Late

The morning started like any other of late.

The alarm went off at 7:45, my emergency time devised to maximize sleep and still squeak in more or less on-time, all going well. I’d forgotten about our meeting. We’ve had so many lately. Some before school, some after. It seemed never ending and I was over it. I’ve had enough trouble with just teaching this class let alone all this other shit they want us to pretend to do. I used to teach year one and had become kind of complacent doing the same thing every year. Now, on a 3/4 composite class, I had to re-tool. Design everything again from the ground up and it was more, much more, than a full time job. I was calling it the ‘job that could not be done’. Add to this all the school wide organisational malarkey, and you’re got yourself a regular cluster-fuck. I was getting used to just doing what I could and letting the rest of the chips, as they say, just fall where they may. Clean up on isle six!

I gotta rush. I’m late. I skull my coffee and run around like a maniac but this is, in fact, my routine. I backed out of the driveway at 8:01. This is one of my mile markers and, it’s much too late for an 8:30 meeting. There is absolutely no room for error. If the traffic is especially good, I’ll make it, but it rarely is and I start to consider my response to being late. The first thought is to just apologise and forget about it. But I can’t help being stressed. I try to calm myself and not worry about it. It’s happened. I can’t do anything about it. Punctuality isn’t my strong suit.

I vow to go straight home after my parent teacher interviews this afternoon (yeah, there’s never ending stuff to do) and go to sleep, but I know I won’t. Most nights, by the time I get home, I have spent the whole day wrestling my class - the crocodile - to the ground and need some kind of reward. Are we making progress? Sure. But slowly. Can you see why I have no room for the rest of the school? My class comes first. I really don’t have time for anything else.

As I enter the highway, after waiting in line with all the other schmucks at the worst set of lights in Sydney, I finally get up to speed. But it soon becomes clear that something is wrong. We all slow down. We’re all going to be late. Then I see one of the signs up ahead that says, ‘accident on the Horsley Drive, expect delays’. Now this is really bad because the Horsley Drive is the road I have to take. It’s not just the highway, it’s the very road I’m heading for and it must be really bad if it’s affecting the highway.

Actually, in a funny way, I’m kind of relieved. Now I have an iron-clad excuse for being late. I can sit back in my little Fiat 500 and relax. Why rush? I’m always rushing. How about time to reflect? This sort of works but not entirely. I still feel some stress because my whole being is just trying to plough through, always, to some unobtainable objective. Must, must must. I steel myself to not achieve these impossible goals but they still have me in a constant state of fight or flight; I choose fight.

But, as time goes on, and my goal of arriving on time drifts to the impossible, I start to reflect upon life. It is certainly a challenge to do what I’m doing, but in the fullness of things, I’d not want it any other way. It challenges me, improves me, entertains me. I’m glad I do what I do. It was certainly better than that dead end job as a bus driver. I used that time, driving a bus, to read. I was an intellectual bus driver, reading Henry Miller and reading it deeply. Science books were grist for the mill. I borrowed a tomb of a science book from the Minto Public Library that described for the layman the most recent developments in science, from nano-technology to string theory to star formation. Those busses were pretty dirty and grease was pretty much everywhere. I had to return this book after a while as it was super overdue, but got it out again later. You could tell where I’d read to without a book mark. The edge of the paper was almost black from grease right up to where I’d left off. It appeared that no one else was reading this book. But I sure was.

I suppose the intensity of my logical mind was only fuelled by my insecurities as a kid. When standing in line outside my grade 5 class, Doug Best (doesn’t the name say it all) thought it appropriate to announce to all in earshot that not only was I the weakest guy in the class (which was blatantly obvious to all) but I was also the dumbest. Wow. Everyone nodded in agreement with these words of wisdom at my expense. My already weak bones were crushed. To a pulp.

The traffic isn’t moving. Those of us who still wish to take the Horsley Drive are on the shoulder of the highway waiting to exit. The brave amongst us, leap into the traffic flow, risking life and limb. I could be that brave if it mattered that much to me, but as I say, I was kind of glad for the hold up. Who wants to go to another meeting?

