Foreword
The Saga of the Stone is a short story I wrote back in
1997 (although it's been revised a bit over the years).
To me it's a very personal story – because the events
and people in it are real. It covers a series of events that
happened to me when I was 20, which very nearly cost me my life. But
that said, it's also a story I find inspirtational, as so much of
what happened during that night echoes a lot of the trials we
experience in life.
As I've said before in The Problems We Can't Fix, we
will all go through periods of our life when we experience deep
personal problems. When I went through such a patch in 1997, I
decided to look back to the events of the Saga of the Stone and write
about the life and death struggle. It felt like a powerful
metaphor for getting through any kind of problem.
I think we all have a Saga of the Stone story in some
way in our past. I certainly feel inspired hearing the tales of a
friend named Jess Bromley talk about hers. Her story and mine remind me that life is a gift, and one of the huge tragedies in life is, it takes tragedy or near-tragedy to appreciate it.
The
Saga of the Stone
Dedicated
to the memory of Violet Wallbank,
a
friend in dark places.
They
say in life that the only certainties are death and taxes. Yet as
children - if we’re lucky –
we grow up shielded from both.
We
might hear about murders on the television or of elderly relatives
who we never really knew ‘passing
away’. But they’re,
too distant –
there’s no sense of intimacy, and no sense of loss. But sooner or
later death comes into our lives, taking someone close, and it leaves
it’s mark on us.
For
me in happened when I was 20 and studying at the University in
Sheffield. It was nearly Christmas, the countdown to festivities had
begun, which pretty much meant for all of us it was partytime!
But before we planned to hit the local bars, I had to phone my
parents at home, for the weekly catch up.
It
was then a bombshell hit when my mother said to me, “I was told by
Mable at church that one of your friends from school’s died”.
My
seemed to catch in my throat as I managed to ask, “Who was it?”
“She
didn’t really say ... James somebody I think. I think you used to
be friends in school. It was something to do with drugs. I expect
it’ll be in the Burton Mail.”
After
a slight silence we finished off our phone call, said our goodbyes
and hung up I headed back to my room, the news circling around my
head. James - it could only be James Taylor. At school he’d been
my best friend, for a while when our fleeting interested had matched.
But teenage friendships can be fickle, and as we moved on to Sixth
Form Colleges and then University, our connection had become broken.
That
was until just a few months ago –
we’d been both working the same crappy summer jobs at the local
factory. He was a different man though –
at school and after he’d been a lively character –
ever ready for a fight or a drunken dare, and much admired by many of
the girls for it. He was a guy brimming with confidence and humour.
Yet the man I’d met that summer had been subdued and almost
haunted.
Life
was not going well for him –
he’d got into trouble at University, with him getting kicked off
his course. His parents wouldn’t have him back at home. And now
he was stuck trying to work at the local factory to make ends meet.
But his woes didn’t end there. He’d just found out he’d
managed to get his girlfriend pregnant, and just felt he didn’t
know what to do, trying to talk the girl into taking an abortion.
He
admitted he didn’t drink too much any more –
it’d got him in too much trouble, as he was always getting angry
when he did. But he did do some drugs –
and could do me a deal if I ever needed some, he had a few
“connections”.
Maybe
my choice of words weren’t the best thought out –
I told him he needed to sort his life out, and that drugs are for
losers. Alas the
textbook “good kid” response to the “kid gone wrong”.
But stupid words that offer no comfort or help. A few days later he
was fired, though on the factory floor the reason behind that varied
from his attitude to him caught stealing …
And
now he was dead. A friend, a school friend, my age, dead. This
wasn’t the way I thought life worked –
death was something for the elderly or something that happened
elsewhere. Not something in Burton-on-Trent.
Deep
inside I couldn’t help wondering if there was something I could
have said, or done that would have altered his terrible fate.
Something better than condemning his mistakes.
Suddenly
I didn’t feel like partying anymore.
The
world seemed different - it was the last week of term before the
Christmas break, and my hall of residence was decked in lights,
tinsel and decorations. The students around me were dedicated to
celebrating the season to the last of their allowance and beyond.
The
thought went over and over again in my head “He’s dead?”.
I
needed to speak to someone, to be with someone. I tried so many
friends, but they were either gripped with the merriment of the
season, or else feverishly slaving over assignments due in later that
week. I felt utterly alone - a gulf away from the party folk and
revellers.
The
atmosphere of celebration was like some foul air to me, on which only
I was retching. I grabbed a coat and headed out, away from all the
laughter and cheers, the small talk and antics. It was a cold,
frosty December night, and the chilling, sobering air offered some
small portion of relief and clarity.
