Lois

The last thing I grab after all the packed paraphanalia are my keys. In the car I do the usual checks for the journey: water, sunglasses, handbag, snacks for Spike. My routine little prayer to my late father to ask him to watch over me and let me arrive safely and without incident and now off I go. I feel like a bit of Nina Simone to drive with me today. Her soulful stories sliding into my ears as trees become blurred watercolours, as lane markings play tag and as I focus yet drift on auto pilot. I’m awake. I’m alive.

The coffee on my tongue psychologically reminds me of this and I’m ok. I’m doing this. Again. Nina asks for more sugar in her bowl and reminds me that I could do with a bit of sugar in my bowl too as the trucks beside me close in and I indicate to get away. Too many horror stories about their driving freaks me out. Must keep safe. Must keep safe. Must get there again….and again…and back……and then back again….and so it goes on and on and has been for the last 8 years and so it will for I’m assuming only 4 more years. Until College. College!! Where has the time gone?! From boy to man. With a hairy face and a broken voice and girlfriends?!

Oh Jesus! Cobham Services already? Ok Hold on I’m over there, indicate, mirror, stop talking to yourself Lois! And here they come again, the jams, the brake lights. I turn Nina up and tobacco smoke in my car takes me back to Ronnie Scotts and singing along to Ray Gelato one night in the crowded club. I know my late father is in the car with me. He smoked incessently from boyhood until it won and broke him in his sixties. Thankfully it was a great reinforcement that refusing to smoke was the right thing for my life. The tobacco often randomly hugs me and comforts me. He’s still here and I love that.

I wonder what went through Mr Bojangles mind at times. I think I love him, just wandering around like a lost soul with dreams of his dancing shoes. I’d buy him a coffee and sit and talk to him. Strangers have the most fascinating stories to tell and sometimes the best advice then you never see them again but they stay with you. Oh god! An ambulance……move over.

Anxiousness washes over my palms and I try to grip the wheel harder. I’ll be here for hours now. Like a time before when we were all tweeting each other in the engines-off jam, it was funny.  Sometimes I wonder how I’ve managed these miles for so many years but I know why. Parenthood. And as we slope forwards at 5mph, I look up as another jet from distant deserts and terracotta skies roars over our car roofs and prepares to land at Heathrow.