Five Years and One Day…

Stephen Doyle
Sep 5, 2018 · 10 min read

Not quite the ghost of Christmas future, but almost

I felt my face redden, as I passed those seemingly, upwardly mobile restaurant diners, on my way to work. It was usually half past nine when I’d pass them en route to the bus depot where I’d take the R bus to work.

It was more than 20 years ago. I was in my mid-twenties but I remember it vividly. I had to catch the 10:09 pm bus so that I wasn’t late for work. It was a 25-minute walk from my front door to the bus terminal and a 25-minute bus ride to work. The next bus left at 10:39 pm.

I worked the night-shift, 11pm until 7:15 am, at Friends Hospital, an acute inpatient psychiatric hospital, in Philadelphia.

My 25-minute walk would always leave my back drenched with sweat so I’d always carry a backpack containing my lunch, one towel, whatever book that I happened to be reading and an extra shirt, which I’d change into upon arrival at work.

Gentrification had suffocated the once working-class neighborhood of Manayunk, where the well-heeled would over-crowd the neighborhood with their Benzes and Maseratis while they dined and drank at the Main Street hotspots.

I envied them. Their smiling, laughing and sharing stories and good times was something that I never had an opportunity for with my family. We were always struggling rather than enjoying life.

I’d never dined at a restaurant with my family because we were always scraping by, and my mother’s premature death, at 51 from breast and bone marrow cancer guaranteed that we could never do that in the future.

She had been fighting the cancer war since age 34.

Wastefully, I resented the restaurant crowd, like somehow these strangers happiness was at all related to my loss. Why did they get to share drinks and laughs together while my family never could?

Life is unfair, and sometimes it helps to irrationally resent others for it.

Photo by Ghost Presenter from Pexels

I no longer had a car, nor did I need one, and was very physically active by default. In addition to hoofing it on foot I was also running 40 miles-per-week as part of my marathon training.

I’d go on to run a couple of marathons, numerous half-marathons and 10Ks. The running had helped to greatly improve my mood. Exercise was an incredible mood-stabilizer for me.

But sleep was often evasive. My mind was racing with many unanswered questions and conflicts. I had wondered when I might feel better, if ever.

Sometimes my grief felt as though I was trapped in a coffin, barely able to breathe and slowly suffocating, eerily reminiscent of that horror movie, The Vanishing, which was directed by the Dutch filmmaker George Sluizer.

The protagonist suffered a clinical and terrifying descent into madness at the mysterious loss of his girlfriend. The film culminated with one of the scariest endings of all time.

Fortunately, my coffin metaphor was nothing more than that. But I’d frequently awaken realizing that I was yet again drenched in sweat, with heart pounding in my chest as if it might finally explode leaving me for dead.

I preferred the quiet and calm of the night-shift because it afforded me the time to read and reflect. But mostly it allowed me the opportunity to try to figure out where it all went off the tracks.

But how did it come to this: frequent nightmares, undiagnosed anxiety-attacks (which I kept to myself out of shame), and self-isolating myself. But working the third shift had seemed like an extra layer of protection against the unrelenting stress of the everyday.

Still, I felt like I was going nowhere fast. In fact, I was almost waiting to die. At other times the third shift had provided a sense of calm, a salve for my aching spirit.

Long distance running did help to put me back on an even-keel after work, and my sleep did improve, albeit incrementally.

I’d regularly run after work, which was especially ideal during the hot summer months, considering that the heat would increase as the day bore on. The early morning temperatures were far more forgiving than the mid-day heat and humidity.

Manayunk Canal and bridge, seen from Main Street

I was in my mid-20’s and the running helped to alleviate my depressed mood, which I’d never really effectively dealt with on any consistent basis. It would still be a couple of years before I’d muster up the courage, against all sense of self-preservation, and seek professional help.

Running had provided a temporary respite from my suffering, which was merely an extension of unresolved childhood traumas. Up until this point, I had been self-medicating with alcohol bingeing. The bingeing was mainly limited to my weekends off, from work, and alternating week days when I didn’t work.

But that came to an abrupt end a couple of months prior when I had my driver’s license suspended for six months for a DUI conviction. I was speeding on I-95 South just past 2 am. It was a really stupid thing to do, especially at that hour.

My father and I were both convicted of DUI’s on the exact same week, back in 98’. My conviction was on a Monday, where I was permitted to enter a guilty plea and had my license suspended for six months while I attending court-ordered classes. I also met with a probation officer three times over that six-months period.

My father’s DUI was far more serious. He was driving the wrong way on a busy highway, in central New Jersey, when he crashed his Oldsmobile head-on into a packed mini-van.

Thankfully no one died. In fact, the most serious injuries sustained were to my father: multiple broken bones, which required three surgeries.

My father’s victims, a family of five, were largely unscathed. Well except for their 12 year-old son who endured a broken arm.

My father was looking at a potential 10-year prison sentence. At least that’s what the DA wanted.

Photo by karatara from Pexels

If the severity of the offense wasn’t bad enough a state police officer, who was sitting in a speed trap, had witnessed the accident.

He blurted out, while being questioned by the DA: “It was like having a front row seat to a horror show.” He added: “I’ve never seen anything like this in my 20 years of service.”