I started walking
- but still from the lampposts and windows hung reminders that this
was a season to be jolly and merry, not to lament the passing of
friends. Without thinking, I caught a bus that would take me to the
outskirts of the city, and watched from my seat as the crowed streets
of Sheffield dissolved into the harsh emptiness of the Moors.
I
got off the bus to be greeted by the silence of emptiness, and headed
out, away from the mad city gripped fervently in celebration, away
from those who would tell me to ‘cheer up and have a beer’,
away ... where I could think, and, perhaps, find some answers.
A
light chill mist hung in the darkness as I set off, following the
isolated chain of electric lamps which led like some mythical ‘yellow
brick road’ to darkness and oblivion. The world was silent but for
the terrible humming of the lamps above which made the place seem
that much more empty and eerie. Behind me the city lights bathed the
horizon in an orange phosphorescent glow, like a mechanical sunrise.
Back there shone people and houses and all their petty hopes and
dreams, ahead lay the darkness and obscurity which was my
destination.
It
was a long walk, but did nothing to settle or calm me. I was
resolved now in my mind as to my destination - to stand in utter
darkness, beneath the naked sky and there, maybe, standing between
the Earth below and the Heavens above, maybe there I would find some
revelation or perspective, to find out why my friend was dead.
This
was a walk I’d done many times before, but never in such darkness
or such cold. The landscape, so beautiful and lush in the sunlight,
seemed in this blackness like that of some haunted, shadow world. It
was eerie, but it matched my mood so well, so much better than the
dazzling, happy lights of the city. I walked on.
And
then the lights ran out - the edge of civilisation, beyond the grip
of the city whose orange glow raged on behind me was like a inferno
swallowing the horizon. Here now to one side stretched a large
reservoir, with a sign, battered and abused saying ‘Yorkshire
Water’ and warning people not to contaminate the water. For a
moment I fought back the childish urge to urinate in the lake - to
leave a bad taste in the mouths of those who’d made me feel so
alienated tonight, but it passed with a turning in the wind, and I
renewed my attention to the road ahead, past the orange monochrome
world, and entering dark shadows that waited ahead.
I
looked back to see that last, lonely lamppost, its light reaching
vainly out to me, like a lighthouse calling me back to the shores of
civilisation and people. I took a deep breath that chilled me
inside. The misty darkness was terrifying and unsettling now that I
stood within it, and that last light seemed so warm and secure and
open. But I had set my sights further afield, and swallowing my
nerves with renewed resolve, I moved further into the darkness...
The
darkness where it waited, as I knew it would. Aware as I was
of it, my first sight of it still filled me with dread. Even
in daylight it was unnerving, but swathed in the night it seemed more
evil still.
At
some point it had been a car, perhaps one which ferried children to
school, carried shopping home and took families on holiday. But now,
by some unknown twist of fate it lay here, nothing more than a burnt
out wreck, a rust covered shell of an automobile, that reminded me
all too much of a rusty medieval hanging cage where the corpses of
men would be displayed as a warning to other travellers. I quickened
my pace, faster, faster until the shadows and mist had swallowed it
whole again, yet still I felt it watching me, and waiting.
I
walked on, the reservoir on one side, a forest to the other, until at
last the road unceremoniously ended and twisted off to the right to
become a footpath through the trees. The frozen, muddy path creaked
and scrunched under my feet ‘crunch crunch crunch’, and I
stopped every so often, hearing something rustle in the woods to one
side. I would gaze with the eerie feeling of being watched, staring
into the still and silent trees, each time bracing for an attack from
some swift, unseen assailant. But the only demons pursuing me were
phantoms of my mind.
Little
did I know it as I walked on, but danger, lurked from another, unseen
but very real direction.
Eventually,
the forest petered out, and before me stretched the endless emptiness
of the Moors. At last I was alone, standing on land untouched and
twisted to mankind’s purposes, a timeless land. I stretched out my
arms, breathing in the gloriously desolate air as if being
resuscitated by the breath of God, and threw my head back to view the
night sky - clouded as it was with only faint, isolated stars peering
through the dark clouds.
The
footpath - not really a path, but a worn track - snaked and staggered
like a drunken man, until at last it came to a huge rock, at which
point it seemed to fork off. I lay down on the rock, and looked into
the sky. It felt peaceful - and there I felt an understanding of
life pass into me.
“What
happened James?” I wondered in almost silent prayer. And although
the clouds never parted to reveal a holy light, still within me a
stirring calmness seemed to answer my thought - life goes on ...
my life should go on.
