Letters from the Other Side

4.2.4 The mermaid of Turtle Island and the shopaholic of Pretoria

Eleventh newsletter (Second trip. Fourth newsletter)

8 May 2008 

I just passed the eight month marker, can you believe it? It amazes me how happy and settled I am now. School starts for the teachers on Monday 12th of May and for the students on the 16th of May. Then it's five months of grind and hustle and bustle again (a long semester!).

Mom's been here now for a month and it's an agreeable change to have some company for once. It's very insightful to read her newsletters. Her first impressions of Thailand reminds me a lot of how new and strange everything felt for me in the beginning. I've noticed that I'm so used to everything now (for example the street dogs and transportation system) that I don't even notice the misery and weirdness around me anymore. Then mom's perceptions are quite enlightening.

Mom landed on the 7th of April. It was so odd to see her again for the first time in seven months. Later she admitted to me that the first thing she noticed about me was how much weight I had gained. We were both very glad to see each other. At least we didn't make as big a scene as two aunties who screamed, ran into each other's arms and almost toppled over from the embrace.

Mister Atticus ("To Kill A Mockingbird"), Mom's British boss, took us to her new apartment. It was an open plan, one-bedroom flat on the sixth floor. There was only one double bed and no duvets. We took a taxi to get my suitcases at my Thai friend's place and then went to the nearest shopping centre to buy mom a bedspread. We found a pink one that didn't cost too much.

Aunt Bettie, very irresponsibly, gave mom one of her prescribed sleeping pills. Mom drank it before she went to bed. It was potent because it knocked her out before her head hit the pillow.

In the middle of the night mom woke and walked to the bathroom. But she was as drunk as an owl from the sleeping tablet and she slammed into the bathroom wall. She just couldn't find the doorway. There was a fan next to the wall and she kept ramming into it over and over, so much so that she sprained her finger (and almost broke the poor fan. The frame was skew from that day on). She started screaming but she just kept smashing into the fan and wall like a headless chicken.

I jumped up, grabbed her other hand, lead her to the doorway, waited for her to pee and then lead her back to the bed. It was awful for me to see her in this state. I was bewildered. And I was vexed with Aunt Bettie. Doctors prescribe pills for a reason, for goodness sakes! You can't just give your prescribed medication to someone else. 

But the worst was that I had this queasy, uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. An upsetting premonition hit me.

My mom had struggled her whole life with depression and since I was a child I felt it was my duty to be a shoulder for her to cry on. I patiently listened to her boyfriend problems or when she felt her work was "killing her soul". I worshipped my mother. It was the two of us against the world. A lot like the movie "Mermaids"

But it was late at night and the reality of what I had just seen, had left an indelible impression on my mind and I was still digesting it. I struggled to fall asleep after that. Mercifully, I eventually passed out.

As the sun and unbearable heat rolled in through the glass sliding doors, things started to look hopeful again. The breakdown of the previous evening melted away like mist in the morning sun. Things looked promising in the daylight. We relaxed that day and the next day we headed for the island of Koh Tao (Turtle Island).