Tim Dowling: a trip to the dump brings up painful memories

It is Saturday, and my wife wants me to walk the dog before we go to the dump, which strikes me as a lot. I would prefer to combine the dog walk and dump trip into a single excursion. I make a fuss about this, and prevail.

The purpose of the dump visit – by appointment only – is to get rid of an old wooden desk that has been rotting under a tarpaulin in the garden for two years. Looking at its mouldy green surface, I am reminded of the architect’s drawing board that I owned and loved for 30 years, the drawing board that was also exiled out here for a time after we moved, until my wife finally paid someone to take it away without my knowledge – a monstrous betrayal.

That was some years ago. At the time I promised myself I would never forget, and even though I had sort of forgotten, I remember now, and the injustice of it stings anew.

“Will it fit in the car?” my wife says as we both stare at the desk, one of us thinking about the drawing board.

“We’ll have to see,” I say, tugging out the rain-warped drawer, inch by inch.

The desk does fit, but upside down and only just. Along with the other junk my wife has loaded in, it takes up all the back seat space.

“What time is our appointment at the dump?” I say, looking at my phone.

“11.30,” my wife says.

“It’s not even 10,” I say. “That means I will have to walk the dog first.”

My wife chooses this moment to roll her eyes. When I close mine in forbearance, I see my drawing board. I decide to leave the immediate vicinity.

On my way round to the back door I see a large plastic flower pot, half-filled with soil. I conceive a strong desire to kick this pot, maybe with enough force to send it sailing over the fence (I can go and get it later, when it’s dark). Then I change my mind. Then, as I draw nearer, I change it back.

I don’t catch the flowerpot cleanly; I only manage to knock it over, but on the follow through my foot collides with the edge of a garden spade that is leaning against the house. It clatters to the ground with a bright ring that might have been satisfying had it been in any way intentional.

“What’s wrong with you?” my wife says. I don’t say anything; I just round the corner until I am out of sight so I can wince in pain.

I wait for the sharp ache to subside, but it doesn’t, so I put my coat on. By the time the dog and I reach the park I am hobbling. Before we are halfway round I begin to wonder whether I have broken my left big toe, or merely bruised it.

The distinction seems important: if it’s bruised then I have been immensely stupid; if it’s broken, then I probably need counselling. “Such was the force of his rage,” the case notes will read, “that he caused himself injury requiring urgent care.” No one will listen when I explain that I was aiming for the flowerpot.

When I return from the park it’s time to leave for the dump. My wife seems to have forgotten – or is choosing to overlook – the kicking of the spade. I would be prepared to do the same if my foot didn’t hurt so much.

“What have you got?” says the man in the glass booth at the dump’s entrance.

“Furniture and household waste,” my wife says.

“Why do they even ask?” I say, after we are waved through.

“I guess to make sure I say the same as I put on the online form,” my wife says.

While she drags two bin bags of household waste across the Tarmac, I lift the desk from the boot by its legs and, bracing it against my hip bones, waddle it over to the platform above the scrap wood skip. I heave it over the side, give it a push and watch it crunch against the other broken furniture below. It is immensely satisfying.

On the way home the pain in my toe begins to ease. Only when I get home and kick off my shoes in relief do I notice that my left sock is soaked in blood. I think: that’s not ideal.

Dabbing at my big toe with a cloth as I run it under the bath tap, I decide it may be time to forget the saga of the drawing board, an unfortunate episode now more than five years old, one in which I find it increasingly difficult to cast myself as a blameless victim. Then I think: never.

And then I think: I need to hide that sock.