Flying in the Face of Old Age (11): Stupid old man!

Chapter 11

GET OUT OF MY WAY YOU
STUPID OLD MAN!

You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,
Strike flat the thick rotundity o’ the world!
King Lear Act III Scene II

“Get out of my way you stupid old man! Go get a rocking chair. We are in a hurry, get f–ed, piss off!” she screamed.

I could see the spittle scooting out her open window. The whole scene was humorous … for a few long seconds. SHE was driving a green Mini Minor and appeared to be much too large for the front seat. The car interestingly leaned towards the driver’s side. We were trying to make a left hand turn on a complicated new roundabout a few kilometres west of Bundaberg, Queensland.

At roundabouts a cyclist must take all evasive action and let everyone else take the lead. There can be no arguments between steel and bone. We have one friend who was killed on such a roundabout and another who will never walk properly because of a driver like HER! SHE came into the circle without signals, screeching her tires as well as her vocal chords. She just missed Joan by a few centimetres. I was close behind. The slow burn ignited what heretofore had been a long fuse. I do not get angry very easily.

The past three weeks had been the dream bicycle run remembered until the time you go to the Great Fork in the Sky.

However, there had been two minor problems, we had learned to hate tall sugar cane fields across which nothing could be seen except the tops of distant mountains and the absence of the ocean, basically because the cane fields were in the way. We wanted to take time on the ocean and at Bundaberg we were told the whale watching season had started in Hervey Bay and the beaches were magnificent. We planned a detour, usually a problem on a bicycle, and hoped to end up on Fraser Island for a week of R & R. Having travelled close to 1700 kilometres we felt we had earned a rest. And my knee had started clicking arhythmatically again. Great soldier Joan had become stronger and stronger and was leading our personal pelaton and I was literally becoming a lap dog.

It was always with an air of personal superiority when I read of road rages where people went apoplectic and even drew hand guns and killed offending motorists. That, of course, only happened in America. I knew it would never happen to me such as Joan had experienced towards that unfortunate woman some hundreds of kilometres north. I was above such personal feelings. And I began to boil the inane words of Henry Higgens as the plotting of destroying HER in the green Minor crept in. SHE had driven off, middle finger in the air. I slowly, at first, began to follow her as the traffic was heavy. Then, passing Joan the words leaked into my throat:

I’m and ordinary man
Who desires nothing more than an ordinary chance,
To live exactly as he likes, and do precisely what he wants…
An average man am I, of no eccentric whim,
Who likes to live his life, free of strife,
Doing whatever he thinks is best for him,
Just an ordinary man…
But let THAT woman in my life…

By now SHE had pulled up at a stop light. Her radio was playing hated Rap Music. A reason for vengeful violence by itself! Hatred flowed. I pulled up to the small flat roofed vehicle, anger fully welled and fully overflowing.

Screaming like a battling banshee I hit the top of the Minnie with a hard, clenched fist and Hey, Presto…the damn roof suddenly had a full stoved-in roof and…it was so easy. SHE screamed. I swore. Joan yelled. “Buck get out of here!” We scooted in another direction and the Mini was caught in the green light and cars were tooting their horns for her to move on. From the roundabout to the stoved-in roof, it all took place in a few seconds.

When you hit the age of age you should have learned to take jibes, jokes and personally directed personal insults.

I have survived about all of the contemptuous and insensitive comments possible from the mother-crafted home-made flower sack underpants of my youth to the barbs of a nasty psychologist who told me he was sorry he had not helped me more … after a year of internship under him. Attacking, I quickly told him that I felt sorry for him that he had failed so badly and I would be willing to help him.

Usually, when attacked verbally, I come back very quickly with a word or phrase which takes down the offender and makes him look ignorant. Undoubtedly, not a very nice aspect of my personality but it certainly has worked in life … and made a few enemies.

Father had said, “Don’t argue, smile…then hit him on the nose and run!” I guess this was my way of dealing with bullies.

Probably why a brother has not spoken civily to me for fifty years