Them Old Blood And Bones.
In 1974 while I was living at Ayers
House my world was turned upside down by a terrible event that brought my
motorbike days skidding to an abrupt end.
I had just finished work at the factory and I was riding the new Suzuki
back into the city along Payneham Road.
As I passed through the fourway intersection of Payneham, Magill,
Kensington and North Terrace a car came careering through a red light on my
left. I had less than a split second to
apply the brakes before we connected.
The front disc locked and the rear of the bike swung around smashing
into the front of the speeding vehicle.
My left leg was sitting between the bikes battery compartment and the
metal fender of the car. I was thrown
violently from the bike and I landed on my bum facing South. My lower left leg was badly broken and twisted
and it was pointing pretty much due North.
The white and sinuous joint of my knee was exposed and blood was
spurting out like something from a Monty Python movie. The lower leg was laying flat on the bitumen
attached to the rest of me by a mere scrap of skin and twitching repulsively
like a dying fish.
The traffic came to a standstill on
all sides of the intersection. A school
bus stopped right in front of me and I was confronted with a surreal and disturbing
image, as pretty young schoolgirls started vomiting out of the windows. This vision straight from the bowels of hell
was replaced by a wall of concerned people who were standing around me in a
horrified circle. Voices echoed in a
helpless blur of confusion and I was laid down by caring faces, which framed a
clear blue, September sky. I heard the
words,“This guy’s a Nurse”
and a young man broke through the wall of people. He kneeled down at my side and comforted me
briefly while introducing himself as “Fred Steel”. A nurse from the Royal
Adelaide Hospital. Once the formalities
were out of the way he sprung into action like one of those guys in the
television medical series. The first
thing he did was rip off his shirt and tie it tightly around my upper leg. Then he lifted my semi-severed lower leg from
the bitumen and arranged it so that it vaguely resembled the right shape. He removed my safety helmet and placed it under
the upper leg to further reduce the bleeding, then he commenced to massage the
whole limb till his hands were blood red to the elbows. As he attended to me he was also organising
the crowd to call for an ambulance and clear the intersection for when it
arrived. He was totally in control of
the situation and it offered much needed assurance that more help was on the
way. I felt that I was in capable hands
but it didn’t erase the disturbing thought that I might bleed to death before
they could get me to hospital. I would
not recommend being fully conscious during ordeals of this kind to anyone. I was desperate for any type of distraction
from the moment, so I started chatting to Fred about everything and nothing at
the same time. As he massaged my mangled
leg I thought of something that might offer an escape from the agony and the
absolute horror I was enduring. I asked
him if he considered himself a pretty strong sort of bloke and he said he
thought he was. I asked him if he could
knock a man out in one punch and my question was received with raised
eyebrows. He said he believed it was
within his abilities in a tone which hinted he knew exactly what I was getting
at. I asked him if he would do me the
honor of punching my lights out and he said that he couldn’t because he was a
nurse and it was against the law. My
second great idea came in a flash. At
school I had quite a reputation among the lads as a champion arm wrestler and I
asked Fred if he would care to oblige.
He was hesitant but he agreed to do it when a woman from the crowd
offered to continue massaging my leg. Her name was Julia and she announced with a
certain air of pride that she had been a nurse during the Vietnam war. In the consciousness jolting intensity of the
moment I must have started hallucinating because my good Samaritans were
illuminated by dazzling halos of swirling, spiraling rainbows.
'I felt I was in
the presence of
heaven sent Guardian
Angels’
On my return to the brightly lit realms of consciousness I looked down
to find that my leg suspended within a blood filled plastic bag. The observation nurse who was on duty had
been waiting for me to open my eyes and the moment I did she was at my
bedside. Just like the others she had
that same hallucinogenic tinge. As I
looked closer I was struck by yet another bizarre coincidence. It was Emma the ex-girlfriend of my brother
Dudley. She was the first girl he had
ever dated when we were living in Elizabeth.
Emma frowned slightly at the mention of Dudley’s name. All she really wanted to do was find out if I
was allergic to any drugs and take down other personal details. I was still in the grip of shock and
chattering away like a two bob watch.
