The Old Policeman

A beautiful ward at Bootham Park

This morning I’ve been balancing the books. 

It’s going to be a lean and tight month all told as I’m just getting to grips with my part time pay status and tax bills.

But I got most things sorted, and was presently surprised that I’m in credit to Northern Power by 800£

Happier than I was, I took Roger down the lane to some friends,  who live in the old mill. Here we chatted and drank coffee, whilst Roger galloped like a loon around their field in the faint hope of catching their beagle bitch. 

I’ve been meaning to go down since I got him for it’s important to socialise young dogs with more characters outside his home pack.

I enjoy the socialising too as one of my fiends is a retired policeman from Yorkshire with all the sensibilities and flat vowels that I’m used to

On my way home, I was reminded of an old Yorkshire Policeman called Ken, who I had nursed in York, and of the time he saved me and my friend Tracie from a bit of a beating.

Ken was approaching 80 when I first remembered him. He had been a beat policeman and then a Sargent during the 1930s and forties and had worked in the city of York all of his life. 

A city which was rough as a bears arse come the weekends where squaddies and locals would fight after a session up Micklegate.

Mental illness had left him incredibly quiet and withdrawn and he was admitted under section and was going through a course of ECT which it was hoped would kick start him from his near catatonic state, and longs days sat in a chair staring out at nothing.

I never heard his speak once.

The ward had two sitting rooms, both ornate and carpeted in expensive maroon carpets.One was upstairs where patients could smoke and watch tv  and the other downstairs, which was quieter and used for group meetings. Ken usually sat alone downstairs, in a small alcove overlooking the grounds. He was on general observation and was not deemed a danger to himself. 

Now I was still in my early twenties , back then, and still dressed like a children’s tv presenter ( thick colourful jumpers, loud pants) and I remember one day suddenly being embroiled into a physical encounter with another sectioned patient who WAS a danger to himself and to all around him. 

This schizophrenic patient had secreted a few snooker balls into his pocket from occupational therapy and with one in his hand , had hit me with it several times before I could call for help. 

A nurse by the name of Tracie Birkin came to my aid, she was fearless, and even though she always wore substantial heels and a tight skirt and bright red lipstick, she would get stuck in with the best of them if needed. 

A barrage of snooker balls , made her rethink her usual strategy and I remember we both ran into the downstairs sitting room in an effort to garnish more help. It was there that the patient caught us and the fight continued as another member of staff who had shut herself into the ward nursery with some mums and babies , sounded the hospital alarm bell.

Now even though we knew in a matter of a minute or so each of the seven wards in the hospital would send a runner to help us, we were losing our fight. 

That was until something clicked in Ken’s head and the old policeman resurfaced with a vengeance.

“Gi’Orrrrr! “ he shouted  ( Gi Orr is Yorkshire for GIVE OVER!) 

And after getting up from nowhere he swung and punched the violent patient once, very hard in the jaw , before helping him to lie down, unconscious on the carpet.

“ There’s no need for all that” he said simply helping Tracie who had lost both shoes to her feet and was sat down quietly in his chair before the runners from the wards breathlessly arrived in the doorway seconds later.

I can’t really remember if Ken ever recover properly following his ECT .

Too many patients and too many years have gone bye since he saved me and Tracie from a bit of a pounding

But I would like to think that the old guy did recover enough to go home