I collapsed in an airport once. I remember it well. It was midday and the flight was delayed. I’d run out of water and out of any money to buy any more with. I was walking across the lounge to go to the ladies room and the next thing I knew I was flat out on the floor with an overweight lager lout hovering over me asking me if I was alright. I was confused, the last time I had a fat man hovering over was my friend’s uncle who fell ontop of me as I was sleeping on his lounge floor at 5am in the morning as the last few stragglers of a party were going to bed. He tried to get out of his chair after too much whisky and misjudged it badly. I awoke in shock to find his red face half an inch from mine. It was a source of valuable amusement to everyone else who seemed to be ignoring the fact that I couldn’t actually breathe. I wouldn’t normally have been bothered by the event apart from the fact that I hated the fucker who had spent the evening complaining about everything and 89
generally being a racist bastard. Anyway, back to the story. I was alright, turned out I was seriously dehydrated. Funny, I thought I’d drunk enough that week to sink a ship. Unfortunately it was all alcoholic which defeats the object. I got back to my seat and all my monkey brained boyfriend….no I’ll re-phrase as monkeys do actually possess a high level of intelligence…. my pigeon brained boyfriend, had to say was ‘What took you so fucking long?’ It was the last holiday we spent together. Personally at that point in time, even the swollen bellied lager lout was looking an attractive companion.
What really got me about my ex husband was that deep down he despised me. He didn’t mean to. I even think he thought he loved me. He couldn’t see that he hated all women.
I wonder how much of my life I spend staring into nothingness. I’m staring but I’m not looking. I don’t want to look. I want to fix my eyes on one particular spot and drift away. I do it regularly. I don’t think it’s morbid, just an escape for a couple of moments. It usually makes me feel worse actually, like I’ve nodded off for a couple of minutes, it takes me a while to snap myself out of it and the real world becomes visible again.