Rainbows Have Echoes by Julie Miller

Author:Julie Miller
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Autobiography, memoirs, life story, teaching, challenges, education, positive thinking, memorable teaching, special education, special teaching, special needs, life story with traumatised children, New Zeland, Bath, dementia, caring, English teacher, teaching children, ESL, family, husband
ISBN: 9780722348352
Publisher: Andrews UK Limited 2018
Published: 2018-05-15T00:00:00+00:00

38. A Kind of Wasp Experience

Now I was heading towards sixty years of age and Terry nearing seventy. He had retired ten years earlier and was now a truly valuable member of the village. Terry was on every committee. He was clerk to the village council, chief organiser of clubs and trips out for the older members of the community, and constantly on the move. He was also a consumer of a great deal of alcohol, but he was much admired and his advice and helpfulness was sought after. His walking became limited, and in 2003, when we were all consumed by the notion of war in Iraq, his knees failed him. His left knee was particularly troublesome. The doctor said that he needed a knee replacement and X-rays confirmed this necessary treatment. The NHS had an impossibly long waiting list, but if Terry was willing to travel overseas the NHS would foot the bill. I could go with him, but I, of course, would not be NHS-funded.

The week before the Iraq War began we were in La Clinique Pasteur in St-Étienne in the South of France. Terry would stay the full three weeks, but I would return to the UK after ten days because of my school commitments. To travel alone from a foreign airport filled me with dread, but the time I had with Terry was so very worthwhile. He had wine with his meals - non-drinkers were donating their bottles to him, acknowledging his liking for the stuff, and his room often smelt like a brewery. His single room housed his bed, a wall-mounted television, a fold-up bed with a lumpy mattress for me and an orthopaedic chair. It had a tiny shower room and toilet en suite and, wonder of wonders, a balcony where I could have a cigarette. Joy of joys!

The nurses were utterly splendid, and doctors and surgeons beyond brilliant. The care was outstanding and the interpreter was so kind and helpful it was enough to make me weep. She became a real friend and later visited us at home in Corston with her English husband.

The time came for me to leave Terry. A taxi was to pick me up at the hospital and take me to the tiny airport at St-Étienne. I had charged my phone and had made arrangements for my son Christopher to meet my plane at Stansted.

As I disembarked from the plane, stressed beyond belief, I rang his mobile number. He answered straight away.

“I’m here,” says me.

“I know - I can see you, Mum.”

My shoulders went down and my love for my son soared skywards. My dear, dependable, adorable son. Who could ask for more?

He drove me to his home in Milton Keynes - a large four-bedroom detached house - but rather than remove one of his three children from their own rooms, he gave me his big double bed and he and Glenys, his wife, slept downstairs on sofas.

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