journal entries around the time of the Operation.

Wednesday 22nd January.

Oh to smell the sweet perfume of a rockrose in the mountains of the Algarve, high about the Hubbub of the resorts and human concern.

I woke up on Tuesday morning ashamed for drinking into a stupor and it stops... My blood pressure is high. The penny has dropped - I have stage 2 high blood pressure (145/100 this morning). I don't want to die young - which 53 surely is in the 21st century? And I want to leave one nice In Memoriam: this was my life's mission and I can't fail? Can I? Oh the pity.

This morning it's 140/100. It seems I've stage 2 high blood pressure. And I thought different and approached Leeds differently yesterday. And today I am going to eat those things which are supposed to reduce the rate. Apart from my alcohol intake, and the bad diet habit I usually stumble upon there, I am pretty healthy for my age; excluding the foot injury and the eyes aging badly... Yesterday I enjoyed a while on the allotment turning over the soil, adding chicken manure and covering the areas as I slowly head southwards towards the next allotment (I never reached the left hand corner last year).

People are possessed by bullshit. Listening to Hipsters: they sound lost in a hall full of self reflections; narcissists.

Calm down! I think I did? I returned to the flat at noon. Made a noodle soup and refried beans (the final runner beans from the allotment) - which I ate for supper and breakfast.

I almost went and climbed on the 8am bus to Wetherby without recalling I have an appointment (the first of 2025) with Abby the Occupational Health Therapist @ 9am... Christ. I didn't remember at all. Perhaps my mind is so distracted? Anyway I was told that my blood pressure (around 140/100) is fine by the GP who called and it is nothing to worry about - I must just get 7 days of morning and evening readings and then there are options (more pills and less booze).

Sat in the window of the Caffé Nero on Vicar Lane (the old NatWest opposite the Victoria Quarter).

Good chat with Abby. It was the first I'd had in an age.

Made mum a nice cod 'Goan' curry with the packets she purchased for a £1. I made it more interesting with cubes of fried potatoes and turmeric rice. She complained all the time about me cooking it... But went back for seconds! She's never appreciative of me anymore and I've turned angry - frustrated would be the world. What's the point of all this conflict, mum? I don't get it...

***

It's over. Start again.

Great random meandering from Horsforth train station to the flat. Many stops along the way for food and halves. Found an interesting part of Leeds - Hawksworth Woods. Old mills. Mill race stream... Related to the Abbey in Kirkstall and into the modern era - a paper mill. Went to the Cardigan Arms which is very high Victorian (a la The Adelphi)  before running foul of some rugby toffs in Kirkstall Brewery tap... I left and continued my walk towards the flat. In North Bar I was talking to two guys from near the IKEA and in The Social I explained the rules of Scrabble to a bunch of twenty-somethings. Good Saturday. Blood pressure 145/100 this morning. Heading to Wetherby today. Relax... It's Sunday? Yup.

***

New week...and a new hope? On Thursday I have the operation to remove the Morton's Neuroma, finally, after years of waiting. And now all I am thinking/hoping/praying for is "pilgrimage".

Lola stayed over last night - Emma no doubt suffering the mother of all hangovers - so we were up far too early! A little like me yesterday. A little tired from Saturday, not hungover though but I have to not drink anything alcohol at all this week. And it is possible? I must remember the importance of resilience in recovery from an operation... Staying over again once more in Wetherby. Hopefully the allotment later today too. Weather dependent as it rained heavily yesterday afternoon and overnight. Blood pressure a tad high this morning.(155/100) Perhaps having Lola alongside me reduce the quality of my sleep? A bit tired this morning and mum's got the builders in... I am tired. Tired of everything.***

Tuesday

140/100. Not a perfect night's sleep, but vastly superior to the previous two nights - last night a car alarm was being alert some distance away and I had to accept it before I could return to lalaland. It's just gone 5am.

