The Nurse

ACT I
Scene 1
The Nurse

The scene is set in a treatment room. There is a medical couch with a curtain around it, which is drawn back. The nurse sits next to it in a swivel chair. She faces directly the audience.

The Nurse
This is our consultation. You have a ten minute appointment slot. Can you tell me everything in that time?

Do you remember me? You saw my eyes look at you above my surgical mask. They were an intense blue, the same colour as my theatre blue scrubs. You closed your eyes tightly as you lay on the theatre trolley, cold and prone. I held your hand, you dug your nails into me and I didn't flinch. I told you that I wouldn't leave your side and that I would be there with you when you woke up. I attached you to the monitors of the anaesthetic machine, your heart rhythm raced with anxiety, as I talked to you calmly it slowed to sinus beat.I repeated to you that I wouldn't leave you over,and over again. Your hand relaxed as the mask was placed over your face and you drifted into the sevoflurane gas.I had checked the anaesthetic machine, I had drawn up the I.V drugs for the induction, I had set the trolley and handed the consultant everything he needed...exactly, perfectly, scientifically and artfully. I was there when you woke up, still holding your hand. Do you remember my eyes looking over the surgical mask?

The nurse stands up and walks towards the couch.

THE NURSE
Do you hear my footsteps in the hospital corridor? I walk with an air of authority, fast short strides. I walk with a purpose. My dark navy uniform, my lace-up shoes, my fob watch, my nursing union badge, my I.D tag, the alcohol gel attached to my belt,my pens and scissors...do you see me?

I came to see you when you were sleeping on the ward. It was night, and dark. You were curled up on the hard bed, wrapped in the standard issue blanket, N.H.S pillow. You didn't know that I missed my break, and that I should have been home two hours ago? I'm doing this because I care, and we are short staffed. I don't wake you, you don't see my pen torch as I check your pupil reactions to light. I Calibrate the machines controlling your pain relief. I write in your charts. You can't hear me move about softly, plastic apron rustling. My gloved hands touching your wrist, checking your pulse.

THE NURSE
You remembered my eyes, you remembered me. You handed me a card on your discharge day. It said simply "Thank-you!" You had written my name. The baby that was born to you that night...you named her after me.

Light fades to black.

Angel?

I took a detour last weekend to visit the sculpture The Angel of The North. Created by Anthony Gormley (occasionally Gormless). As I live only a few moments drive away, the need has never arisen until now to visit this huge erection...until now. Having driven past it every day for over a decade, I decided it was time to view the old dear from a different angle. Anthony was quite hard to please when it came to choosing the spot on which this great icon would stand. He said: “That mound was the reason I accepted the invitation. Because I was quite snooty at the time. I said I don’t like motorway art”. Well, having looked at it a least twice a day for the last ten years from the motorway...I think that’s a bit of a bummer, like.
I remember the day when there was nearly an RTA whilst driving past. People were rubber-necking to see the funniest sight standing on Anthony’s mound. For there clad in a gigantic Alan Shearer no. 9 shirt was our very own Angel. That was in the 1998 FA cup final, when Alan was captain of Newcastle United. Over a decade later, perhaps a for sale sign needs hoisting up on it “For Sale...one Football Club...£100,000,000...ono, one previous owner, hardly used.” Oh! The pathos!
So, as I digress, I was saying how I felt the “urge” to view this 66 foot Messenger of Gormless close up. I needed to view this beast from a different angle...I’m always one to see things from a different point of view. I mean it was nothing to do with the fact that I saw a documentary on how it was made, and the only thing that stuck in my mind was that Our Ant had sculpted the Angel on himself. Ergo...every time I drive past The Angel Of The North...I see Anthony Gormley’s arse? Oh! The Irony!
I have a special place in my heart for my Angel. It is an icon and a beacon of hope to us Geordie folk. When I am coming back from the airport, having been abroad (i.e.: London), I feel my soul sing “I’m home”. For as Anthony Gormley indeed said himself...”It’s very, very much to do with the character of the North East, the fact that people are warm- hearted, open-minded, practical, get on with things..” Well. I divven’t Knaa aboot that, like!

Going the journey.

A play in one scene.

The scene takes place on a Northern bus en route in County Durham.( Some Durham Dialect is used. Translation is available upon request.)

Cast
Kitty. (No description required.)
Old lady #1 Annie. (A large lady with a blue rinse.)
Old lady #2 Flo. (A thin lady with a knitted hat.)

