Radiotherapy #1

Early January 1997

It was the heart of Winter; Arctic winds had pushed in from Siberia, thick rime ice had white-washed the trees, icicles hung perilously from the gutters of houses, cats and dogs would not go out, cars failed to start, the buses never came and the children never got to school. Me; well I was okay. I sat in the in my German army and navy parka and wondered what all the fuss was about. This was freedom. This was about being alive...all this white stuff.
We set off again in the same direction, taking in the same sights, on the same old road, to the same place for six weeks of radiotherapy. I must admit that I hadn't got a clue what radiotherapy entailed, so I just followed the way; through the hospital doors and to the end of the purple line that dropped into the lead lined hole.
I signed in as usual, sat down and did what I did best; 'waited.' Ten minutes, read 'Cosmopolitan', twenty minutes, read 'Women's Own', 30 minutes and I began to consider playing with the kids toys in the corner but a toddler with a skinhead had commandeered the dumper truck and the crane and my, oh my, despite the miserable setting, he seemed to be really enjoying himself.
I got the call, got a smile from a pretty girl in a white tunic who showed me into the 'mould room.' 'I need to make you a 'headshell' and it will take about thirty minutes.' More lost time. 'You need to keep completely still through the procedure.' Time was floating passed. She began by putting a 'swimming' cap over my head and massaged a cream into my skin which was quite pleasurable. Then things began to get very surreal as she lay strips of plaster of paris bandage all over my face but leaving holes for my nose and mouth that allowed me to breath. Now I have never indulged in sensory deprivation and I wasn't getting any thrills from this especially when my face started to burn. Shit, embalmed and burned alive; fuck, bring me a wooden box to lie down in. Then, from nowhere came the magical words 'all done now'
I walked away after my face peel and waved at the toddler without much hair who then smiled at me and laughed. Yeah, he'd been there too.
I made my way back into the world again and stood beneath a sky of unbroken blue. A plane soured high overhead and disappeared and I thought, man, that's beautiful and my senses returned again, all snow white and azure blue.