133/96. End of the day. Mum's watching the 6pm news down below. Lola has left the building. Finished The Temptation of Saint Anthony (middle good otherwise hard to follow - it's quite surreal, but I guess that's the point). Three days sober. Three days zero alcohol. Saturday I did drink too much so blood pressure was high! I understand it now. The longer between bouts of heavy drinking the maximal...

***

Wednesday

138/96 bp @ 5am.

Penultimate morning prior to the operation on Thursday afternoon. Day four of zero units of alcohol... Wonders!

Chilled. Slept well. Break the chains of alcoholism... Been trapped since COVID took a bite out of the rotten fruit.

6:30am and remaking the bed, ablutions, etc. going to spend the morning with Lola and the afternoon on the allotment, then back to Leeds for the final night prior to the operation on Thursday afternoon...

No allotment - couldn't get my head around that. Once a week is better than nonce a week? Back to Leeds on the number 7 around noon. Sunny in Leeds. Sat in the sun outside Brownhill and Co, but not for long as there was a chill in the breeze.

Tried several nolo beers. OK. It's fine I guess - better than it used to be with Kaliber... But they just lack something and I don't get the warmth I get from true beer. However I've not had a beer since Saturday and my BPM says I am fine once more... I was disappearing down the rabbit hole of alcoholism.

***

140/100

Day of the operation.

Ate healthily and no alcohol - 0.5% beer... A number of them. Slightly upset stomach this morning? No idea where from - unless yogurt and kefir don't mix well... Awake just prior to 5am needing the toilet. Oh well.

***

125/88

Night of the operation.

Just gone 4:30am and I've not really slept. Perhaps an hour or two, but I was restless and never in the zone where I would turn to snore against the outside world - the inner ring road (and both the repeated call bell and air-conditioning fan) would be my state. I guess I was so full of painkillers, the after effects of anesthesia and the wiping through my bowel the laxative I took(with the ginger biscuit) around 10pm.

The night orderly was snoozing in the reception area as I sought coffee which she has placed on the bedside table alongside the easy chair I am reclining in with my left foot raised above a rolled towel on a foot stool - so far I feel no pain in the foot whatsoever...

Ah, breakfast @ 8am. That was a long wait to fill my empty belly. I drank a jug full of water, all the lemon water I'd brought yesterday and the two Walker's biscuits... Golden Oats - yummy - around 5am. A nurse gave me more opiates... Oh how I yearn for an opium tainted something like those hedonists Oscar Wilde so described in The Picture of Dorian Grey - a novel I despised at high school: although I adored his plays (and I disliked Will 'self' Self's retelling too)...

One of the orderlies returned to take the polished clean porcelain, and almost whisked away the remainder of my ultimate caffeine hit: but I stayed her hands 'not that, not yet!'

***

Nuts! Oh yeah. A packet of salted peanuts. That was my hors d'oeuvre? Yes I suppose it was! Followed by chips and curry sauce, then two pork pies and a fruity/nutty scoundrel... Then home to listen to Finley pluck those strings on his acoustic guitar: he's pretty good really. A rock and roll star: he's my nephew, but he's Stewart Anderson (who was a good lad). But I am tone deaf with an interest, but not an obsession, for music. As a wee laddie I was obsessed with early Elvis - I even had a blue shirt with Elvis 56 emblazoned on the chest stenciled by my mother with those 1970s coloured pens which are still sat in their rack in the shed slowly decaying into their constituent parts: mainly heavy and toxic metals I bet?

Day one after surgery was a strange one, but now I start day two of the post Neuroma era with my leg up on several cushions, beside the bay window, drinking coffee and listening to Matthew Sweet on the wireless set. 1st February 2025 already.

On the long path to recovery - total recovery. I hadn't drunk anything since Saturday so Friday was my excuse. It was a momentary lapse? Today I want to be extremely healthy, wealthy and wise, but I am back in Leeds until Monday? Sunday is my birthday - ideally I'd like to stay this evening at 42 and be narcissistic tomorrow...

But el hefe won't allow it? Probably not... She's not one with compassion really for me.

***

I stayed. And from 5pm until 5am I was under the covers. My mobility is severely restricted. But in the long term my mobility will be expanded? Give me back el Camino. It's all I want.

