By Douglas Kruger
WE glanced to the left. There stood our little Beaver Scout, waiting in line with his troop. They were all dressed to the nines, ready and eager to march by the King. Then we glanced to the right. The sky had all but disappeared. In its place, the four horsemen of the apocalypse seemed to be dragging a sheet of swirling doom across the Island.
The timing couldn’t have been worse. With split-second accuracy, a cloudburst strong enough to wash a politician clean hit their tiny heads, just as they started to march.
On the upside, I got some cool photos of my drowned rat as he floated proudly by. On the downside, not one of them had raincoats, because in this instance, the Scouts just weren’t… um… prepared.
Still, he loved every second of it. Oh, we can throw his formal shoes directly in the bin. And it took a bath back home to stop the shivering and restore feeling to his toes. But he loved every second of it.
It’s funny how that works. How often do our most miserable moments become our best memories?
Case in point: When I was just a few years older than him, I got into skateboarding. I lived, slept and breathed it, to the total abandonment of school work, hygiene and most human relationships. One year, my dad carted me off to the national championships in Cape Town, which is no mean feat when you live in Johannesburg and can’t afford to fly.
We piled into an ancient Rover. It creaked when you got in and the cracked carpets emitted a suspicious odour. You stopped noticing that once the fumes from the exhaust started circulating in the cabin.
So accommodated, we set off on a 17-hour drive. Much of that journey crossed the Great Karoo, a semi-desert region where the endless straight roads can send you loopy with delirium – if the gas chamber of a Rover hasn’t done the job already.
As a general rule, skateboarders are not what you might call wealthy, so a gaggle of older ones bummed a lift with us, flicking hair out of their eyes and saying things like “dude”.
The only way I could fit in was squished into the boot. That’s health and safety for you, South African-style. Fortunately, the leg cramps kept my mind off my dehydration.
Today, much like my son marching in the rain, I think back on that time as one massive adventure. It was a gruelling trip. But I wouldn’t have had it any other way. It’s one of my best memories. I can still vividly picture stopping in a small desert town at night, crawling from the boot with my skateboard, then roaring across the open concrete of a filling station in the chill desert air, thrilled to be speeding through a strange and empty night. That was well over 35 years ago.
I’ve since made that same journey many times over, each time in an air-conditioned Boeing. For the life of me, I can’t recall even one of those trips.
And the more I think about it, the quicker the confirmations come.
Relaxing on holiday? I can’t really remember that. But sweating blood to get a book written by a deadline? That’s actually a pretty good one. Staying in and watching TV? I’ve got nothing, though I’ve done it thousands of times. But hurling my reluctant body into the ice down at Havre des Pas rockpool, then coming up blue and gasping for breath? The recollection still makes me smile. Granted, that may be the manic grin of trauma survival but still…
When was the last time you felt truly alive? And be honest: Was it during a moment of ease and comfort? Or was there something trying about it? Perhaps even something gruelling, entailing discomfort to endure, or a fear to conquer? Do you thrill to the memory?
I suspect Jeremy Clarkson was on to something. He said that the last thing he wanted was to die peacefully in his old age. Instead, he hoped to go out “upside down and on fire”, so his death could at least be an interesting anecdote for his wife to tell at parties.
Maybe we’re just not built for comfort. Perhaps it’s even bad for us. Maybe letting the kid march with sopping socks in the downpour of the century will become a reason for his 40-year-old self to smile wistfully, some time around 2057.
Besides, what’s the alternative? Slow but comfortable petrification? A cosy life leading up to a gentle goodbye? At the very least, we don’t want to leave this life haunted by the ghosts of what might have been. And much of that requires stepping out from beyond the duvets.
I won’t forget the King’s visit. For someone who grew up out in the sticks of the colonies, it was a singular moment. But I won’t forget the lesson either. And it came not from royalty, but from the mouths of babes. And I quote: “It was cool walking in the rain. I liked it.”
Suffering builds character. It also makes us feel alive. If nothing else, it’s a good philosophy to cling to as we stare down the barrel of a six-week-long school holiday. Heaven help us.
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Douglas Kruger is a professional speaker, and the author of the book Poverty Proof. Born in Johannesburg, he now lives in St Helier, where he churns out YouTube videos from his apartment, provided the seagulls aren’t shrieking too loudly.