Emma intercepted the stream of meaningless verbiage to tell me what had
happened while I was out cold. I
underwent an initial bone reconstruction operation which had proved a success
thus far, but I was still very much on the critical list. All she could tell me apart from that was the
fact I was involved in some kind of micro-surgery experiment and the physicians
were working out what to do next. The
entire leg had been placed in a vacuum bag right up to my crutch and I was
being pumped constantly with blood in an attempt to keep it alive. The leg floated around in that plastic bag
for five excruciating days and every time I moved it was like a lightening bolt
had struck the tattered stump of my knee.
On the morning of the third day I was moved out of intensive care into
an orthopedic ward where I found myself in the company of a number of other battered
and broken young men. Many of them had
been involved in bike related prangs as well and most had lost a limb in the
trauma. I was counting my lucky stars
because at least they were trying to save mine. The police came to interview me
the day after I was admitted and they informed me that I had been involved in a
hit and run accident.
‘ACCIDENT!’, How could anybody with half a brain describe a
hit and run situation as an accident?
The two just don’t belong together in the same breath. The act of jumping a red light is based on
precise and conscious intent and I was expected to be satisfied with ACCIDENT!’. They told me they were
hunting for a suspect based on information received at the scene of the crash
and all they had to go on was the fact it was a white male driving a red
Datsun. The insensitive fuckheads
actually made light of my predicament by saying, “Hey!, Even if we don’t
catch the bastard, you’re still gonna clean up on compo”. I
think the best part of me died that day as I comprehended the spirit crushing
fact I had been cheated out of my youth by some unknown and as yet unpunished person.
I descended into a black and seething mood. In a withdrawn and unapproachable state I
indulged in angry and vengeful imaginings involving myself and the faceless
driver of a red speeding car. Just
twenty four hours earlier I had been a brave and strapping young champion. Destined for success and unstoppable. I could sing and I could dance like
motherfucker. I could spin a mighty yarn
that would have people in stitches and I was so on the frigging ball that no-one
could put a trick past me. I was the
special one out of the pack who could do anything, be anything and I thought
the world was my big fat, juicy oyster.
I guess I couldn’t have been too sharp after all because didn’t see
that, ‘Spawn of the devil, low life affliction upon humanity’ coming through
the red light.
Blood on the road.
So at last we meet my would be assassin, far better for you if I had
died.
Come absorb the pain I have suffered and the countless tears that I
have cried.
I know not your name and I know not your face, only you, know who you
are.
September the fourth, nineteen seventy four you left me for dead, in
the tracks of your car.
A hit and run driver in peak hour traffic, bloodstains on your bumper
and tires
a crumpled bike in the rear view mirror, beside it a smashed up, young
man lies.
Now perhaps, just a blurred recollection, like a poem you may have read somewhere
a distant reminder of something you did, for which you showed no
remorse or care.
Take heed to my words for ‘karma is real’ and all of us reap from the
seeds we sow
If Hell exists for parting souls
then into the furnace your spirit will
go.
I’ll follow you down to the bowels of damnation and stalk you forever
through an endless fire.
I wish you well for eternity friend, for the hunt is on and I will
never tire.
In her role as a Lavender lady Kitty was my most regular visitor in the
ward and I got more of her time than the other patients because we were
buddies. My parents made as many trips
as they could down from Owen but as the months dragged on their visits became
less frequent. All of a sudden Anna
Maria changed from being my hot and sexy, big city girlfriend into something
more like a sister or invalid carer.
She used to come in and see me on most afternoons and would bring
Grecian treats from the restaurant where she worked. Long term patients such as I were granted
special privileges and sometimes the nursing staff would let her stay a little
longer after visiting hours. I was
driven to distraction by the flirtatious antics of the frisky, young nurses, so
a little slap and tickle in the evenings went a long way in helping me to
remember what it felt like to be normal.