Yesterday afternoon I took Lola out - she was looking at me in her particular manner - and it was the slowest 30 minute walk of our time together? But she appreciated a walk through the 'hazards' of Wetherby... Mainly the same dozen faces in the the same half dozen pubs... One's who don't offer me anything more than marginal interest - most hardly rise an eyebrow (rarely a smile). It's not you it's me... It always been me? I am more than the sum of its parts, but it will outlast me like the afterglow of a supernovae, as a shell of what was once pretty vibrant?

It seems true to me? It was a vibrant place in my youth? I am sure it was. Sure there were problems, but there were places to go to discuss topics. The back room of The New Inn was where us six formers formed up.

***

This is good. I feel I have something positive to look forward to now I've had the operation. And time is a healer. I heard from John yesterday and gave him advice for Susan and him if they are interested in the walk from Le Puy-en-Velay in July...it's very addictive - and I know the Camino Frances is an excellent social affair, but France has another element entirely to Le Chemin Saint Jacques...Via Podiensis.

Walking slower has slowed me down. Interesting - I am paying attention in the moment... Perhaps I was walking with overwhelming anxiety...

***

Prescription review on Wednesday and I feel it's time to reduce the dosage?

Must provide morning and evening blood pressure readings to the surgery, but I don't know where the record I made has gone... However I know how to manage my blood pressure now! Less alcohol. Don't need it. Not at all. Want el Camino back in my life! They want me to record it again... So now I am en-route to Leeds(slower) on a pongy(mouldy) bus X98.

***

Close to one pm and I am reading Chéri avidly, over a pint of Dissolution, in my new local, Stick or Twist - I occasionally pretended to chef in the casino above here - I hated that casino and the clients and the aggressive steak chef... I did little positively except cater for the weary eyed croupiers who dealt cards to Chinese abhorrents - they appreciated my efforts... I was the chef looking after the most important client: the staff!

151/101

***

Time and again I come out of the shadow of alcoholism - a current mode - only to see the world I do not want. The world is sinister. It is a pox. When I am inebriated the world is far removed, but after a few days the ten thousand things begin to overwhelm me again. When I am inebriated I become sinister like the world. Currently I don't want to be inebriated so I must suffer the world, which is truly a joke of the largest proportions - without mentioning names?

That Joker has come up. It has been placed into the deck and was eventually dealt; and how I snigger at The King of Fools. 

Some how I made it to the X99 at 6:55am, yet I was brutally awake at 4:30am so did a wash, ate a small breakfast and recollected all my items in the back-pack. Another podcast - the discovery of Oxygen - and then I prepared urid daal for tea: a daal for sure. It's a bit colder this morning... 148/96.

***

140/96

Cold morning - whore frost... And now I am sat beneath the blue sky as the church bells chime a quarter to three.

Why do I feel I am always waiting for something to happen? I can answer this question pretty sincerely - because I've over stayed what has long since departed from what I need. The boat left the dockside but I wasn't on it so now I cast glances at the oily ripples, with the final rays of the setting sun bouncing and taunting on them, and it's insufficient for me to keep pondering when I know there is another way to get back on the way in my life?

***

Friday 7th Feb

141/104

Already left 42 and drinking a coffee in Costa in the Market Place. It's not like a café in France, or anywhere south of Le Manche, as it's utterly industrial with the stiff manners of the barista and the long counter which suggests something from a canteen in the 1980s (the Co-op café attached to the 1970s carbuncle in the Horsefair Centre). Same faces - always the same faces. I walked passed Caffé Nero as the one solemn groundskeeper of the Rugby club was the only client. It's cold this morning, but not frigid. Heading to Leeds to see Abbie (OHT) @ the light at 9am.

Two days ago Glenn and I booked our route out of here - Limoges. I like Portugal, but the Algarve ain't France: it's not so cultural. It's warmer, and I like it, but it's not romantic! However ... I am not getting romantic about Glenn(yet)!

