A Dash of Reality

by Murray, Lee

  Crap.

  Trust Cherry to bring that up. I do not dance like Mr Bean! And I did not sing into a stick of deodorant. How ridiculous. As if.

  It was a tube of toothpaste.

  21

  It’s 3:00am and I’m wide awake. It seems like ages and ages that I’ve been staring at the television standby light, a teeny red beacon in the darkness, and now I can see several thousand teeny standby lights repeating all over the ceiling. Jack’s gone home and without him my bed feels big and empty. He doesn’t like to stay out on a school night. I wish he were here to tickle my back because I can’t sleep.

  My wakefulness is all Cherry’s fault. She would have to go and bring up the height issue, wouldn’t she? Because she’s got me thinking and the thing is, she’s probably right. My biggest weakness is my fear of heights. And it’s so not fair because I can’t help it. Things with height take a lot of avoiding. Try saying no to playdates, school camps and weekend parties involving tree houses, flying foxes, bungy launching, abseiling, rock climbing, diving boards, and second floor balconies. Even a pair of four-inch heels makes me nervous. It doesn’t leave me many options. I once visited the Sky Tower. Took the elevators to the observation deck.

  Bad decision. Bad. Bad. Bad.

  I completely lost it.

  The bottom of the lift shaft fell out beneath me.

  It just fell away!

  I was left staring into a void.

  A 200m drop.

  Visions of heads bursting like tomatoes on concrete.

  In less than 40 seconds, I’d dropped to my knees, curled into an upright foetal position and squeezed my eyes shut. My fists clenched, feet damp and slippy, and my heart hammering in my chest.

  Then I bawled.

  Thinking about it has made me break out in a sweat. I heave the duvet off me, kick it to the bottom of the bed, and lie there feeling the air on my skin. The TV standby light blinks.

  At the Sky Tower a little boy of about eight was riding up with his dad. He called me a cry-baby. I was so ashamed. I was a cry-baby on the way down, too.

  It turns out all three elevators at the Sky Tower have a glass floor panel. All of them. How cruel is that? And there’s no point telling me the glass floor is 38mm thick, could support a Kenworth truck, and is otherwise impenetrable to anyone other than Bruce Willis toting a missile launcher. It doesn’t make any difference, because it’s a totally irrational affliction. People who don’t suffer from a fear of heights don’t get it.

  ‘Get a grip,’ they say. They simply don’t understand how it feels.

  I still can’t sleep and now I need to pee so I get up and pad my way to the bathroom. The light stings my eyes open. While I go I lift my feet off the cold tiles. There’s only a few squares of toilet paper left. Toilet rolls don’t last as long as they used to and they leave fluffy dust everywhere. I wipe the lint off the paper holder with my finger. Yuck.

  I’m snuggled back in bed now, but I’m still wide awake. It’s driving me crazy. The standby light is back to one point now. I try not to think about heights and falling.

  Not thinking about it.

  Cushla says my fear of falling is my father’s fault. She’s exaggerating though because he wasn’t even there the day I rolled off the bed and got a mild concussion. The way she tells it, I was at the rolling, wiggly stage and Cushla was changing my nappy, but with one eye on the telly because the Tasmanian Tarmac Challenge was on. Not that she’s particularly interested in motorsport, but she thought she might see my dad, or perhaps one of his mates, and, amazingly while they were conducting the pre-race interviews with the drivers, she did see Colin standing behind the pit area with a crowd of other groupies attached to Holden’s third-string team. Unfortunately, Colin was groping a Kim Kardashian look-alike at the time. I’ve asked Cushla about this incident since, because it’s plausible a neon-quick flash of two people seen in the blurred background of a pulsing crowd in a live-broadcast television interview by a post-natal wife a small ocean away, could possibly have been misinterpreted. But Cushla says there was no doubt. Apparently, his tongue was down Kim’s throat and his hands were clutching her bum cheeks. According to her, that kind of evidence is difficult to refute. Anyway, Cushla says the early concussion explains my desperate fear of falling.

