Most of my days are just crap and uneventful, but Friday night I was quite proud of myself. I'd spent half the day with my very great friend Shell, gossiping and chatting about personal things as we always do. Considering that I'm only just getting back into the swing of using public transport on my own with my shattered self-confidence, this and what follows is for me quite an achievement. Anyway, later on I mistakenly ended up in Birmingham after forgetting I wasn't on the bus home and missing the stop that I needed to catch it. So round about 11pm I found myself in the big city, facing the prospect of missing the last bus and thus ending up stranded for the night. I'm no stranger to Brum, as it's called locally, but it's all very different in the dark and especially so when you have to get from one side of it to the other on a very tight schedule.
Now, one part of this journey involved having to cross a busy double dual carriageway via a very narrow footbridge. I'm not joking when I say that this thing is easily three stories above the road and just wide enough for two people to walk abreast; and I'm acrophobic in the most extreme sense. So I forced myself to climb its steps, which double back on themselves twice before reaching the footbridge's height, and after removing my hat - I was terrified I'd lose it over the edge - I made myself walk slowly across. I kept telling myself, aloud, to keep looking at the far end of the bridge and not to think about anything else.
It wasn't too bad to begin with, but after about the first quarter was behind me I started to panic and I could see and feel the bridge swaying even though it wasn't. I'm now almost shouting at myself to keep going and not to look at anything but the end of the bridge; and certainly not to think about my being three stories above tarmac, concrete and speeding metal boxes on a thin concrete spar that I just knew was closing in on me.
A hundred years later, my heart pounding through my tight chest and legs shaking like the Pope watching the news, I reached the safety of the steps; whereupon the relief I felt was so tangible, I actually cheered out loud. Luckily there was nobody around.
Incidentally, not only did I make the last bus home, it wasn't even the last bus.
Now, one part of this journey involved having to cross a busy double dual carriageway via a very narrow footbridge. I'm not joking when I say that this thing is easily three stories above the road and just wide enough for two people to walk abreast; and I'm acrophobic in the most extreme sense. So I forced myself to climb its steps, which double back on themselves twice before reaching the footbridge's height, and after removing my hat - I was terrified I'd lose it over the edge - I made myself walk slowly across. I kept telling myself, aloud, to keep looking at the far end of the bridge and not to think about anything else.
It wasn't too bad to begin with, but after about the first quarter was behind me I started to panic and I could see and feel the bridge swaying even though it wasn't. I'm now almost shouting at myself to keep going and not to look at anything but the end of the bridge; and certainly not to think about my being three stories above tarmac, concrete and speeding metal boxes on a thin concrete spar that I just knew was closing in on me.
A hundred years later, my heart pounding through my tight chest and legs shaking like the Pope watching the news, I reached the safety of the steps; whereupon the relief I felt was so tangible, I actually cheered out loud. Luckily there was nobody around.
Incidentally, not only did I make the last bus home, it wasn't even the last bus.
At the age of five, Skagra decided emphatically that God did not exist. This revelation tends to make most people in the universe who have it react in one of two ways - with relief or with despair. Only Skagra responded to it by thinking, 'Wait a second. That means there's a situation vacant.'