Other than zombying out on the bedside telly or following the movements
of the better looking nurses there is very little for a young bloke to do in
hospital. There’s no escape from the god
awful clock on the wall as it goes through it’s painfully slow cycle from
morning till night. As each hour grinds
along between the last shot of pethidine and the next the agony increases until
the most hardy of thrill seeking, teenage heroes deteriorates into a writhing,
moaning wreck.
Like every other guy in the ward my main occupation was to count the
moments until it was time for another trip into comfortably numb oblivion. My idea of getting out of it prior to my
hospital admission was a few beers with the lads on the weekend. For most of my stay at the Royal Adelaide I
was wasted on an alternating cocktail of pethidine, morphine and fortral. It was the most vulnerable and totally
useless I have ever felt and sometimes the pain was actually preferable to
feeling like a fully conscious corpse.
My body was numbed to the bone but my mind was racing like a rocket ship
to mars. With nothing to do but endure the pain and curse the trick card life
had dealt me my mind became a rumbling steamroller of disconnected thoughts and
emotions. Back in the seventy’s there
was no such thing as trauma counselling for hit and run victims so you just had
to rise above the despair somehow or go completely nuts. It’s a bloody good job that I am a natural
born optimist. As the weeks passed and
the shock of the trauma subsided I was able to make sense of the chaotic
jabberings in my head. A renewed clarity of thought helped me to recognize
positive elements among the misery and high on the list was the fact I had
cheated death. With this knowledge I
started to embrace a whole new way of looking at the world with chance a key
component and survival the golden rule.
On the topic of chance it was like I had been swept along in a series of
unexplainable coincidence from the moment I hit the bitumen. What are the odds that a couple of qualified
nurses might be right at the scene of a smash, as it happened?. Then there is the infinitely remote chance of
an incoming patient being attended to by the son of his landlady in the
emergency room of a large city hospital.
To go out cold in the care of a friend and wake up in the company of
another is nothing short of remarkable considering we shared such limited
history. To top it all off I had been
selected by the fates as a guinea pig in the first ever attempt to reattach a
severed limb. The whole chain of events
hinted a special psychic connection and I entertained the notion that my
rainbow tinted guardian angels were actually ‘Alien Health Workers’ disguised as everyday medical attendants.
In 1974 the worlds leading micro-surgeons just happened to be
Australians and it was lucky for me they were based at the Royal Adelaide
Hospital. As the doctors were doing
their rounds on the fifth morning of my stay I met one of the surgeons who was
going to try to save my leg. His name
was George Potter and he said he could offer me no guarantee that the efforts
of he and his colleagues would be a success.
After the briefing I gladly signed an official release form which gave
them permission to operate further. As I
did he stressed the point that they were working in unfamiliar territory and I
could lose my leg at any time. He
delivered this news with warm sincerity and through the psychedelic swirls of
his clean and righteous aura I could tell he was a good man. As he was giving me the details of my
situation Doctor Potter leaned in real close over my bed and directed a question
which caught me completely off guard.
He asked if I knew anything about ‘mind over matter’ and I said that I had never really
thought about it. In a somber and
knowing tone he suggested that I might start thinking about it, because success
or failure in the operations ahead may very well depend on a little help from
me. After this intriguing little chat
with the doctor I was absolutely convinced that my, ... ‘Alien Health Worker
Theory’ was correct. I had been selected
by the rolling dice of chance and human progress to take part in a ground
breaking medical experiment and I was being given clues about my involvement by
the other players in a history making event.
‘Mind over Matter’, ... Mmmm!, ... interesting’
I soon learned from Fred’s gossip
mongering, fellow workers that he wished he was a doctor instead. Who gives a flying fuck if he wished he was a
doctor or the king of the whole smoking shitpile? He saved my life and he can be anything he
bloody well likes. In the natural course
of his profession Fred had been following new developments in micro-surgery
with keen interest. He was aware that
the surgeons were waiting for the right accident to occur so that they could
attempt to save a full limb section and the emergency room were on standby for
such an event. When he spotted my newly severed leg flopping around on the
roadside Fred must have seen it as a golden opportunity to be part of medical
history. Through some administrative
wrangling by Doctor Potter, Fred was assigned to my bedside for the first three
months of the nine I was on my back. The
good doctor must have reasoned that it would increase the moral of the star
patient to have his smash scene saviour around the ward. I found out from Fred’s constant up dates
that the surgeons were counting on their efforts to be a grand success because
the reattachment of my leg meant they would be assured further research funding
in the next budget.