Scene 1
Kitty is seated at the front of the bus. Behind her sit the two old ladies. Kitty is looking out of the window.
Kitty thinks to herself (voice over) “If I was to take a swab of this seat and hand rail, I wonder what bacteria would show up in the lab.?” She takes the alcohol hand gel out of her handbag. She scrubs her hands in the same way a surgeon would.

Old lady #1 Annie.
“I say, Flo?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“Aye, hinney?.”

Old lady #1 Annie
“How’s your Eddie doin’? Last time I saw you he wasn’t all that canny, was he?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Nah! Eee, pet, he hasn’t been all that clever since he had that operation. He’s never been reet since. It’s his hips y’knaa? He had a hip joint seen to in January. They said he’d never walk reet again?”

Old lady #1 Annie
“ He’s never had much luck, poor lad!”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Nah! Well, he has that diabetes an’ all. He can’t see because of it, it made him gan blind.Too much of that sugar! I put him on a diet, but he’s so fussy, he wouldn’t eat it. I said to him..C’mon love, you’ve gotta try. He just refused.”

(Kitty settles back into her seat. She is listening intently to the conversation behind her. Her head is tilted slightly to one side, so she can hear better.)

Old lady #1 Annie
“ Never! How is he now?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Well, he’s had trouble with his...Y’knaa..his...water-works. His plumbing isn’t what it was, put it that way. He get’s ever so embarrassed aboot it, like. He can’t help it. He can’t make it up the stairs at night either. I tried to help him up, like, but it was too much for him in the end. He’s taken to sleeping on the couch in the living room.”

(Kitty feels a pang of sympathy for Old lady #2 Flo...and thinks...”I wonder if I should offer some advice from a medical point of view, poor love needs some extra help. I wonder if there is someone that she can be referred on to.”)

Old lady # 1 Annie
“ Eeh! Flo! That’s terrible! He’s gone doon hill that fast. Mind you, they say that a creaking gate hangs on the longest!”

Old lady #2 Flo
“Knaa ,hinney! It’s not lookin’ so good for him, like.”

Old lady #1 Annie
“Eeh! Pet! Whatcha ganna dee, like?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“I’m thinkin’ of helping him out of his pain..if y’knaa what I mean...”

Old lady #1 Annie
“Never in the world! It’s come to that, like has it? It’s that bad?”

Old lady #2 Flo
“ Aye...I’m takin’ him to the Vets the morrow, he’s gettin’ put to sleep...after all, he is 14!”

(Kitty thinks...Stuff the germs!...and presses the bell...”Next stop please!”)

Kitty in the Lemon Groves.

“Journeys, like artists, are born and not made. A thousand differing circumstances contribute to them, few of them willed or determined by the will - whatever we may think” (Lawrence Durrell)

These heady summer temperatures have brought to my mind the halcyon days of when I lived in Cyprus.
The first thing that I was greeted with when I first stepped off the Aeroflot, was the feeling of being hit in the face by a warm, wet towel. The smell of burnt tundra filled my nose. The Sun God assaulted my eyes, and the okra landscape shimmered in the haze. I could hear the cicadas “zin-zigging” in the eucalyptus trees. I fell in love.
I spent many months each year in Cyprus with an English family of some great charm and hospitality. They originated from Kensington in London, and despite having the countenance of the upper middle classes, they had at their disposal natural charm and a pleasing earthiness.
I was given a hammock strewn between a clementine tree and a lemon tree to sleep in. It was surprisingly comfortable. I could curl up like a kitten and stare at the Milky Way, planets and rogue satellites. On the breeze I could hear the bouzouki being played at the local outdoor swimming pool for some elaborate wedding reception. And as a chorus of small green frogs added their musical contribution, I would fall asleep. I was in heaven.
I spent my days picking through the stones of a neighbours field looking for artefacts from a temple devoted to Aphrodite. Small “corys” could be found. These were small sculptures of women in togas, these were for devotional worship to the Goddess. And whatever was placed in their hands was the gift to her, such as rosemary to remember a loved one. The landscape was filled with wild herbs, and the smell of thyme made me feel overwhelmed .The Butterflies seemed as large as saucers with their garish, strobing wings in flight.
My young companions spoke Cypriot Greek with a native tongue, and I faltered to keep up. They fooled me often about it, teaching me to order a “wanker” in Greek at the local tavern. I eventually learned to paraphrase the last word spoken, so everyone thought I understood. It seemed to work well, as the villagers became so fond of me they gave me my own Greek name, Kyria Karinoula.