from his children, now living in a near palatial area where the rich people go. And when it all happened, the buckets of money) barely dented by a costly divorce, were of no use at all, except that he was able to afford good therapy. Well, good for him, I say and certainly not ‘that bastard only getting help because he’s loaded.’ He didn’t write society’s rules and regulations. He lives by them, as we all do. My guess is he would give it all up tomorrow for a better domestic set up. Popping pills, going to bed by 9.00 pm every evening and more money than he knows what to do with. (He didn’t tell me that but I guessed from his shoes and his watch!)
A man I used to know attended Bristol Rovers games with me back in the 1970s. Very funny, very loud, went to his wedding which was in the middle of nowhere. I never knew he was a manic depressive, didn’t even know he got bad moods. I just thought he just liked to spend time on his own men the mood suited. Turned out he was burying his head in his pillow, wondering whether to end it all.
How many of us are living through dark times? Quite a lot, I thought, as I went to fetch my bicycle. I was probably looking at a crowd of, I suppose, maybe 100 people in and around the store I was leaving. One or two of them, perhaps, peering through the fog of mental illness? Quite a lot, I reckon.
You never really know who’s going through what, do you? I’m the biggest clown in the room when I go off on one and I can’t stop saying silly throwaway comments, very occasionally laced with a sliver of wit. “I never guessed you were barking mad because you’re always smiling!” Well, no one’s really said that, which tells you that a good few people do get it.
Maybe tomorrow will be the day things get better, the world will turn brighter, there will be a better day. Hopefully, I’ll still be here to see it.
