hoped so. I strained to open my eyes, but fear kept them shut. Maybe?
What if I'd been blinded & would just have to wait for a consolatory
confirmation of my condition? I forced my eyes open.
I'd been dreaming. Again. Gravity has a cruel bend towards reminding
us of our limits. It was the morning of my first driving lesson. I
heard that the traffic in New Delhi was insane. No one talks of the
traffic in Lagos. They do what the brave do. They bear it in stoic
silence. I was to join that number. It frightened me to bouts of brief
insanity.
My driving instructor was a chap with passable english. I took it for
granted that his nerves were made of steel. Looking back, I can think
of muppets braver than him. He drove the car to a developing area. Low
human traffic, lower vehicle traffic and nothing to ram the car into.
I then saw the water front and remembered the horror story of a
friend, Paul.
Paul's uncle's wife, Anne, had asked him to teach her how to drive and
he took her to the marine studies institute. When she took to the
wheel, it wasn't up to minute when he was struggling with his door.
"Crazy bitch was speeding to the cliffs. I told her to stop. It was on
my 37th try that I realised that she was resigned to death by drowning
and it all came down to two things. We die or I escape with bruises
and she dies. Not an option. But the door was jammed. I finally freed
the door when she found her will to live... & the brakes.
"I was shaking as I walked round to her side & told her to give me the
keys. I drove us home & never mentioned it again. Never take a learner
near water."
You can only imagine what I was thinking about when the instructor
asked me if I could swim. He was more alarmed than me when I drove as
if I was fighting a tractor beam pulling me to the water. It felt like
I was driving in a straight line. He said I was driving like a
disoriented bat. Actually, his comment can't be repeated in polite
conversation, so I've taken liberties with my recollection.
Anyway, so his reaction reminded me of Kermit the frog or Grover the
cute monster. I think it was the flailing arms and the high pitched
screaming. A touch too high for a man, in my opinion.
--
Sent from my mobile device
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