I
could have stayed there forever, but the cold rock chilled my back,
so I got up, and contemplated going on. Two paths were in front of
me - though I never remembered there being two when I’d done this
route in daylight! But the one on the left looked the most familiar,
and so I set off.
The
moors were calming - much more serene than the reservoir road or the
path through the forest. It felt open, tranquil, safe - nothing
lurking unseen, nothing to be heard but the wind and the ‘crunch
crunch crunch’ of frozen mud and grass beneath my feet.
‘Crunch
kerplunk’. I realised in my romancing of the moors how
careless I’d been. And how very stupid - stupid and complacent.
My right foot had gone through ice and into a trapped puddle beneath,
the chilled water numbing all feeling there.
This
was no path, but a marsh with a thin icy crust that I was walking on.
I pulled my foot out and turned around. My path, the twisting
winding path of which I’d been so certain of was gone like a
mirage. In the faint night light I had mistaken a series of scuffs
in the grass for a safe path. It was no such thing. Now I had no
idea where I was or even which direction to head back in.
Panic.
How could I find my way again? The frozen marsh would be all around
me - I’d been lucky or rather unlucky to get so far that the fork
in the road was far out of sight. I knew roughly which direction the
other path was.
If
I could head to that - surely I couldn’t miss it - then I’d be
able to find my way back again.
I
walked a few steps ‘kerplunk’
went one foot into the freezing marshy water, a few more steps
‘kerplunk’
went the other. On and on it went - and then the ground gave way –
this time it was serious.
The
ground had swallowed me to my waist. This must have been a frozen
marsh, the water an icy shock to the lower part of my body -
freezing, paralysing.
I
grabbed the edge, and slowly, tentatively pulled myself out, the ice
around groaning and creaking and threatening to cast me back. I lay
for a moment out of the water - shivering and terrified.
Cautiously
I stood up, half expecting the ground to swallow me up again - I had
no idea which direction I was headed in anymore, no star
constellations were visible and the city glow was invisible now,
obscured by far off trees themselves too far in the dark to discern.
I turned around and around frantically, but all directions looked the
same - their end obscured by the darkness and the mist.
My
heart pounded - both Hathersage and Sheffield were equally close I
knew, though lay in opposite directions. There was only one thing to
do - chose a direction and keep on until I found something, anything
that would find my bearings, and then find the safest route to either
haven.
It
was slow progress, and one after the other I put each foot down
tentatively, testing the ground before putting my weight upon it. My
drenched jeans - what a stupid choice of clothing they were -
clung heavy about my legs, and were starting to freeze up in the
sub-zero temperatures.
Cold
and in the dark I stumbled on and on and on.
I’d
walked the Moors before many a time. I was drawn to them with their
timelessness and rugged beauty. Here I felt my relationship
problems, work problems, money problems all melt away into the
landscape. Now too it didn’t matter that Claire didn’t like me,
that Mark wasn’t speaking to me or that Prof. Combley was
disappointed in my work.
Here
all that mattered was that I find my way out and survive.
It
seemed like forever, going on and on in vain - every so often
slipping back into the frozen marsh which for all my new found
caution threatened to swallow me whole.
The
darkness and the mist played tricks before my eyes, forming vague
outlines of the track that I so desperately wanted to discover. But
they were only phantoms, each one dashing my spirits a little more,
surely and certainly breaking me. My jeans had frozen solid now,
like an unbreakable rigid plastic numbing my legs as I stumbled on,
tearful, hopeless and so very alone.
At
last in the nothingness of grass and marsh something different came
out of the mist - a single stone, shaped like some ancient pagan
altar, stood alone in this wilderness. Pitifully I clung onto the
stone as a drowning man clutches some flotsam in the hope of staying
afloat. I called aloud to God to help me - but no divine
intervention followed. I was stranded, freezing on the one solid
island in this sea of uncertain frozen marsh.
With
my body worn out I shivered more and more violently. I was lost,
with no hope of rescue on this freezing night, and I was going to
die. The idea of death didn’t worry me, not at all. But not this
way. Freezing to death would not be an easy slipping away from this
mortal coil - no I could look forward to hours of violent shaking and
shivering before that happened - it would be a long, cold and lonely
death. I tried to make myself comfortable face down on that stone,
hoping to sleep and speed up the process. How I wish that death
would quickly and swiftly come to me...
And
there, on that stone I died.
