DIARY OF A GRANDFATHER: Invisible Prison

Invisible Prison

Curled into a ball in the corner of the prison afraid and alone you are tired of trying to climb over the walls. You cry and groan and like your speech it is unintelligible and unheeded. Now and then you try again to break out clawing and trying to climb the walls. But you always fall back injured and bruised. Every time you try and fail makes it harder for the next time. But you keep on trying; what else can you do? Unlike a normal prison your walls are like glass and you see the other children just like you talking and playing, laughing and joking, singing and being friends.

Then the children stop playing, they come and stare at you, some call you names, you try to hide but there is nowhere to go, you try and talk to them. They laugh at you and call you stupid, they know you are not smart, you cannot be. You cringe tighter into a ball trying to hide from the abuse. Your only friend is your imagination, in there you are normal and unafraid you have lots of friends and you speak like a king. You retreat into it and from it flows writing golden and pure, in your writing there is no interruptions or snags, no snigger's or prejudice. You write a lot, you read a lot for escape is your only option in this invisible prison.

School Bully Stock Photo - Premium Rights-Managed, Artist: Raoul Minsart, Code: 700-03456723

I was visited in prison by my mother Alice, by my brothers, Robert, Peter, and Gary, and also by some friends and family and a very special man named Mr Davies. For years and years they comforted me and gave me the ladders so that every now and then I could climb out and be free. Then I could play and be a child, to laugh and “be normal”. And every time the prison ensnared me again they would never give up, they broke in and picked me up, wiped away my tears and held my hand. Every time I wanted to curl up and be afraid they guided me into the world.

I climbed out of this prison long ago it took a while and sometimes I fall back in. But now that I am an ‘old man’ I think back on that long ago time and know that I have been blessed. I was blessed because I escaped, but also because even though I felt the blow torch of ridicule and prejudice I learnt to be patient and to be emphatic with those who were different and also persecuted. I learnt that all is not as it may seem, and that what lies within a man is much more valuable than what is without. I was blessed with an imagination that bloomed and grew in enforced isolation but which has taken me on many of the most beautiful journeys in my lifetime. But mostly I was blessed because I knew I was loved, by people who cared and made an effort for me. Mum : Pretty potted daisy with 'I love you' on the container Stock Photo

Mum : Pretty potted daisy with 'I love you' on the container Stock Photo

My prison was the straight jacket of stuttering. From the age of seven when I could barely talk right through into my teenage years I battled this ‘thing’. I overcame it eventually because in my battle I was joined by others who fought beside and with me. They gave me the strategies and the plan to overcome. Without them I would be still cowering in the corner. I HAVE BEEN BLESSED.

PS; Mr Davies was a speech pathologist at Camp Hill State School in Bendigo during the sixties.