Life’s black eyes never lie so let’s roll with its punches

Who-Hoo! Level 1!  I, again, like William Wallace Mel Gibson-style shout: Freedom!

My black eyes are maybe just not Gibson’s blue make-up (too soon, too soon). But we all have black eyes, I realise after I talk to my psychiatrist friend.

He’s high up; the highest you want: head of an anti-depressant countrywide lifeline; “renowned” on the international stage – but for me? Just Frans.

And Frans tells me plenty about black eyes.

“This woman sits across my desk: ‘Doctor, I lost my job; I have no family; please?’ What do I tell her, Carine? How do I give her hope? There is none.”

If he doesn’t have the answer, I can’t even pretend to.

And here’s my niggly worry: high-up doctor of psychiatry is not only fallible, he folds. He is human. And he is down. Like all of us.

But a psychiatrist dares not admit. Ever. As much as he deals with the “abnormal” in normal times, this is the new normal that is but so abnormally normal.

I want him to read all the normals in the abnormal sentence above – but I know he couldn’t care about “normal”.

His normal is the abnormal; that’s what he deals with. There’s no new normal.

Dare I confide in you? The good doctor is trying to deal with whatever comes his way the best he can.

But his mind … How do you handle hopelessness? You do.

But you know you are lying, methinks – and life gives you a black eye. Life’s black eyes never lie. It’s just hard to recognise.

Look past the sunglasses or the smudge of Mel Gibson’s blue make-up and you’ll see: the people waiting to help us have black eyes too.

They feel the punches too; those unseen ones in the soft tissue.

Those that make you curl up because you just can’t help. They have the tools; the training to roll with life’s punches – but they just can’t roll the way they normally do.

Frans, I know, doesn’t have the answer. But you know what goes a long way?

One kind word, one loving acknowledgment: “I’m here.” Kindness. What a simple way to tell another struggling soul that there is love to be found out there.

Carine Hartman.

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