Poorly Learnt Lessons

I try, when I remember to, to bear in mind the saying, “Everyone provides an example; some to follow and some to avoid”.  There are some people to emulate, and some people to consciously attempt not to, or more accurately, certain things about people to emulate, and certain things, often about the same people, to avoid.  I also try to remember the prayer, “Lord, may I see myself as others see me, and see others as You see them.”

It is far too easy to become judgmental and arrogant about other people, and I am well aware that this is a serious fault within myself, and despite my (often far from-) best efforts I do judge and look down upon other people.  However, I also try and draw lessons from them as well.  Unfortunately, it seems that I require the same lessons repeating on occasion.

Those of you with the signal good taste and excellent good fortune to have read my book, Three Men on a Pilgrimage (Link to the right, tens of copies sold nationwide, available online and from all good bookshops, the book already being described as ‘By Thomas Jones’) will be familiar with the chapter in which the eponymous characters encounter the shop assistant who’s constantly harassed by an old man to further reduce the price of the items he’s reducing at the end of the day, and the epiphany that the shop assistant had that the way the old man acted was exactly how he acted towards God.  I can reveal that this is based on a true story.  I was that shop assistant, during my incarceration in a supermarket, and the old man is based on a real person (or rather persons).  Having had the realisation, I attempted to act more kindly towards them.

Several years have passed, and I finished my sentence in retail and was released into a office role at an international company.  I work in the country headquarters, but we have numerous salesmen based around the country who travel about visiting customers.  One of my jobs is to send out brochures, catalogues and demonstration equipment, and as a result I am frequently contacted by the salesmen to send literature to customers, or send demonstration equipment to themselves.  Others phone because they’re on the road, and want me to check our database for a phone number or address for a customer.  They’ll frequently tell me that I’m a ‘star’ or ‘my best mate’.  On those rare occasions when they visit the head office, they will often pass through the part of the office I work in and won’t give me a glance, let alone the time of day.  Now don’t get me wrong, they’re all decent, pleasant people, and they're extremely busy, so they’re hardly to be blamed if it’s a bit ‘out of sight, out of mind’ for them.

Nonetheless, this used to annoy me, and I’ve complained to the people unfortunate enough to sit near me about the fact that I don’t seem to be their ‘best mate’ when they don’t want something.  Then, like a hammer to the brain, I realised that I’d just made exactly the same mistake as before.

“Hi God, my best mate!  Could you just...”

“Hi God, how are you?  Just a quick job for you…”

“Hi God, if it’s alright, I just need…  Thanks very much, you’re a star!”

“What?  Oh, God, it’s you.  No, I don’t need anything right now.  Why are you bothering me?”

I like to think that I’m reasonably intelligent, but that clearly doesn’t equate to being able to learn things easily.  I have resolved (if I remember to!) not to mind that they only tend to speak to me when they need something, and not to complain about it, or make sarcastic comments, either to them or my colleagues.  We’ll see how long I can keep that up for…

Everyone provides an example, some to follow, some to avoid.  Very often, the person whose example needs avoiding most is me.  I just need to be willing to learn my own lessons, as well as those of other people.

Of Books and Buses

Nowadays, I tend to do the bulk of my reading either while waiting for the bus, or on it.  I don’t usually read too much in the evenings and I go to bed quite early during the week because I have to get up so early for work.  This, in and of itself, isn’t a particularly bad thing, but it has led to a problem of late, in which I find that the bus driver always ensures that we arrive at my stop in the morning just as I’m getting to a really good bit.  I can’t start reading again until lunchtime, an infinitely long 5 hours or so later.  It’s very frustrating.

I don’t know why they’d do this.  I’ve phoned the bus company in the past to complain about their poor service (the company’s, not the drivers, who are usually fairly amiable) and it’s possible that the drivers have taken this as a slight upon themselves and wish to punish me.  I’m also not entirely sure how they know when I’m at a Good Bit though.  Possibly they make sure they can see me in their rear-view mirror, and gauge the quality of the particular section I’m reading by how absorbed I appear to be, accelerating if it looks like I might finish that bit before we reach my stop.  It’s the only thing that makes sense really.

It seems like a low and petty thing to do to a person, and I’ve been tempted to complain about it, but I imagine that they wouldn’t take me or my complaint seriously.  I’d have to ask to speak to someone who reads a lot, but they might not have anyone.  It is Stagecoach after all.  The only other thing to do is ask the driver to circle for a few minutes if it looks like we’re approaching my stop; maybe take a more scenic route for a little while.  The other commuters wouldn’t mind too much, I’m sure.  It would be a treat to them; these people who see the same roads, the same houses, the same lamp-posts and fields twice a day, every single day, while I am exploring distant worlds in the sanctity of my own head.  True we might be ten or fifteen minutes late, but that’s no worse than the bus company often manages entirely without my input.

And if I’m fortunate enough to be reading a book which consists, cover to cover, of one long unbroken Good Bit (such as, to choose a completely random example, Three Men on a Pilgrimage: A Comical Progress by Thomas Jones, published by Whispering Tree Original Books and available online and through all good bookshops), then we could go somewhere really different while I read it all, detour through far-flung fields, hills and meadows, verdant forests and majestic mountains which would uplift their spirits, something that badly needs doing to assuage the soul-ache of knowing that soon you will be in Luton.  It would be good for the driver too.  It would do wonders for their alertness, morale and general joie de travail.  We are told that it is very bad to travel on monotonous roads, that it leads to drowsiness, inattention, property damage and death.  By persuading them to go on this circuitous but picturesque journey, road safety will be increased, my fellow commuters will be happier (and therefore more productive once they get to work, easily off-setting the slight lateness that may result), and more importantly still, I’ll get to finish my book.

Everybody profits, no-one loses out.  I may well write to the Prime Minister and suggest that he puts the idea before parliament.

I’ll expect my OBE in the post.