Autumn of Life

Autumn of Life

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. The paper would already be ash and once the leaves had burnt completely the rest underneath would go up in smoke. There would be no trace of anything and I would be safe. ‘Oh no’….”Hello Linda, Linda, where are you darling? Are you ok? I could smell smoke and got worried. I did call out but you obviously didn’t hear me. Where are you? What are you burning so early in the morning?” My helpful but sometimes nosey neighbour Mrs. Morcombe had walked through my house and out to the back.

“Yes Mrs Morcombe I’m fine. I have been sorting out old papers and thought the easiest way to get rid of them was to burn them. It’s all under control”. I tried to steer her back through the house but her eyes focused on the fire I had lit and she wandered over closer. “Now make sure you watch this fire young lady. It doesn’t take long and whoosh, disaster” and she demonstrated with her long arms, nearly knocking me out in the process. After she had surveyed the rest of the back yard and was satisfied it was ‘danger proof’ she headed off towards the house, calling out “Don’t walk me out love, you stay here and keep an eye on that fire”.

As soon as I heard the front door shut behind Mrs Morcombe, I took the poker for the fire and gave the remaining leaves and little sticks a good prod. They had already transferred their flames to what was underneath them and it was now roaring and crackling.

I had to burn it. I didn’t feel good about it – and as I was poking the dying embers I had to keep reminding myself of all the positive reasons why I did it.

The next part of my plan was getting rid of what was carefully wrapped up in a strong hessian bag and living under my bed. It had been there for a few days. I’d checked a few times that the object was still there, and breathed a sigh of relief each time I saw that it was.

The idea only came to me after finishing lunch with my overbearing mother a few weeks earlier. She had a way of always leaving me feeling pretty negative about myself and this day was no exception. I thought she might have mellowed with age. But being into her eighties had not softened her one bit. “So I was wondering what you would do with yourself if you didn’t get offered the lead role for the Alzheimer and Dementia research?”

I used to day dream as a young girl that my mother actually cared about how I felt when she criticised and put me down. I had often hoped that after she had insulted me or just reduced me to tears with a random comment that slithered out of her mouth, she would re-evaluate and apologise to me. It never happened, and now many years later, she is still hurting me with her venom.

I had decided as I was getting ready the day of meeting her that I wouldn’t take her bait, I didn’t want to argue, for a couple of reasons, one being I didn’t have the energy and the second was that I would never win the argument and would end up in tears. My mother was an expert at winning disagreements – one of the reasons my father left her I suspect.

After the meal and a couple of wines for my mother, we had coffee. Her mind and mouth were lubricated enough for her to be extra opinionated and rude. “Well, what will you do if you have to leave the team?” she persisted.

“I won’t have to leave the team. That’s a ridiculous notion. After all I’ve been doing research work for many years there. They will want to keep me on even if I don’t get picked to lead it.” I told her, adding silently, ‘so shove that Mother’!

“Yes I know you can say that Linda but you have spent a lot of time working in this area, you love this field and to be fair….”

I thought, unrealistically, that she was going to say “You are the number one pick as far as I can see, and should lead the research”. But instead, finished her sentence with…”And you do know that you really aren’t getting any younger and are in the autumn of your life”.

I wanted to cry then, but I didn’t. I held it all in until I got home. Just for once she could have been nice about my capabilities and how hard I have worked. She would never change. When she said, ‘the autumn of your life’, it really had an effect on me. I hadn’t thought of my life in that term before. Well she was well and truly into ‘winter’ and there was no guarantee of another ‘spring’ for her.

I really had put my study, and career before my private life. I did have a chance, many years ago of marrying someone who truly adored me, but I was in the middle of my Masters, which eventually led to an amazing job, involving travel and a fulfilling career, so took this path ahead of possibly a life partner. But it was my decision. Later on my career took a different direction. The hospital where I was working at the time was given a substantial grant for research into a field of medicine that I had always taken an interest in – Alzheimer’s and Dementia. Maybe secretly I needed to know what makes some elderly people, such as my mother so difficult to get along with!!

So now, many years after the first research I did at the hospital, a grant was being given to a team of scientists to work on Alzheimer’s research – which will be instrumental in finding new treatments to stop, slow and prevent the insidious disease.

I was, along with a fellow scientist in the running to lead the research. His name was Leon and I had worked with him on many occasions. He was astute and had a brilliant mind, and just like me, desperately wanted to win the lead on this. We got on quite well although Leon could be a bit ‘up himself’ at times, and seemed to be getting worse with age. I’d say he was definitely in the ‘autumn of his life’!! But this was what I had worked towards all these years and I felt like I deserved it! My eagerness escalated at the prospect of being in charge of something so important, and to be recognised in this field for initiating new treatments was beyond my wildest dreams. But I knew I had to keep my true feelings under wraps until the lead on the research was announced.

“Hello Linda. How are you feeling about the research grant? What a lot we can do as a team with the amount of money we are being given. I’m not sure how you feel about leading the team, but I should think I am slightly ahead of you in the running because of the research I led a couple of years ago” he smugly informed me.

“But Leon, that research wasn’t in the same field. If I remember correctly it was ‘finding better techniques and management for the millions of people who have to deal with diabetes’. I’m not saying that’s not a worthy research, just that this is totally different, so I’m probably slightly ahead I would say, wouldn’t you?”

“Oh Linda, I know you wouldn’t be condescending regarding my work, you’re too professional for that. Well, we should know soon enough who ‘head honcho’ for the research is. I’d like to extend my hand to wish you the best of luck when you submit your research proposal in, and as mine is finished and is sitting on my desk to be proof read only, I am ready as we speak”. He extended his long thin arm and I shook his hand. Then as he walked off, he turned around and said, with a smile on his face “Oh did I tell you that the new CEO of the hospital is my Uncle, And not only an Uncle, a very close friend also? Enjoy the rest of your day Linda”.

That really threw me. The fact that Leon was not only a nephew but a friend of the new CEO was a definite advantage. Even if the details of my proposed research, the methodology, my approach, timeline, feasibility and all other considerations were exemplary, I didn’t have an Uncle or a close friend making the final decision. With only two days left to hand our proposals in, I made an ‘extremely out of character’ decision.

 I took the only other option left to me. I made sure Leon had nothing to hand in.

As the ash from the fire blew away in the wind, I could only justify what I did by saying to myself…’Leon shouldn’t have told me about his proposal sitting on his desk, and he shouldn’t have been so bloody smug about everything. I will now get my proposal accepted, the only one to be handed in, and as an act of charity, I will ask Leon to be my ‘right hand man’. I felt ok with it all. I did, after all I deserved it. It was probably my last ‘roll of the dice’ as far as leading a team. The younger ones were being given more chances now.

I took a hammer to Leon’s computer – smashing the backed up proposal to pieces before I scooped up all the bits and buried them in my garden. Just as I was walking back inside my house to wash my hands, Mrs. Morcombe popped her head over my fence and called out “You’re gardening early today Linda – you’re always busy” as she looked around to see what I had actually been doing.

“Oh well you know how much there is to do in the garden in autumn” I replied.

I sat down on the lounge with a cup of coffee to think excitedly about what my future held now, but more importantly, how in a few days I could ring up my Mother and tell her what I had achieved.