***

A tired Saturday. I was fine this morning, but I think I need to do nothing on these plates of feet? Briefly ventured into Wby with Lola, but the hair of the dog didn't do anything for me. Need to lay off now as I've two hospital appointments on Monday and another on Tuesday. Mum and I are having a curry night. Not had one in ages...

***

Lola and I relocated at 4:30am to the sofa. She pushed me to bring her breakfast at 5am - before she would go for toilet. She shared a little of the Shazlik with me yesterday. Dry and perfect and middle eastern... I rarely eat takeaway, and never Chinese takeaway, but it was a nice occasional thing. It's Sunday and it's time to chill... Just going 7 and mum's still asleep - Lola too(snoring on the sofa). It's Sunday so another quiet day. Hospital Monday and Tuesday so well behaved. Mum rarely had the TV on yesterday as she has a good book, which is a good thing!

***

The second section of Chéri is a little more difficult to wade through. It got interesting as he collapsed on the bed - mentally exhausted I guess (the first world war cast a long shadow on the veterans). Everything changed. Everything has gone bad. Since that war the world has been really really bad - corrupt even, systematically.

Monday morning and I definitely have an infection where the operation took place. Yesterday afternoon I couldn't stand lying there with this continual pain around the dressing - which I removed to find it stiff as a board with old blood. The swelling decreased during the night, but covers most of the toe area either side of the wound. I will need to see someone about the wound...

***

151/111 @ 6am.

Or how to introduce much more panicking into a system already stretched to snapping point!

I don't think taking a reading of my blood pressure morning noon and night is helping my head any. I don't live a perfect lifestyle, but I don't smoke , eat healthy and am cutting back on alcohol - I am also pretty active for a 53 year old! 

151/107 @ 4:45pm.

***

151/106 @ 5:30.

Wednesday morning. Paid my debts (the vast majority). Leg up as the antibiotics do their work - much less paid across the toes. Modern medicine is a amazing - every time I go into hospital I am floored by the science as well as the professionalism and the performance. Instant coffee this morning! Bugger... Forgot we'd run out at 42... But there was once a time when Gold Blend was a 'luxury' item! 6am. Breakfast time.

The final batch of last year's ratatouille. Still hardly reduced. So I reduced it and had it on toast. This week is going to be close to zero all week and dull all day. And it's like my opiated mind. Waiting for a bus out of here until Friday. Bored. Didn't sleep too well last night. Too many aches in the foot. But it's definitely recovering.

***

Thursday. No blood pressure check this morning. In pain in the foot. Having a day inside the flat keeping the foot elevated and rested. Even when I don't 'walk' I am still walking. Needs to rest. And there is nothing of any consequence outside my door. As I watch the traffic and the construction workers across from my flat filling their time with nothing of any consequence I wonder what really matters? I am not cold, not starving and not in need of anything to maintain me in this existence. But I am convinced I need more because there must be something more than just this? This life. It's not all that exciting... Do I want bombs to rain down from the sky to pummel these cardboard boxes across from me back into the dust they're made from? I've brewed a pot of tea to break up the monotony. Am I more depressed than usual? Being unexpectedly disabled just adds to the list of things to whine about. Life's great: this pickle is great: it's an experience which has cost me nothing!

***

Friday 14th February 

144/104.

Podcast: Catherine of Aragon - fairly interesting... I think King Henry was poisoned by his advisor! They were in love in their youth.

Got an appointment at Nuffield at 9. The foot hurts less, but is still sensitive. I appear to have some chilblains on my right foot too. Took only 3 antibiotics yesterday as I took 5 the previous day. Day 4 of the dosage. Need to get cleaned this morning: flannel and soap: although I don't stink... We definitely wash too often in the 21st century. We are animals with animal odours. Took first tablet at 6 am. About to go remake the bed. Slept well until the foot began throbbing and I found sleeping uncomfortable afterwards. I listened to the noise on the street and couldn't hear buses so snoozed onwards. 6:50am and off to remake the bed...

These last few days of thoughts have become many many days ... And it stops!