Good on them and half their bloody
luck if they can further the noble quest to make artificial limbs a thing of
the past. Whenever he got the chance
Fred would eavesdrop on the doctors as they were discussing my case and this
kept him pretty up to date on how things were going. He used to bring his anatomy books into work
for me to look through and he’d get all excited as he pointed at the intricate
diagrams. He described each forthcoming
operation in graphic detail with a passion that hinted at how much he wished he
could be a surgeon. The illustrations
combined with Fred’s well informed dialogue had a profound impact on my self
perception. Late in the sleepless night I was browsing through Freds books and
exploring the anatomical universe when quite unintentionally I slipped into a
new dimension of artistic thought and imagination. A fresh blast of morph kicked in as I was
flicking through the pages which somehow transformed the illustrations into
detailed ariel maps. Freds verbal descriptions echoed through my head like
flight transmissions and the words,“Mind
Over Matter” took on critical significance. An exhilarating new sense of
purpose came into being as the hospital ward became a transfer station for
inner space travel. I was bound to a
hospital bed with no outlet to externalize the flood of inspiration so I
internalized it in the form of a fully conscious tour of my own anatomy. Base logic told me that the mind can
influence the molecular structure of the body and the imagination is a healing
tool. Within the space of this thought I
found myself sitting upright in the comfort of a space pod recliner and my
finger was resting on the trigger of a lazer equipped healing gun. In wonder
and fascination I lifted off from the inner surface of my skull and passed
through electrical synapse flashes deep within my brain. On my arrival at the tip of the spinal chord
I hit the thrusters and ascended down to the pelvic bone where I found a
capillary exit. Once in the femoral
tendon it was easy navigation to the knee joint where I came to a stop in a
vast escarpment of tattered flesh.
Before me was a towering canyon of irreparable cells and tissues, veins
and arteries. I adjusted the laser
projectors to maximum spread as I banked the space pod towards the damage
zone. Covering an area about ten times
the size of the space pod I was able to shear away large sections of dead and
dying flesh in a relatively short time.
My onboard reserve of compressed, life force energies were sprayed with
generous abandon all over the injury like a mountain mist on a storm damaged
garden. Newly multiplying cells started
popping to life before my eyes and I was filled with relief knowing that my
mission had been a success. When my work was done I switched the thrusters to
hyper drive up through the top of my head and returned to the normality of
hospital life”.
'Morphine eh! … Wild Shit'.
Long after the initial shock of the trauma I would find myself breaking into a cold sweat as I comprehend how close I had come to death. The word ‘Survival’ took on a greater meaning than ever before and I started to ponder the importance of an individual life in the infinite scope of creation. How do human beings differ from ants or bees where the individual holds no real value so the whole might better survive?. The concept of self preservation became so firmly embedded in my thoughts that I began to imagine what dangers might await me once I was free of the hospital ward. The world outside now appeared like some kind of hostile and unpredictable hazard zone, where one false move can mean instant death. The idea of maneuvering a car or a motorbike through the urban road system became less attractive as paranoid imaginings spiraled out of control. Even the act of crossing a city street became a thing to fear. With my growing sense of caution towards all things man made I became anchored in the carnal platform and the realm of essential physical truth’s. I suppose my brush with death could be compared to the young soldier on the frontline battlefield of war. He has been recruited by some regime or other to fight for a high and mighty ideal and he sees himself as the well trained and invincible man of the moment. The universe is infinite in all directions and waiting to be conquered by him and his platoon of young braves. Then as a stray bullet breaks through his battle weary skin he finds the universe has shrunk to the diameter of the metal slug in his arm. After a number of extensive micro-surgery operations I received regular skin and bone grafts until the knee had filled out to something of it’s former splendor. The skin for the grafts was shaved from my thighs and buttocks like long shreds of bacon and large chunks of bone were excavated out of my pelvis. Six months after I had entered hospital I was hobbling along on crutches and confident enough to take a shower without the aid of a nurse.