  God, I’m so tired. I need to go to sleep. I wish Jack were here. I want to snuffle in close to him and smell his warm skin.

  I wonder if I could practice not being scared of heights? I’ve been training my muscles with Olaf. Why couldn’t I train myself not to freak out? I could start by standing on something modest, like an apple box, and then when I get comfortable I could work my way up to a step ladder and then when I’m comfortable with that work my way up to something taller and something taller and something taller…

  22

  This morning I’m outside the toilet block at the northern end of Pilot Bay, looking up at the Mount. This 232m volcanic cone poked out on the end of a peninsula at the entrance of Tauranga Harbour used to be nameless. Maori legend, as recounted to me by Caro, says when his mountain-girlfriend went off with someone way cooler, the volcano didn’t want to live anymore. Some legendary fairy people agreed to help the volcano drown himself by pulling him into the ocean, but they’d only managed to get his feet in the water when the rising sun chased them away. Apparently, fairy people are scared of sunlight. Anyway, the upshot was the love-lorn mountain got stuck there on the end of the peninsular and as a result he became known as Mauao, which means ‘Trapped by the Dawn.’

  It’s barely dawn now, not quite 6:00am, and I too am trapped here on end of the peninsular at the base of the mountain, at the start of a training session with Olaf. We’re squeezing in this session before work because Olaf insists there are great benefits to be gained from revving up your metabolism at the beginning of the day. I suppose if you extrapolate his theory, then it makes sense to get up in the dead of night and give it a good rev too.

  Olaf has his right foot up on the campground fence, using it for support as he tightens his shoe lace. Even in this early morning light I can see he’s dressed in a pair of Orca compression shorts and a pale blue t-shirt in super-fine dry-fit fabric. His hair, ordinarily gel-sculpted and spiky, is firmly squished under a vivid blue Adidas running cap. He drops his foot, stamps it a couple of times and then begins his pre-run exercises, a curious blend of walking and dancing movements, rather like Irish dancing in slow-motion. He looks as ridiculous as John Cleese in that Monty Python skit about the Ministry of Silly Walks. I’m careful not to smirk in case he makes me do them too.

  ‘I’ve asked you to come here to Mount Maunganui,’ he says while completing another dorky side-step, ‘because it’s time to introduce some hill training into your program. Today, I will run with you to help you with your technique and to motivate you,’ says my trainer. ‘Let’s start off by jogging slowly around the front of the mountain to warm up.’

  We set off past the tiny Copenhagen cone shop on our right. It’s not open yet so there’s no lovely waffly aroma of toasted cones, and nor are there any snaking queues of bell-bottomed tourists on the footpath.

  ‘Hill training will build strength in your legs and improve the capacity of your lungs,’ says Olaf. ‘How do you say it? The aerosol capacity, I think, yes? Running up a hill does the same sort of work as sprinting, but without you having to vomit afterwards.’

  Lovely.

  We jog slowly past the Saltwater Hot Pools. I glance to my left at Mauao. Today there’s no mist to hide it, so the mountain soars above us like a pyramid with its top sliced off, a great misshapen ice-cream container. It looks a long way up. When does a hill officially become a mountain anyway? We round the corner by the ranger’s house in silence, pad quietly through the sleeping camp ground and hang a left at the shower block. When we’re a distance from the slumbering holidaymakers, Olaf resumes his lesson.

  ‘The trick for running up a hill, Melanie, is learning how to relax.’

  Relax! Diff
icult to do when you’re faced with the prospect of climbing a blimmin’ mountain before breakfast! I’m tempted to make a quick dash for one of the tents, but Olaf is probably quicker than me. I resign myself to the idea of climbing this mountain as we clamber over the first stile and into the sheep paddock. The ground is mushy underfoot and my trainers slip in a squishy pile of sheep dung. I mutter the appropriate expletive under my breath.

