access

Date: 21 February 2009 19:22:28

I catch the eye of a woman and child in the cafe. There's something familiar and quite desperate and tired about her. I recognise something.

After a short wait it dawns. These are her last few moments of child access. She overdoes her last play and boils with hurt as her ex arrives to pick up the kid. He doesn't rise to the argument she offers, and spirits the child away. Then the woman bumps into a friend and pours everything out.

I'm really happy she met someone to talk to. We spend every day among the suffering and the half-alive, and we barely know it. There's so little we can do.

I wonder why I felt so familiar with them. Maybe the child in me remembers the feeling, or maybe all desperation tastes the same.