This time, back in Malta, I was not going to join the party set or waste my time going back on my new commitment to ‘find the truth’. This time, I was in hell!
I tackled everything I did with dogged determination and a certain amount of stoicism but there was a raging storm going on inside and I was barely managing to keep the boat steady. I went back to my avid reading of Augustine and the lives of the saints together with excursions into the bible. Henry, my friend who ‘threw the book at me’ in London, was now back in Malta and we would endlessly discuss our faith, say the rosary together and go to mass. Henry loved God with a passion but he was a flawed genius. He painted, played the piano magnificently, sang beautifully and spoke many languages including Greek and Latin. However, he was highly erratic and his eccentric behaviour sometimes drove me crazy and worried both my mum and dad. He would sell me one of his paintings and a few days later, when I was out, would come in through a window and take it back. Nonetheless, he was a good friend and I appreciated him in many ways.
I took on some small jobs but was spending most of my time at home, keeping clear of all the old haunts of the past and did not mix with the party crowd at all. However, some of my friends would make a point of dropping in regularly to see me and I would play ‘canasta’ at home with mum, Cecil and Roger. My mother would ask me what had happened to change me so much but I would not answer. It was too difficult to explain it to her.
I felt the need to expand my boundaries and started a correspondence course in scriptwriting run by Scriptwriters TV in 35 Fleet Street, London.
And so it continued for the next year or so, reading, writing, praying and discussing whilst my mind was still in a terrible state. I would continue to turn down all invitations, even those from my friends in London. Sally invited me to her wedding with John Thaw but I declined and sent them a present to wish them well. Then, when I sent some of my writing samples to the scriptwriters’ in Fleet Street, someone there wanted to come out to Malta to discuss my work. I said, “no, I am not interested. Don’t bother coming.”
His reply was, “no man is an island”, and I stopped my correspondence with him.
One good aspect of this time was to see my mother and father going out for drinks together and at least things seemed more normal at home.
***
My new found faith had told me what to believe in but not how to go about it. I was like a lost traveller in a strange city. I continued to pour through the unfamiliar pages of the Old Testament, read the New Testament and plough heavily through the works of St. Augustine. Rather arrogantly I identified with Augustine and felt at one with his long desperate struggle to embrace the Truth.
My mother had told me a lovely story about my little niece who it seems had a great love of St. Martin de Porres as indeed my mother did. It seems my niece would often wander away from mummy and have quiet chats with the statues ending with “Sweet Saint Martin De Porres, how I love you.”
I knew very well what I had to do to be a decent Christian but the how perplexed me. The thought of twenty four hours battling with my negative, destructive thoughts haunted me and life seemed to have lost its joy and was nothing but an endless battle.
One day I was sitting at a desk in my shorts and bare footed – everything had become such an effort. The ‘Life of Augustine’ was lying on the table and I was staring vacantly nowhere.
My little niece entered and blabbered on about everything and nothing. My heart was filled with a sadness and I prayed in the silence of my heart “Sweet Lord, this little girl is so good and innocent. Please help me to be like her. Show me what it is in her that makes her so good.”
As if she had heard my unspoken words, this little girl turned round and said to me, “Don’t try to understand me Uncle David, you never will.”
I was amazed and startled, the words resounded in the very depth of my being. They were spoken with an authority beyond her years. I rushed up to tell her mother what had just happened and as though to put all in perspective, this little girl, who never showed any familiarity, slapped my behind!
From then on I realised that motives were often unfathomable and man was wrapped in the very mystery of God Himself. From then on I feared anyone who thought he knew everything about me or anyone. I accepted the counsel of very few and relied more and more on the Spirit of God working within me. Later on in life, I learned to listen to only very few people, such as Fr. Michael Hollings whose only advice is well chosen and is always to do with the love of God.