  We run through the long grass across the paddock. It’s quiet, with only the sound of the grass brushing against our shoes as we progress. We reach another stile and emerge on a gravelled four-wheel drive track. Being firmer underfoot now, our steps resound with the gratifying crunch of stone and sand. Already the gentle gradient is making me huff.

  ‘Relax, Melanie.’ I grit my teeth. ‘Relax your teeth, Melanie. Put your shoulders down. They are up by your ears. Push them down.’ I unclench my teeth and focus on dropping my shoulders. This latter has the effect of poking my boobs forward, which seems to satisfy Olaf. ‘Good.’

  He skips forward to open the gate ahead of me. His enormous turnip-sized calves inflate as he bobs up the steps. If Tigger is still looking for his family, I may have found a long lost relative. Olaf is very very bouncy. The track widens and half-comatose sheep scatter in front of us as we climb. We’re getting into a friendly plodding rhythm when Olaf says ‘Hill work, it is like eating an elephant, yes?’

  ‘Eating an elephant?’

  ‘Like the joke, one bite at a time,’ he chortles. “But it’s true. If you think about running up the whole mountain it can seem too big, too insurmountable, but if you think about taking one step and then another step, before you know it, you’ll be at the top.’ I must’ve looked unconvinced. ‘We will run up the mountain in little bites,’ he says.

  The track rises as it winds east. When we reach the headland we get our first view of the Pacific Ocean, rocking slowly in the cradle of the bay beneath a skim-milk sun. The masses of postcards and calendars photographed from this spot do not do it justice. It’s absolutely breathtaking. I only get a fleeting glance though because we turn sharply northward and confront the first steep section of the climb. It’s gi-normous.

  ‘Relax, Melanie. Your shoulders are up again. Now, this is important. You must use little springy steps, light steps, on your toes.’

  He demonstrates his bouncy Tigger-technique which I imitate.

  Boing, boing.

  ‘Yes, that is good. Very springy. Now lean forward into the hill. No, not so far, slightly forward, Melanie. The gravity will pull you up the hill.’

  I’m not so sure about some of Olaf’s theories. Surely gravity is a downwards force? Still, it does seem a teensy bit easier. I’m sort of falling up the hill with each tiny step. Tripping over and upwards. Who knows? Maybe he’s right? I shrug.

  ‘Shoulders down,’ says Olaf sharply.

  I’m chugging up the slope now. Little steps, little steps. Chug, chug, chug. This isn’t so bad. I’m slightly huffing, but regular huffing, not desperate lung-scorching heaving or my former asthmary gasping. I must be getting fitter. I steal a quick look up the track. Whoops, bad decision. It’s positively miles to the top. I’ll never make it. I want to wail in despair. It occurs to me this mountain has another Maori name, Maunganui, which means big hill. Ha! Someone has a sense of humour. Maunganui must be a euphemism. This hill is not big, it’s fucking enormous.

  Beside me, Olaf urges, ‘Remember the elephant.’

  His comment focuses me and I practice taking those little baby steps. At last, we reach the gate and once again Olaf bounds forward to open it for me, robbing me of the chance to stop and open it for myself.

  Damn.

  On the other side, the track is even steeper. My lower back is beginning to ache, and my calves are smouldering, but I’m actually inching and huffing my way skyward.

  ‘We need to get to the flat, Melanie.’

  Oh, thank goodness.

  Get to the flat, get to the flat. Must make it to the flat. The miniscule plateau where the track forks becomes like a palmed oasis to a dying man. It calls me forward. Beckoning.

  Must. Reach. The. Flat.

  I maintain my springy falling. Hooray! I make it. I’m at the plateau, the flat. Whoopee! I pull up.

  ‘No, no, do not stop Melanie. Now we have reached the flat we will run in a circle to recover our breath and then we will continue on,’ says a still-bouncy Olaf. ‘Perhaps four circles, yes?’

  By circle three I feel renewed, but I don’t tell Olaf because I need all the recovery time I can get. After circle four we tackle the north face of the mountain. I’m worried I might freak out being up so high, but thankfully the track is wide and well-trodden and if I keep hard to the left with my eyes glued downwards, I feel I’m on solid ground.