Perhaps not in
body, but the boy who gave up on that stone slowly faded away. It
was not God, it was not the ghost of James that had lured me to this
point. Tragedy had struck in the loss of James, but I’d chosen the
path that led me to this calamity.
It
was in that moment of utter hopelessness - of settling down to the
inevitable fate of death - that something had stirred within me. A
new hope came upon me –
I would not give in, I would go on.
I
got up. The stone I had clutched in desperation and certain death I
now released in hope to find my way again. I felt something familiar
about this place now I looked with eyes turned to survival rather
than fading in death.
The
ground further on had little grass, and was quite stony. I followed
it until, at last, it gave way to a cliff edge. At last I was found
again, for down there would be a road which would lead me to
Hathersage I was sure. I followed the cliff edge along until it came
at last to a point I knew to be a relatively gentle, downwards path,
which, if I was right, I had been truly fortunate to stumble across.
My luck at last was changing for the better!
I
made my way down slowly, arms supporting me as my legs, one by one
tested the ground. I inched down the slope, all too aware I had made
enough rash mistakes for one lifetime this night.
At
the bottom, a lonely road waited for me. It was deserted, not a
single car moved along it. But I knew it and it would lead me where
I needed to go.
My
mind was racing. Ideally I’d have been headed back to Sheffield
where I had a warm room waiting for me, but at least Hathersage was
off the Moors, the beautiful and deadly Moors.
There
was no way I would risk going back through them to Sheffield! But
once I reached Hathersage what then? Throw myself at the mercy of
the first house I came to? What would they care for some dumb
walker who’d got himself into trouble? But I was alive and off
the moors, and what ever it would take now to stay alive I’d do.
I
walked into Hathersage, a quiet, deserted town at this time. I saw
by the village clock it was 3 o’clock - almost 6 hours since I
left, and how many of them lost and despairing on the lonely, savage
Moors?
I
found a public phone - thank God I had plenty of change, the first
thing I’d done right this night! I called several taxi firms in
Sheffield, getting their numbers off the back of my Student’s Union
card, only to be told I was out of their region. I tried several
local companies, but in this quiet village they had closed down for
the night.
But
I was not beaten - not yet.
I
made my way towards the train station - I’d survived hours on the
Moors, I was sure I could survive the remaining hours until the next
train. I read the badly lit timetable, scrubbing away the ice which
had formed on it’s surface, to find the next train would arrive at
6:50 am. Now if I could only get some shelter - like the public
toilets and then remove these freezing jeans which were sapping my
strength to move in, then things wouldn’t be so bad.
I
tried the public toilets but found them locked - what kind of place
locks it’s toilets up at night? My only chance of shelter was a
bus stop, exposed as it was on one side. I huddled there, but the
bitter wind blew right through. “So this is it?” I thought
“reduced to living little better than a vagrant?”.
I
wandered around –
not knowing what to do. Wanting to sort myself out, not rely of
help. Keep moving, keep warm, and take that first train.
Wandering
the church, I noticed there before me was the grave of Little John -
the reason I’d first come to this village. He was something of a
hero of mine –
tall, legendarily strong and I always thought of him as an
unswervingly loyal right hand man. Several places claimed to be the
burial place of Robin Hood, who I thought of as probably a vain and
egotistical leader, but there lay a man who in my eyes was solid,
dependable, loyal - all the things I felt a man should strive to be.
This
was no time to give up, and I had no wish to join Little John in his
final repose. I decided I needed help, and hoped I could rely on the
Vicarage to lend me some aid. I rang the bell, once ... twice ... a
light came on upstairs, and then another, and another, this time
downstairs. Then the clanking, twisting creaking of a door lock.
My
heart leapt into my mouth and I swallowed hard, terrified of being
turned away, so ashamed to rely so heavily on the unknown compassion
and charity of whoever stood behind that door at such an unsocial.
Would they rant and rave about being woken at such an hour? I
certainly would. The door slowly opened, and a grey haired head of a
man looked cautiously, blearily around, his face both strict and
compassionate in equal measure.
“Can
you help me?” I shivered pathetically, “I’ve had a bit of a
walking accident.”
“You’d
better come in” he said matter-of-factly. I followed him into the
wonderfully warm house. A quiet, gentle Alsation padded up to me,
and stroking him I felt life return to my hands. Quietly, the old
man looked over me. “You’d better get out of those clothes. Do
you want a drink?”
“Er
... y-yes please.”
He
put the on the gas fire, and disappeared into another room. I cut
open my frozen laces with a nail clipper in my pocket, and struggled
out of my icy jeans which turned slowly malleable in the new found
warmth, and sat there in front of the glorious heat, clutching that
dog and shivering the deep-set cold out of me.
