It’s Boxing Day and we’ve decided to go on a walk in the Cotswolds (or, rather, Lizzie and I have. The kids have done their utmost to make it clear they don’t want to go – it’s taking away from valuable lying around/gaming/eating chocolate time).
I’ve organised the walk. It’s one we’ve done before – a circular trek beginning and ending in the pretty North Cotswolds village of Ilmington.
I like going for walks in the Cotswolds, because a) they’re nearby, b) they’re beautiful and c) I can pretend I live there, like rock stars and millionaire TV presenters do… rather than living where we do actually live: an area of the Midlands mostly inhabited, it seems, by people from the car industry.
Anyway, after a twenty-minute drive from home, we pull up in the middle of Ilmington. The kids have been complaining and bickering the whole way and I’m already feeling a little on edge.
‘How long is the walk?’ asks Lizzie.
Thinking she’s been on the walk before, why’s she asking?… and also thinking I have absolutely no idea… I reply, ‘about 7K, I think.’
Lizzie blanches. As much as she’s able to, with her already chemo-pale complexion.
‘What time is it?’ she suddenly asks.
Whenever Lizzie asks me the time, she isn’t really asking me the time (after all, she can always check it on her own phone). She’s saying, without saying, ‘do you know how late it is? It’s far too late to be doing this kind of a thing.’
Instead of waiting two seconds for me to look, Lizzie checks the time on her own phone. ‘It’s 1.30,’ she says solemnly.
I begin to feel even more on edge. Where’s this going?
‘It’ll be getting dark at three,’ says Lizzie. ‘And I’m going to be slow, ‘cause I’ve just had my fifth round of chemo. So…’
So? I wonder, gulping.
‘So when it comes to map-reading,’ Lizzie concludes, ‘there can be no margin of error.’
We begin walking up a muddy bank to the footpath and, and simultaneously, I feel fear and hysteria rising in me. No margin of error…
But there’s always some kind of error, when it comes to me and map-reading. ALWAYS!
I experience mounting dread as we pop over a rickety stile one-by-one. No margin of error… I don’t feel like I’m leading my family on a cosy, post-Christmas country walk. I feel like I’m the leader of a pack of lemmings, about to guide them unquestioningly over the edge of a precipice (or, in this case, the Cotswold escarpment).
‘Have you already gotten us lost?’ Jake asks mischievously, enjoying watching me squirm.
‘No! No!’ I insist, rather loudly. At this point I storm ahead, staring intently at the OS map app on my phone as I leave my family for dust. Part of the reason for this is to keep things moving. The other part is to give my panic attack some time to subside.
Panic attack? you might think. Isn’t that slightly an over-the-top description for my emotional state, on this walk I’m talking about?
You might be right. But, nevertheless, I have begun to regard these kinds of episodes as ‘panic attacks’ over the years. I came to this conclusion long before I was ever diagnosed for anxiety (I’ll talk about that another time!).
I first started to get panic attacks when I was working in television – specifically when I was having to ring agents to book their celebrity clients to appear on shows like The British Comedy Awards.
I was OK ringing the agents. It was when they rang back… and I had to immediately be all schmoozy and persuasive and impressive with them on the phone… that things began to go pear shaped. My heart would beat faster and faster… I’d find it hard to breathe and speak… I’d eventually end up rasping ‘can I ring you back!’ and have to hang up on the exasperated media high-flyer on the other end of the line. They must have thought what a fucking freak. Must be on coke. (I wasn’t).
My panic attacks have continued in other ways all my adult life. One time they frequently happen is when I’m driving my family about. It was particularly bad when I first started doing this. (Fyi, I passed my driving test – after failing six times – literally days before Jake was born. Pregnant Lizzie was in the waiting room, at the test centre, and the driving tester took pity on me and said ‘if I pass you, will you name your child after me?’ ‘Yes Stephen,’ I lied back).
So, this is what happens. I’ll be driving Lizzie and the kids about… and I’ll inevitably get us lost (even with a SatNav) and Lizzie will begin to look REALLY QUIETLY CROSS ABOUT IT. (I’ll say here, even though in many ways Lizzie is a kind, gentle person, she can – at the drop of a hat or taking of a wrong turn – quietly project an air of abject disapproval which I find utterly terrifying).
