Tuesday 15th January

13:35 Dad sat back in the driver’s seat, surveyed the road in front of him, and then screamed so loudly that the keys fell out of the ignition. Once the screaming had died down a long and disturbing silence descended on the infamous lime green Milton station wagon.

Dad had been playing his Carpenters tape at full blast and hadn’t felt the terrible shuddering as our un-trusty old Renault chugged up Town Hill towards school. Suddenly, halfway through the second chorus of I’m On Top of the World, an earthquake struck the green machine. The back right tyre was so flat that the rim was sticking through the rubber. Dad did his usual whistle, nodded at the shredded tyre, and announced that we had a puncture. He then grinned at me and said he’d been changing tyres since he was ‘knee high to a grasshopper’.

With a skip and a whistle he popped open the boot with an unhealthy creak and lifted up the carpet cover. His eyes glazed over and his lips moved without making a sound. Sensing a nasty turn of events, I moved in to get a closer look. Instead of a spare tyre there was a crate of Castle Lager. On top of the beer crate was a faded handwritten note that read:

Pete you old crab stick, hope you don’t mind but I needed the tyre. Here’s some jungle juice to keep the old engine purring. Frank.

And then it said:

PS Will return it by Monday

Underneath the date was written:

24/7/1988

Dad cracked a Castle and reread the note. He didn’t seem at all concerned that Frank had borrowed the spare tyre for a weekend and hadn’t returned it for two and a half years. In fact he seemed to be far more impressed that the Castle Lager still tasted good after spending nearly three years in the station wagon. My father held out the beer can like it was the Cullinan Diamond and said, ‘The taste that stood the test of time.’ He then grabbed two six packs, returned to the driver’s seat, and switched on the Carpenters again.

13:45 Dad drained his beer and crushed the empty can on his forehead (a skill he has perfected since New Year’s Eve, when the same stunt ended up with Mom rushing him to Addington Hospital for stitches). My father burped loudly, shouted, ‘Gesundheid!’ and immediately cracked open another beer. In a voice that could have grilled a steak, Mom instructed Dad to put his beer down and find help. Dad clearly wasn’t picking up Mom’s mood because he spread his arms out and said, ‘We must trust and believe that help will find us.’

Mom then said that the only thing that would find Dad were divorce papers.

Dad shook his head and grumbled to himself. He then grabbed a six pack and started striding up the emergency lane of the freeway. Mom jumped out the car and ordered my father to leave the beers behind because she said they made him look like a Cape coloured. (This wasn’t helped by the fact that Dad had been using Instant Tan over Christmas instead of sun block.)

Dad returned to the car and offered Mom fifty bucks to go and find help. Mom was appalled that Dad thought so little of her that he would bribe her in an emergency. After more shouting and some serious haggling, a bribe of sixty-three bucks was agreed on.

Mom strode out into the truck lane of the freeway, waving her arms above her head, and soon managed to flag down a PPC cement truck. After some lengthy discussions she drove off in the truck with a sweaty man in a white string vest called Larry. Dad looked at me, shook his head and muttered, ‘Women.’ He drained his Castle and began singing sadly along to We’ve Only Just Begun.

I opened my new shiny red diary.

Year ............................ 1991

HOLIDAY REPORT

HOME

I guess overall my holiday gets a six out of ten which, although a bit disappointing by most standards, was still pretty decent for a Milton. The first two weeks were a bit rough and I mostly slept and watched videos. Dad tried to get me out of the house to play some cricket in the garden but that was called off after he clobbered my first ball through the dining room window. Blacky (my deranged Labrador) had to have an emergency operation after he swallowed the hosepipe nozzle. Fatty called me once and asked if I wanted to go with him to the Stellawood cemetery at midnight to look for ghosts but I lied and told him I had diarrhoea. He said if I ate a kilogram of chocolate and drank three teaspoons of cooking oil, I’d be fine in a day or so.

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 708