The thought of evasive action leaves me. I’m content to take things as they come. I stay on the shoulder and my thoughts again turn to my youth. This time I’m back to around ten years old where my parents explained to all of us that we would one day die but that was a long, long way off. Some people live to 100. I was 10. I still had a near infinite amount of time left, much to my relief. We were on a picnic, standing beside a river, the significance of which escaped me until now. I told you reflection was good.

It’s now ten to nine. The point at which I’m not only going to be late for the meeting, but also late for the start of class, so a phone call is necessary. I ring them up with my trump card. I’m going to be late. Yeah, an accident. Just now I saw a firetruck creep through. The Jaws of Life? Man, we’re never going to get there. The fire truck pushes its way through and out of sight. We slowly creep forward and eventually, finally, it becomes clear that the accident is ahead.

I’ve had a good life, all in all. I’m eternally grateful for my two beautiful girls. I used to say, everybody thinks their kids are special. But, in my case, it was true. We had a special relationship, more so because their mother and I split when they were 5 and 3. Before that, I was given a running commentary on how I should behave and say and react to them. Now, on my own, I could be me and truly enjoy watching them grow. A lump wells in my throat when I think about our history. Maybe only doing things for others makes us truly happy. I remember being completely up against the wall in the early days of my separation back in 1997. Child support was out to skin me alive and it seemed my life was truncated. Done. And this, brought upon me an epiphany…if not for me then for my kids. With that realisation, my troubles melted away and I dedicated my life to them. Now, this may sound heroically altruistic, but in truth, it really was for me. To have those kids and to see them every week, to grow with them, to consul them, to help them, laugh with them. It was heaven. Tears come to my eyes now as I recall this. I have this tremendous relationship with them even though I don’t see much of them. They travelled together to India for 6 months, then, the next year, to South America for 5 months and were able to revisit the places I’d been to in my 20’s! With modern communications, this was a father’s dream to follow.

I led kind of a double life when they were growing up. The other half of my life was far less grand. I was looked down upon, ignored, laughed at, and, disrespected. I recall taking the train to Darling Harbour one summer evening and wandering like a ghost through the crowd. Everyone had people to talk to. People were laughing, talking, pointing, expressing their excitement on this warm summer’s night, and yet, I, a floating figure, disconnected, unattached, longing to talk to everyone, could just move through the crowd unnoticed, unattached, unable to speak to a single soul even though I burned, burned, burned to talk to them all. I don’t think I’ve ever been sadder in my whole life. That was the nadir, the bottom. Up was the only direction left to take.

Then, two days later, I’d see my girls and I’d be whole again. Isn’t life funny? The traffic creeps along. There is a truck in front so my vision is obscured but surely we are approaching this accident. We’re all in a hurry all the time and when something like this happens, we’re all affected. I’m not worried too much though. I needed time to reflect. My life had been going pear shaped lately and I needed some kind of circuit breaker. The calmness seems total now. All stress has left me. Reflection is so key to our happiness, but how do you maintain this within the hustle and bustle of life’s hurricane? If you find out, let me know.

A truck is ahead of me, so I can’t see much, but I do pick up the flashing red light of an emergency vehicle reflected off the vehicles going the other way. We are really close. Soon I will be on my way.

But, then, the truck slowly creeps forward, perhaps less than a metre, but enough to reveal something that takes my breath away. A car, a tiny car, is crushed under what appears to be a load of pallets. I had a pallet fall on the edge of my foot once back in 1988 and I milked it for about a week and a half. My wife’s friends were visiting from Australia and I used this time to spend with them. I really had been hurt, but maybe not a week and a half’s worth. The thing I learnt, however, was that those pallets are actually pretty damn heavy. And here, up ahead, a whole truck load of them had fallen on this little tiny car that looked remarkably like mine. In fact, it was a Fiat 500 and a convertible just like mine. Then I saw the license plate and an eerie sense of calm came over my entire being. It was mine. How was this possible? I had no sooner asked this question when I was no longer sitting in traffic. Somehow, I was floating. Looking down in a dreamlike way. Time increased in pace. The car towed, the traffic sped up and the days turned to nights and the seasons passed. The seasons changed, the days changed, the patterns continued as they had since time began. This time I was outside and watching from above. I could see, in the distant future, my girls growing old, remembering their childhood, raising their own kids. My ashes scattered in a tearful ceremony that brought joy to my very being. And I turned to the light.