Bugger!, ... There’s no experience that can quite compare with having
your testicles sponged by a buxom wench who would look right at home on the
centerfold spread in a girlie magazine.
The nurses were great fun and easy to share a joke with, but there was
also a mean spirited bull dyke matron who treated every bloke in the ward with
contempt and loathing. Being slightly more mischievous than the rest I soon
became the target of her scorn. When
there was a rush on and the ward was short of beds she used to say, ... “Stick Steven up with the bone cancer
patients, He’s been here for ages, ... he’ll cope”.
Late in the restless
hospital night, old men frail and eaten to the bone.
One starts to moan and
then another, two more hours till the next shot of peth.
Late in the restless
hospital night a young man weeps for the world he has lost.
Gone are the days of
innocent dreams, withering souls at the doorway to death.
Is this the prime of my youth?
After the last of the skin grafts had healed over and the bone was
sufficiently calcified I started feeling cautiously more confident I had beaten
my injuries. I even went beyond the
normal mode of fatalistic thinking and started believing I might actually get
to keep my lower leg. One day during
visiting hours Doctor Potter stormed into the ward followed closely by a team
of other medical staff. He came to an
abrupt stop at the end of my bed and pointing his finger he said,“That’s him”. All of the visitors were promptly herded out
of the room by the nurses and instructions were given to fumigate the
ward. I had contracted a methicillin
resistant, staff infection in my leg or the dreaded ’Golden Staph’ as it is
more commonly known. ‘Staphylococcus
Aurous’. It kills the very young and the
elderly. As my bed was being hastily
pushed out of the infected ward I was informed that I was in the age group that
can best fight the disease, but it was still a very touch and go
situation. I was bundled into a waiting
ambulance and carted out to the Northfield Infectious Disease wards. On my arrival at Northfield Hospital I was
placed in a large room at the end of a very long hepatitis ward and there were
only two other patients in the room with me.
One of them was in a wheelchair and his name was Murray Todd. Murray used to be a truck driver before he
became disabled and one day he described how he came to be a paraplegic. He was changing a flat tire on his rig at the
side of the road and a passing motorist hit him. Both his legs were tucked in between the duel
wheels of the semi-trailer right up to the base of his spine. As well as the loss of his lower body Murray
had contracted the same God awful infection as myself. Even though he was rendered mostly immobile
he still maintained a good sense of humor and high spirits. He cracked jokes constantly which helped to
drag me out of my morbid and depressing headspace. One of Murray’s ex-girlfriends was a nurse in
our ward. The old flame had been sparked
up prior to my arrival in the ward and they used to engage in hurried late
night sessions of horizontal folk dancing.
I was as horny as a three balled tomcat in mating season most of the
time and the sound effects coming from just over the thin partition were torture
beyond belief. In the bed directly
opposite me there was an old guy called Dennis.
This poor old timer was a passenger in a mini minor that had rolled
seven times on the Port Wakefield Road.
In the prang he lost both of his legs and an arm. He also sustained severe brain damage which
left him rambling incoherently most of the time. Dennis was kept in a child sized, stainless
steel crib so that he wouldn’t fall out and hurt himself. On the nights approaching a full moon when
the lights were turned out in the ward streaks of silvery moonlight filtered
down through the high, uncurtained windows directly onto Dennis’s bed. His brain damaged chatter used to keep me
awake at the best of times but illuminated in this way it was a deathly
spectacle. The stumps of his limbs would
wave around in the crib like stripped palm trees in a blow and he would repeat
the same monotonous chant, …..
“I’m only half a man, ... I’m only, ... half a
man”.
I stayed in the infectious diseases ward for about a month and in this
time my lower leg went from it’s previous life clinging color of pale, orangy
pink to a sickly purple and blue infected tone.
The wounds were swabbed constantly in plain old salt water which is the
only available option when antibiotics are of no use. Eventually the usol solution brought
salvation to my dying leg and the first tell tale signs of regrowth became
evident. After the worst of the
infection was gone the doctors said that I had beat it because my age was just
inside of the statistical parameters.