I remember not sleeping more than four hours (per night) after my DUI trial had ended because I was dreading my father’s trial. It was an incredibly tense week where I did my best to not talk with my father, fearing that I’d rip into him about his incomprehensible actions.

My father’s lawyer was really good at his job, somehow getting the state trooper’s testimony thrown out, due to bias while cooly and smoothly relaxing the courtroom tension.

He even managed to elicit a couple of smiles from two of the jurors.

I was equally impressed and repulsed at his skillful tactics. He was as suave as Perry Mason, but olive-complexioned and never reminding you how smart he was. He just as easily could have been a top-level salesman if he ever left the law.

My father ended up with 364 days that he could serve in the county jail. The sentence was crucial because if it had been one year, or more, he would have gone off to state prison.

But it was conditional: he had to permanently surrender his driver’s license and attend weekly classes for two years after he had served his time.

He quickly agreed to the conditions.

His biggest obstacle would be the adjustment to doing time. County jail was no cakewalk. But he was permitted to serve the time from Friday through Sunday evenings, which allowed him to keep his full-time job.

If that wasn’t generous enough the judge would give him credit for three days served-instead of two-because Friday through Sunday would be counted as 72 hours instead of the 48 hours per weekend.

image compliments of Pexels.com

While most 63 year-olds are contemplating retirement he got to look forward to spending his weekends in county jail.

While it wasn’t the death sentence that would have been state prison it was still a difficult step to contemplate.

I remember sitting several rows behind my father and his lawyer, Ed Crisonino, and feeling really awful for the victims while they looked as if they had seen a ghost upon hearing the verdict. I did my best to avoid looking in their general direction.

I felt complicit in what seemed like a grand larceny. I still cannot forget the statuesque affect of the father who could only stare, in muted impotence, at the judge.

He and his wife were a study in contrasts. She was sobbing loudly and only stopped to catch her breath. That went on for an eternity. It felt like the end of a Catholic funeral Mass: somber music, people struggling to move, and swollen eyes and tears.

I remember feeling really awful, and strangely complicit, in what felt like a miscarriage of justice. That family was wronged a second time with the judge’s decision.

But I was also relieved.

Additionally they could not sue for pain and suffering because they had ‘limited tort’ and did not meet the very high standards needed to make a case. My father would not lose the house in a nightmare lawsuit scenario, thanks to legal technicalities.

As an aside, I have, and always will have, full-tort auto insurance. Saving a little money with limited tort is just irresponsible. One never knows what the future may hold.

It appeared that my father’s lawyer was doing his best to hustle my father from the courtroom, especially after the judge permitted my father to only serve county time on weekends, because he had feared the expected confrontation.

Something else flashed before my eyes, so to speak: my father’s fate could very well become mine if I didn’t make needed changes.

After all, it’s not everyday that a father and son get convicted the same week, and for separate-though similar-crimes.

So I quit drinking for five years and one day.

I had my first drink, a pint of Guinness, at a bar above Holt’s Cigars on my weekend off from work. I was going through a divorce and had just learned that my father was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer.

Photo by Fancycrave.com from Pexels

An old friend had invited me there on his sympathetic dime. But that’s all that I had. Just one pint of beer. It wasn’t anything special. It didn’t queench any thirst for some near-forgotten elixir of yesteryear. The beer was actually flat and without any flavor.

I went another six months before having another drink, a double single malt scotch (Macallan 12-year).

I figured that, in general, if I did not drink then I had nothing to worry about. Besides, I had enough going on to consume my energy: work and driving my father back-and-forth for his chemotherapy treatments. I had too little time for anything else.

I also had a nagging sense of guilt, a guilt that hung over me like a dark cloud wherever I went. I felt really bad that my divorce would leave my older son without my regular presence.

I would also slowly learn the pain of missing out on witnessing his firsts: reading for the first time, his first haircut, first trip to the shore, first vacation, first time climbing all the way up a tree and a few more firsts.

I also hated how sad he looked when he’d stand at his front window, at age 2, 3 and 4, and watch me walk away at the end of our mid-weekday visits. He definitely paid a price and I can only hope that it hasn’t cost him too much.

Ironically, my parents never divorced; my father was ‘physically’ usually present. But he was never interested in the day-to-day well-being of any of his children. I was more present for my older son despite the divorce.

Thankfully, I’ve learned from my myriad mistakes and have become a better father and spouse because of it. Both of my sons are thriving and I can only admire my wife for her strength, limitless love and the incredible example that she provides for both our boys as well as me.

As I write today, at 48 years of age, I realize that I have so much to be thankful for, and have come to understand that while the past may have been far from pleasant, and at certain times, downright brutal, the present is looking really good and the future, promising.

Now I do enjoy a good IPA and the occasional single malt scotch. But I no longer drink and drive. It’s far more enjoyable to invite friends over for a cookout or to share wine during dinner.

I’d much rather read and work on my writing. I also have my own family to enjoy. But I do wonder, albeit wastefully, why didn’t my father enjoy his opportunity to be a loving parent?

I’m not getting any younger and I’ve finally discovered my passion, even if it has taken a few decades to get there. I now have a loving and supportive family to share it with.

Writer, husband and father, with a PhD in life experience, contributing writer at ManyStories. https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevedoyl

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