“Every day is a journey filled with twists and turns. Every day, if you smile, you will feel alive, my son.”
[Santosh Kalwar]
The Ponciana's won't let me divert my attention. Peeping through cracks between old Queenslanders, contrasting their orange red flames against distant prussian mountains, glowing in the first light of day, striking dramatic silhouettes at sundown. Their persistently photogenic nature delightfully distracts me throughout the day. They command my vision, and last week* they caused trouble...
After a recent morning of play at a friend's house in Wrights Creek the poets had quickly fallen into a collective deep sleep in the back of the car. I found myself in a rare parental moment of air-conditioned silence and space. The usually short drive between Wrights Creek and Gordonvale took on epic meditation-retreat-like proportions as I luxuriated in the capacity to hold an uninterrupted thought for more than a moment-and-a-half...
Then the epiphany! While the children were sleeping, why not allow myself a now all-too-rare creative indulgence - and stop to photograph a few of the sites I had been driving past each week, thinking of all their visual potential - without being able to act...
So, with poets soundly sleeping in their air-conditioned capsule, I stopped and snapped away happily beneath the blazing midday sun [and my rather generous sunhat] to my delight, delight, delight... Approaching town, with still not a single utterance from the back of the car I decided to extend my profligacy - driving through the traffic lights and out to a series of blazing Ponciana's I knew would be at their best. Now just past midday, the sun was high and hot - but the children slept on happily impervious to the heat. More snaps; delight aplenty. Then satiated, I returned to the cool of the idling car and took a moment to scroll through the images I had made.
I took a moment too long. With no warning the car engine shuddered, made what I can only describe as a little yelping noise - and died...
Que numerous attempts to restart car [none successful].
Que memory of my justifying why we no longer needed to be members of the RACQ Roadside Assistance - [I can't remember the actual justification - only how financially liberating it felt - at the time...]
Que [recent and repeated] reminders that the car was now thousands of kilometers past its service date and desperately in need of repair... [ouch...!]
Que the daunting estimates of what it would cost to have to pay for the car to be towed in lieu of surrendering our RACQ assistance...
In the silence that ensued I heard myself make a little yelping noise as I assessed the gravity of what I was now re-labeling my 'creative frivolity'. Fortunately I was still on the part of the road where I had mobile reception - and my phone was [miraculously] still charged. Seeing the perspiration quickly beginning to form on their little foreheads, I knew the poets would not be sleeping much longer and that two hot unhappy children waking to find they are stranded roadside in the heat of the day was going to be ugly, no matter how picturesque the surrounds...
Then the second epiphany!
Scrolling back though months of iphone messages as the perspiration on the poets grew, I found a text containing the number of the man who just might save the car, the children and my creative a%se...
Our local mechanic Troy is something of a car whisperer. A humble man who I suspect sings to cars rather than fixing them via any conventional method. And by some good fortune our car had broken down on his road [well - not quite on his road - but on the road that leads to his workshop some ten or so kilometers away]. He answered [Que palpable relief!] and YES! he would be happy to come and collect the car - although his afternoon was full already - could I find a way home in the meanwhile? 'Sure!' I answered confidently, 'there are any number of friends I can ask for help.'
Que numerous phone calls to local friends and neighbours who, for various [understandable] reasons were unable to assist.
Que poets, stirring from their slumber and starting to moan...
Que iphone battery... dying... followed by another little yelping noise...
At this point - blissful surrender...! I laughed under the blazing sun like a mad woman [which I am sure to the man mowing his lawn across the road I must by now have appeared!]. I again donned that generous sunhat - and resolved to carry the children and our bags home on foot. It wasn't really that far - just a few kilometers - although I had [mistakenly] made a decision that morning to break with usual habit and rather than wearing my sturdy [but rather 'nanna'] hiking sandals - opted for the far more stylish, plastic ballet flats [still yet to be worn in]... Wincing as I guessed the number of blisters about to grace my feet I set off for home, with Dante on my back and Rumi cradled in my arms ...
There is something particularly satisfying about rising to an unexpected challenge - but the real surprise on the hot walk home was just how well the poets handled the heat, the sunlight, and the regular jeering from passers by [who seemed to think we were out in the heat of the day by choice and not chance!]. Dante chattered away about flowers, clouds, houses and anything else she had the nouns to describe; Rumi snuggled into my chest, meeting my eyes regularly with his and widely smiling his partially toothy grin. The poincianas were glowing brilliant, the sky - high - open - blue, the air still and quiet. It was for the most part a surprisingly pleasant experience. Blisters aside - the shoes are worn in now, the car is back on the road [thanks Troy] and it is finally serviced and running better than ever ...
Oh, and I am rather pleased with the pictures that started the whole [mis]adventure ...
Oh, and I am rather pleased with the pictures that started the whole [mis]adventure ...
“When your efforts run in the face of conventional wisdom and accepted mastery, persistence can look like madness. If you succeed in the end, this extreme originality reformulates into a new level of mastery, sometimes even genius; if you fail in the end, you remain a madman in the eyes of others, and maybe even yourself. When you are in the midst of the journey…there’s really no way of knowing which one you are.”
[Hilary Austen, Artistry: A Guide To Pursuing Great Performance In Work And Life]
[Hilary Austen, Artistry: A Guide To Pursuing Great Performance In Work And Life]
“the most important reason for going from one place to another is to see what's in between, and they took great pleasure in doing just that.”
[Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth]
“It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.”
[Ernest Hemingway]