Secretly I knew that my imagination powered healing gun had played an
important part in the process but, I didn’t mention it for fear they would send
me to the psyche ward. Once free of the
staff infection I was returned to the Royal Adelaide to resume my skin graft
treatment. Two more months of round the
clock attention rolled by in a semi-conscious blur of hospital routine. No more medical complications reared their
ugly heads to threaten my progress and I was told by Doctor Potter that my
departure from hospital was just around the corner. I had not felt the wind on my face for the
best part of a year and I was yearning for liberty like never before.
My hospital days eventually drew to a close and I was informed by the
nursing staff that I was to be placed on a lighter schedule of
medications. From a steady supply of
heavy duty pain killers I was reduced to pitiful offerings of Panadine Forte
and with it came the most vivid and horrific withdrawals. While squirming in the grip of muscle
twisting cramps I would be suddenly transported into nightmarish imaginary
situations. I think I was having the same kind of fully conscious dreams experienced
by the South American Indians when they blast their brains out with
Ayahuacha. During one of the carnal mind
trips I found myself down in the concrete mote that surrounds the elephant
enclosure at the Adelaide Zoo. There was
a big angry bull elephant in the mote and he was trying to whack me with his
trunk as I attempted to scramble up the acutely angled side. The whole time I was tucked up safe and sound
in my hospital bed, but that didn’t do anything to deter the marauding beast
that was trying to flatten me. Another
horrific episode took place a few days later and it was so severe I had to be
given a calming blast of pethidine. It
happened while one of the nurses was massaging my foot and attempting to
stimulate the first signs of movement.
In the confines of my bed I was rigged up in a complex mechanical
traction brace which held my bones together through a series of externalized
pins and long steel screws. Where as it
had not been there before a long, compressed spring appeared at the side of the
splint. It crawled like a stainless
steel worm all the way up my body and around the back of my neck. I started
shaking uncontrollably as the pressure of the spring caused my head to lean
forward towards the leg. The whole
metallic splint configuration began to fall apart like a kids toy and my lower
leg snapped clean off at the knee joint.
The recoiling spring brought it flying up into my mouth with a sickening
thud and I couldn’t breath for the blood pouring down my throat. Unable to scream all I could do was lay there
in gagged mortal terror.
The day I got out of hospital I was so excited that I was up and
dressed with the sunrise. I still had
four long steiman pins protruding out of a lower leg plaster so my Levi jeans
had to be cut and re secured with safety pins.
I had lost so much weight since last I worn them that I had to pull my
belt right back to the last hole.
Arrangements were in place for my parents to come and pick me up at
around lunchtime, so I was just hanging around in the reception area counting
the moments and killing time. I was
looking forward to life away from hospital but part of me was dreading the
thought of returning to the farm. I had
little option to do anything else because I was barely capable of walking on
crutches, let alone all of the other stuff you have to do to function
properly. My mother always made such a
big deal about the sacrifices she endured to raise her kids and we were made to
feel guilty for the smallest motherly service she performed. I knew it was only her sense of Christian duty
that was providing my next bed and not any deep love she might feel for her
son. While I was gazing out of the plate
glass windows of the reception area someone called my name and I turned around
to see Fred stepping out of an elevator.
He had just finished his night shift and he was on his way home. I told him that I was being released from
hospital and I thanked him for all of his help.
He suggested since I had so long to wait for my folks I could do it at
his place which was just up the road. I was
ready to jump at any opportunity to get away from the hospital so we hailed a
cab and headed up North Terrace. Fred’s
house was a little cottage which was located right across the road from the
intersection where I had my smash. As we
passed over the crossroad in the cab I noticed a distinctive black stain in the
spot where I had fallen and it made my skin crawl.
“So this is what it’s like to be stoned, ... Mmmm”
‘The marijuana molecules
were kissing my brain like shock waves
from an exploding
galaxy’
‘I
was ready to
go along with
anything’
“It’s a Triumph, ... “An
absolute Triumph”.
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