PART OF THE LAMPLIGHTER CHAPTERS

I remember a time, a few years ago now. I was just walking along with only a little rainy cloud above my head for company. I wasn’t happy crunching around on egg shells in the dark and moody state of mind I found myself in. I knew it but, I’d been there a while and it try as I might I couldn’t recall the way back again.

I felt weary. Taking a seat on what appeared to be an empty chair, I wondered about being lonely. I knew with great certainty that I had not accidentally crossed the bridge into a deep depression, for when I stood with my feet on the first wooden board, hands gripped around the ropes on either side, I could still hear voices behind me.

I was not quite at that junction. I was on “The Chair”. I wanted to make a choice to help myself because I knew that there was no one else who would. I had a very good idea of how I had gotten to this point in my life and I had ideas about what had caused me to feel so low. Anger, loneliness and disappointment invaded my thoughts every time I tried to be still. I felt unappreciated and resentful. Daily.

I was sure that I was completely justified in my experiences but, then it occurred to me, I felt this way because I had allowed certain emotions a stage to perform on. My feelings were visitors who had outstayed their welcome. I had every right to acknowledge the fact that I felt great injustice’s had befallen me but, by blaming every single, little thing on the cause of them “I” had turned my cloud from grey to black. I squeezed my eyes shut, and allowing my head to fall forward, I slowly shook it from side to side. “What am I to do?”

It was at that point that the silent person already sitting in the chair wrapped their arms about me and held me tight.

They seemed familiar. Tears ran freely from my eyes and I felt safe.

When I awoke it was dark, but I was a little stronger – more in control. I stretched my arms out in front and meandered this way and that for some time until my fingers found the smooth wood of a door. Pushing it open I tentatively stepped outside. Squinting and shielding my eyes from the sun, it took barely a minute for them to adjust. Right there in front of me was a way finder.

“The Way Back” or “The Way Forward”.

I took a very long, deep and slow breath. I had been searching for a way back for such a long time. But, I realised there was no real road to that place at all. Instead, it would just be a series of turn-abouts and dead ends. A sure-fire way to misery. What I needed was to leave the past where it was, where it belonged.

As I took the path “Forward” it finally dawned on me. The person who had been lost in the dark was the New me all along. I was becoming her as I travelled in and out of the ups and downs. When I had sat on The Chair, I had granted myself some holding space and much needed rest.

The arms of compassion and patience I had felt about my shoulders as they tightly prevented me from falling to the floor, were the Old Me. It was only once I emerged through the doorway that I understood.

She had been my rock, forged over time. She had seen much but weathered it all and on her I could always depend.

© 2025 Juliette Proffitt
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