When porridge isn’t really the problem
But state of mind is…
When they told me that Pony Dalgleish had been diagnosed with a mental disorder, I felt the bitter chill that a friend feels having lost touch. Tim Dalgleish was given the name Pony by all of us boys in his class at school, for the reason he liked to keep his long hair tied up. The last time I saw him, perhaps a decade ago, he still had a fine head of hair, silvered of course, but tied up the same way. I felt envious, having started to lose my hair before I was thirty.
When I tried to get an idea about the seriousness of his illness, the information seemed vague. The physician told me that Pony didn’t understand consequences anymore; his first reaction toward people was insensitive and unsympathetic. Really? That’s a mental disorder? How many times have I felt the same way?
It was hard to accept, having known him since school, again as a teenager, and finally, having grown old together, realizing that Pony was always the life and soul of any gathering. He wasn’t without fault, attracted to trouble and the more fun because of it.
I asked if I could speak with him, stating that I was leaving the following day, heading out to the Minch fishing grounds. Fishing grounds Pony had known well, having worked for my father most all his life, crewing when he was sixteen, tough as can be imagined, fearless, who drank more than anyone, which is most definitely why he never married. I hadn’t seen Pony in a couple of years, the last time bailing him out of the Oban jail for demonstrating lewd behavior in public, pissing on the saddle of Jack Rafferty’s bike, the local bobby on the island.
Pony, they told me, was in the gardens. It took a few minutes to locate him, but there he was, his diminutive frame standing next to a flower bed. He was watering the plants.
“Hello Pony, what’s going on, buddy?”
“Och, now is that you, young Harry?”
“I don’t know about young anymore, Pony. Hit seventy this year. What are you now? Eighty-two, maybe?”
“Aye lad. Tell me, how’s the old man doing,” he said, laying down the water hose.
I ushered him to sit with me on a bench before explaining that dad died a year ago.
“He did, Harry? That’s sad. Your dad was a good’un, a real good’un.”
“Yes, Pony. He was,” I said.
“I guess they’ve told you I’m mad, eh. The doctor put me in here, you know. He said it was for my good.”
“How do you feel? You seem fine. Any problems?”
“Nay, laddie. I’m rosy, diamond even.”
“You look good, Pony. How’s the food?”
“I’m an old man, Harry. No one takes any notice of me.”
“How’s that, mate?”
“I like my porridge thick and salty in the morning, ye know what I mean, lad?”
“I do, Pony.”
“Every morning, it’s slop. I think the kitchen people are worried I cannot chew…or something. It’s like baby shit, Harry.”
“I’ll have a word, Pony, lad.”
“Thanks, Harry. You’re just like your old man. I appreciate it.”
I left Pony sitting on the bench and walked away. I hadn’t gotten ten yards away when a brick hit me in the back of my head. I turned, dazed, blood trickling through my fingers, and heard Pony yelling.
“You won’t forget the porridge, will you, Harry?”
Sometimes, even when we think we know what is best for friends, it’s best left to the experts.
Pony, it seems, is in the best place.
Harry Hogg 2021
