Condition Other Than Normal: Finding Peace In a World Gone Mad. Gary Tetterington
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My head was ready to explode and I had to listen to, “Alcohol…! On my ward…!” she spit and sputtered. “You… you… irresponsible person! With everyone on medication! You…! You…!” Her rare and precious nurses were feigning not to tehee and titter or hiding it well. I thought the whole affair a merry prank and jest.
The doctor was called in at 4 A.M. and he did not even pretend to find the matter amusing. After he was done flailing and frothing, he had the audacity to ask me if I was an alcoholic. I replied that I preferred to be considered a drunk in search of the truth.
The doctor then asked me intently, just what did I think my sidekick was doing in his hospital? Here I had to remind the man that he was the doctor and I had no way of understanding my partner’s complaint. On hearing my judicious rationale, the man went on edge and was ready to eat raw meat. He was a disturbed dog in August. A facial tic was making him an excitable fellow. His arms were lashing on short – circuit speed and I dearly hoped the scalpels were locked away and under chain and key. The doctor was special pissed – off because that lush colleague of mine had been admitted to Stanton Y.K. Hospital for alcohol poisoning.
“Do you realize that just 1 drink could kill that man?” I wisely chose not to comment or to tell the doctor that his patient was comatose, the result of his having guzzled and put away the better part of 20 oz. of vodka by his own self and that he had long since gone into a deep alcoholic delirium and was horizontal on the floor of our communal room at that very moment. No. Best to remain silent. An observation of such substance would not have done much for my position. No.
Instead, I sat back, soundless and silent and wondered if it would be cattle prods or hair shirts or whatever means the good doctor used to control pest problems and irrational creatures like myself. I was ready for and expecting any lunatic cure and I felt like Jack Nicholson in the best movie of his excessive and extravagant life.
But no, it was not to be this way. Rather, the charade was over and even if I was an incomparable rascal, I had to give my solemn word of honor that there would be no more shenanigans or I could, “get the fuck out of my hospital and walk to Edmonton, for further care and treatment!” Cold, I would have to say. But an easy choice.
Two days later I was discharged from Stanton Y.K. Hospital and released onto the streets of Y.K. once more. Amazingly, nurse Dietrich herself returned and presented me with that closing bottle of vodka, still containing a goodly portion of drink. That bottle was mine, by virtue of having my name stenciled boldly across its silky smooth label. ‘Sensational,’ thought I.
With a thank – you very much and a neat click of my heels, I was gone. I was off and running down main street, pulling on that ugly and evil bottle, delving and dealing with demons and headed for Giant Y.K. Mine.
All is well.
G.B.T.
A –Shaft -The Deed.
Anxiously, I raced the last 100 yds. to the camp, needing to be part of the mayhem and music I could hear and feel, even at that distance. I was craving an uneasy dependency I knew so well and had felt so often, amongst other fools and failures.
Handshakes and backslaps all around. The liquor and the laughter tasted natural and true but a tone of disquiet was in the air and a hostile and threatening power was drawing closer around me and that bunkhouse celebration could have been the dance of the red death.
Only an hour had gone by and in walked the boss – man and it was a rude jolt and stagger, to be told I no longer had a job. I had been let go, fired, for not being at work the previous 5 days.
Stand by me here folks. Since I was a bit crazy at that point in time, all I can do is scribble and scratch out how I felt and reasoned back then. I may think differently today.
Bastards! I had been in the hospital! Because of an injury I had gotten in their fucking mine! And the bastards knew it! Not right! Not fucking right!
Anger, mean anger, get even anger, was my1st and immediate reaction. It came upon me with great force and would not let me go. I was possessed with anger. I was over the line with anger. Easy…
Now, I had been canned and banished from so many jobs, one would think I would have had little difficulty in dealing with yet another dismissal. But… something went snap. Something basic and vital and I had been aware of it but unable to define it, to reason it out and to ward it away. I was helpless.
The party and the pandemonium and the sheer craziness sent me shuffling back to my room, for solitary drink and reflection. Alone in my room I was E.A. Poe, buried deep in a dark and desperate nightmare. I was frightened. And I was so weary.
I pondered on my wordless rage and what I knew would surely be my most outrageous act of dismay and defiance. I had been bushwhacked and I knew I was going to do something.
Torn and gone was a frail and fragile thread I had grasped and seized onto, a lifeline I had abused and battered until it had finally parted and I was falling. My faith and credit had been severed and I did not believe I would be walking away peaceably, not that time. No.
I was a long way from home, wherever that may have been and I was busted. No coin. I had nothing. Nothing!
Well, whose fault was that? Who was responsible for such error and indiscretion? Well… I was… of course. I know it now. But back in Y.K., in ’76, I was mixed up and confused. Perhaps I had been deceived by an evil influence. Intelligence and my heart say yes. It was exactly this way.
What was I to do? Where was I going to run to next? What would I be doing when I got there? And the big one, who would I be when I did get there? Troublesome questions and cause for much alarm and distress.
The delusive fact that I had been wrongfully dismissed by Giant Mine had pushed me over a thin red line and a lifetime of self – inflicted grievance and injustice had compressed itself into a tick of time and I was not going to run away. Not that time. No.
Suddenly it came to me! Inspiration and awakening born of despair and madness! Kill the beast and be done with it! Yes! Yes! Yes! Giant Mine, low – swine corporation that it was, would have to answer to my defeats and anguishes. It was a flash scenario, brought on by a rogue star I had never seen before and quick as lightening, a sweet vengeance was mine.
Giant Mine and so many other ravages and raiders had been harassing and complicating my life on this leisurely planet and it was time to rid myself of their evils.
Blow it away. Waste the worthless pit. Chase the demon. I was going to do it. I had the means. I was the man. I was the one.
The image grew rapidly and became a swift certainty and it was totally correct. Consequences never bothered me or entered my head. It was urgent and imperative I do the deed. It was the only way out because my whole life to that point was one enormous and abysmal foil and rout. It was the only way to break free of a washout existence or I was going to die. No doubt about it. There were no alternatives. It was an awesome revelation and a perfect understanding.
The very idea of bombing Giant Y.K. Mine was an atonement and a redemption for past deceptions and shortcomings. The act itself would be a salvation and set me free.
An icy calm and a low – point acceptance offset the fury I had felt. No emotion. No motion. The world stopped turning. I was comin’ home. There comes a time.
Come 2 A.M. and guided by strange gifts, whiskey and white magic mostly and being drawn by the spectral mysteries and music of the Northern Lights, I set off for A – Shaft.
Listen up now. Along the way and in the way, happened to be the main powder magazine. It was a monster of a container, a glistening and glaring steel edifice holding vast and limitless tons of explosives and it supplied the whole damn mine with fire and lightening. I walked around it. Shook my head and kept walkin’ because had I gained access, well, the entire camp and everyone in it would have vanished and died. The trailers and the men in them, would have been sent spread and sprawling, all across the northern tundra. And I would have touched off the bastard. Why not? I felt that right, that night. To the point where I was