I
looked around the room - there were shelves of neatly arranged books
on Christianity and faith. He returned and offered me a steaming
stoneware mug of coffee.
“I’m
Jeremy, the vicar for this Parish.” he softly informed me. “So
what happened?”
So
I told him my tale of my lost friend, and how my reaction had led me
into such danger this night. He asked me about James, and about
myself, and with the lifting of the cold and the emotional burden,
life seemed to take shape once more. And after a while, he got up,
saying “We’d better take you home.” He left the room to get
changed from his pyjamas and dressing gown, and came back properly
dressed, passing me a pair of jogging bottoms. “Try them on.” he
said.
There
was mainly silence in the warm car trip home, save the odd
directions.
When
at last he pulled up to my hall of residence and I said “Thanks
ever so much”. It didn’t seem enough. He’d saved my life,
never complaining once about being woken up at such an unearthly
hour, and words seemed such a little thing in return. I owed him a
great debt, and he wished for nothing in return. I watched him drive
away, passing away into the mist before returning to my room, the
Christmas decorations seeming less oppressive than they had been
hours earlier.
I
woke the next morning still shivering, and looked around my room as
if looking at it for the first time. I had lost a friend last night,
but in trying to deal with it, I’d looked death in the face myself.
Something had changed. I was a little wiser, but not that much. I
would still make mistakes, I knew that. But I had looked into the
depths of despair …
and came out the other side. And to survive, sometimes I had to look
to myself, and sometimes I knew I had to have to courage to ask for
help. There was no shame in needing help I knew that now.
This
is not a tale about heroics or a man’s triumphant battle against
the elements. This is a tale about a friend who died, a stone which
gave me hope, and a vicar who came to the rescue.
James
is long gone now, Jeremy has moved to another parish (though I did
get the chance to visit him again at a more reasonable hour that
summer and thank him again) and I am forever growing into an
older, wiser man. With the odd bend in the track along the way.
Life
moves on, and death leaves friends behind us. But the stone remains
- like a seat on Mount Olympus it looks out over the cliffs and to
the countryside of Derbyshire. It hangs on the edge of all that is
timeless and eternal. And it waits for me still.
I’ve
visited it many times - that strange stone that broke me and
re-forged me. And each time I look at what I have done with the
extra life and wisdom I gained there, remembering the night when my
petty problems faded away and only survival mattered.
I
last visited it with my wife, and explained its significance and what
happened there, sharing the tale of my struggle against insanity and
the elements. And knowing its importance, she promised me that when
I die, she would return my ashes there.
It
gives me comfort to know that in death I will return to the place
that gave me back my life and my hope. For I am a mortal man, and I
now know death must someday come to me, as one by one it comes for so
many others who I’ve known along the path of life.
But
the stone remains. The stone remains forever.
Epilogue
The
story you’ve just read was based on real events, with some name
changes.
Over
twenty years have now passed, and on each December 10th I
remember it, and count my blessings as I’ve been given one more
year of life. And it feels a wonderful gift, though I say this
against the tragedy of a loss of a friend.
This
much I know –
in my story there are two people having problems and asking for help.
My friend James was in trouble, and my reaction was to point out his
mistakes. However when I was in trouble, Jeremy the Vicar listened
and offered help.
I
realise now that people in trouble sometimes just need to be listened
to, they’re all too aware sometimes of where they went wrong. And
often the judgement from another is enough to terrify people from
opening up and talking. Life sometimes seems too full of people
willing to judge, but it’s the people who’re willing to listen
who make the world a better place.
The
last year has been a tough one for me, as I lost another close friend
named Violet. And in some ways I’ve found myself going through
some similar motions as in this story dealing with her loss. Though
this time my grief didn’t take me on such a perilous path.
But
grief makes us act in strange ways. Sometimes it can seem to others
as if a kind of madness has gripped us. But to us, we’re trying to
make sense of a strange and very personal loss. I know with Violet I
was all too aware of complaining how unfair her death was. As if God
was some football referee who if we complained to enough would
reverse their decision, and bring you back your beloved friend.
But
life can’t work like that, though in grief we wish it could.
Ironically
Violet helped me so much with the writing of this story, and now
sadly I’m finding I’m adding her name to it, in a way I could
never have imagined at the time.
Grief
takes us to strange and terrifying places. A lot of times we have to
weather the path by ourselves. If this tale has a message, it’s
that it’s okay when you’re lost to ask for help.