At these moments, my heart will start beating faster and faster, my stomach will knot, my whole being will kick into fight-or-flight mode. And not being able to go for the ‘flight’ option (being stuck in a car with my family), I’ll opt for ‘fight’ instead. In other words, I’ll become incredibly argumentative and bolshie. And, of course, that makes things even worse.
So you can imagine on this walk in the Cotswolds, when Lizzie has told me there can be no margin of error, well basically… I’m shitting myself. Her continued talk, on the walk, of how she’s worried she’s not going to manage the whole distance, because of her chemo, is dialling my usual travel-related anxiety up to 11.
Mustn’t take a wrong turn I keep telling myself, my heart-thumping. ‘Are you lost?’ Jake keeps taunting me. Mustn’t swear at my child, I keep reminding myself, as my bolshiness levels rocket.
So far, the entire walk has been uphill. It’s a circular trek, so presumably there must be a point it goes downhill again somewhere. But… when? As the steep upwards trudge continues endlessly, I begin to feel like a figure in an Escher painting.
It soon becomes clear that Lizzie isn’t going to be able to continue any further. It’s too much for her. I draw her attention to the lovely views over the escarpment, but for some reason that doesn’t pique her interest.
Guilt and panic kick in. What am I going to do? How am I going to get my family back safely? If we turn around and go back the way we came, it’ll take ages! GAAAAAAHH!!!
Fortunately – thank the Lord – I spot on my OS map phone app… a road. A short-cut home! It’s downhill all the way and it’s half the distance!
The panic in me subsides a little and I stomp off in the direction of the road, my family following listlessly behind.
As we edge our way along the roadside, things begin to look a little better. Yes, we WILL be back before it gets dark. Yes, Lizzie IS going to manage this far gentler ramble. The knot in my stomach untangles itself a little more.
Unfortunately, the apparent success of this short cut begins to make me overconfident. I spot on my phone OS map app right ahead… another short cut which will get us back even quicker. This particular short cut is over fields again, but the fields to the side of the road look flat and not too muddy. Surely going over them will be all right?
What am I thinking? Perhaps the adrenaline which has been slowly dissipating from my stomach – as my panic has subsided – has gone straight to my head, in a biological first, and has completely fucked with it.
Whatever the reason, moments later I hear myself saying to Lizzie and the kids. ‘There’s a shortcut over that field. Let’s take it!’
Lizzie, Jake and Annie follow me over another stile – eyeing me suspiciously the whole while. Soon we’re halfway over the first field… which is when Annie says ‘those cows are very big.’
The cows which are now surrounding us are very big. Particularly a large dark one, which is eyeing us intently as it chews grass.
We’re now twenty metres or so away from the fence and stile on the other side of the field… which is when Lizzie says ‘those cows don’t have udders.’
Yes, you’ve guessed it. I’ve led my family – including my long-suffering, chemo-undergoing partner – into a field filled with bulls.
A massive feeling of panic engulfs my stomach once more. With good reason this time.
‘We could get to the fence and move slowly along it to the stile,’ suggests Lizzie nervously.
I look at the fence and stile ahead of us. Over the other side of them are…
‘… more bulls,’ I say, pointing.
This time when my ‘fight or flight’ response kicks in, instead of making me bolshie and argumentative, it actually has the desired effect.
‘LET’S GET OUT OF HERE!’ I whisper tersely to Lizzie and the kids.
We hastily tip toe through the mud, back over the stile and out of the field. Fortunately, none of us are gored.
Well, I screwed that up, I think to myself, as we walk the rest of the way along the flat road back to Ilmington and the car.
But, somehow, I no longer feel any fear about the words there can be no margin of error. When faced with the impending doom (by bull) of all four of us, my anxieties about taking a wrong turn – even when those anxieties have been chemo-magnified – have, for now, faded into the background. I guess there really is only so much I can worry about at any one time. And, it seems, I’ve reached my limit.
P. D. Clifton 
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