I was confident that I could stay up late Wednesday night knowing school would resume Thursday, because every teacher capable of teaching school as usual would make it in to catch up with activities lost Tues & Wed. Anticipating a call from the sub line for Fri. action, I spent a challenging hour digging my car out of the driveway and making sure I could back into the street. So there really was no excuse for me staying up late — until 4a — early Fri morning, but I did, and when the sub line called at 7:10, I was glad to be returning to class for the first time in almost two nail biting weeks. I’d been away all of three, but I had taken myself off the sub calling roster to finish a writing assignment by deadline.
I had not anticipated the condition of my car at minus four degrees on a bright sunny Friday. I was due at 7:40, and on a good day, I could make it in 15 minutes. Allowing 20 to include five minutes for the engine to warm up and start defrosting the windsheild, my key went into the ignition at 7:20 and the engine started right away. So much for the easy part.
The ice crystals that form on car glass don’t disappear at minus four nearly as fast as they do at plus 30. As the engine began to warm, I tried, with a broken ice scraper to get a hole large enough to see through in front of the steering wheel. The scraper was useless and the brush attached to it was almost as useless. NEXT TIME I will use a credit card, but this novel notion didn’t come to me until I began writing this entry. I knew the heater was working the way I know God has a beard and a voice like James Early Jones. But the presence of heat, to say nothing of James Earl Jones seemed mythic as desperation set in. I could not be way late for the assignment at JMS, teaching Learning Resources. So cautiously I backed out of the driveway.
Driving into the rising sun, I could barely anything in front and nothing on my left or right; only a little to the rear. Thirty feet east of driveway, I felt for the curb on my right, stopped and scrapped a little more off windshield and windows with the brush. I planned to stay on the right, take lightly travelled residential streets streets when possible and keep the windshield as much in direct sunlight as possible. By the time I was in heavy traffic, I figured visibility would be significantly improved thanks to the heater taking effect. And I prayed that the Holy Jones would be with me in the right seat. I should have been accosted by a Springfield Police officer then and there and ordered to return to my own driveway and cease and desist from being a menace to navigation. But it didn’t happen that way.
Slowly. . . . . . . . . . . cautiously . . . . radio turned off so I could sense my way down the street . . . I made it as far as Ash going east, past Sixth. To see to my left, I had to open my door. The window was frozen shut; couldn’t wind it down. There was a short line of cars halted at railroad tracks, the street blocked by heavy freight on cold steel. As I sat there, I noticed that what indicated a quarter of a tank of fuel when I had started 20 minutes earlier was approaching empty! I had left some cash at home, taking only enough for my traditional sub teacher lunch: vending machine party mix, peanut butter & crackers, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and a Mountain Dew.) and my sudden new fear was that I’d run out of fuel before reaching school.
So I U-turned homeward bound to get the $5 bill and call school to say I’d be late. Driving away from the sun was a whaleofalot easier than driving into it, and my feeling was returning to my feet next to the heat vent. Grabbed cash, called school, apologized for being late, promised I would make it in. Time: 8;00.
Back on the street and I could see 50 percent better than earlier. Stopped at Fourth at South Grand, heard a car honk and a fellow waving at me. Opened my door to talk to him; window still frozen shut. It was Bill Ridley, my first “boss” in my writing career when I wrote funeral home advertisements for the Order of the Golden Rule back in 1979. He asked how I was doing. I had just enough time to say I wasn’t working full time, desperately needed to be, and as the light turned green and impatient cretins in cars behind us began to lie down on their HORNS, asked him to remember me if he can ever use a writer. BOOM, back into motion.
He said (STILL in italics! This is as bad as Blogspot, DANGIT!) three dollars and change. I had seen the same scraper at Shop N Save for more tha $6, but I didn’t argue with him. For all I know he gave me a break. Scraped off the big areas of remaining ice and snow. No one would arrest me now. . . .
At 8:35 I pulled into the faculty parking lot and jogged part of the way on immaculately cleared concrete to the office. During the final three minutes or so, the car had finally warmed up and I was transiting the city like most grownups who can tie their own shoes.
I was greeted by Mrs. P who explained I was doing fine, I should not feel bad about being late, that a lot of other teachers were experiencing the same kinds of delays. The day of teaching was an utter tropical breeze of friendly, professional faculty and students who generally behaved themselves. The day there was a delight. I departed happy and grateful for a day’s honest work.
Even stopped at the hobby shop en route home. Didn’t by anything by I enjoyed seeing the guys and drooling over the new model airplane kits. Didn’t by anything. Noble dreams are not valid tender in most retail enterprises.
Home warm and safe and after a short nap in the easy chair, resumed normal “programming.” I will NOT be caught so flat-footed and unprepared again. Felt so good about the day that on Saturday morning, I spent another hour shoveling snow, just for the good exercise and to show a little pride. It’s obvious I’m a lucky mother’s son. Now if I could just find a frikking full-time EMPLOYER!
Live long . . . . . . and proper!