  In front of me, Olaf’s shiny muscled calves pump, left and right, left and right, punctuated by the sound of his footfalls, my huffing, and the reflective tail-spots on the heels of his trainers. Along the northern aspect of the mountain the path is practically level, with increases in elevation provided by kindly-spaced flights of timber-framed stairs. I marvel at the tenacity of the unknown builders of these stairs, and the lunacy of whoever hefted those planks up here.

  On the western ridge the trail curves sharply back upon itself and meets the roadway. I admire a twisted tree beside the trail. One massive branch has sent down its own thickened root, as solid as a ship’s mast, and adorned with curly tendrils like the cornices in a Parisian apartment. I mustn’t dawdle though because Olaf has already taken the hairpin and is calling from somewhere up in front. I whip up the final flight of steps in a perky burst of gusto to reach the road which is… virtually straight up!

  I’m stalled at the intersection. There’s no way anyone could possibly fall up a hill as steep as this. It’s got to be at least 65 degrees, maybe even 70. Practically vertical. It’s impossible. I can’t do it. I can’t. Suddenly, I’m not alone on the path. Coming downhill toward me are a couple of octogenarians in matching rustling track pants, the first humans we’ve encountered today. They’re holding hands and descending the mountain at breakneck speed.

  ‘Morning!’ the man announces crisply, not breaking stride.

  ‘Good morning,’ his partner says, matching him step for step. ‘View from the top is gorgeous this morning.’ Her wrinkled smile warms me briefly and then they’re gone, replaced by Olaf who has come back to find me.

  ‘On your toes, springy steps!’ barks Olaf. But I’m right there bouncing, springing, leaning, and telling my whining back and groaning calves to quit their bitching because this sister is running up this mountain. If two octogenarians can make it, then I will too. It’s somewhat of a Gloria Gaynor moment. I’m embarrassed because for a second I wanted to give up. My attitude adjusted, I resume my little steps inching myself forwards.

  ‘Very good. Now we do like the skiers, Melanie.’

  Now he’s being downright ridiculous. I look witheringly at him.

  ‘Olaf, there’s no such thing as uphill skiing.’

  ‘Yes, yes, you are right. Ha ha. That would be silly. But, it’s not what I mean. We will slalom up the hill, from one side of the path to the other, so always we are running on the flat. Isn’t that clever? Follow me. We will try it. This way first.’

  I follow his sweeping zig-zag course, and imitating his bouncing baby steps until we reach the next plateau. I’m not going to admit running slalom-style up the slope is easy, because it bloody well isn’t, but it isn’t as awful as that first day when I ran up Maxwells Road. Running from side to side does make the hill seem less steep.

  I’m even more encouraged when Olaf advises me there are just two more teeny bites of the elephant to go. After my sixth recovery circle, we attack the next section of mountainside. It’s wickedly steep and now my calves feel like apricots overnighted in a dehydrator. My knees are protesting in a patter of clicks and cracks. I notice the noises I make as I run. My breathing makes a catchy rap:

  F
oow, foow, blow, foow, foow, blow,

  Up I go, to and fro, on my toes.

  The lyrics need work. Olaf’s voice cuts through my ditty.

  ‘Good, Melanie. Very relaxed. Excellent. You’re getting the idea now.’

  The last plateau is high off the ground, deep in the hillside and tucked under the tree ferns where the air is heavy with the smell of bracken. As I complete my circles I consider the possible routes forward. There are two choices; one is a level path to the south which leads under a leafy canopy into the ferns, while the alternative is probably best approached with a Sherpa guide and an oxygen tank. I don’t even bother to waste my hopefulness on the gentle foray into the bush. As expected, Olaf elects the steeper path.

  ‘Up, up. Little steps.’

  According to Olaf it’s the last push forward now. Any moment soon, I will burst over the crest of the hill. Any moment now after I’ve conquered this final stretch of rocky craggy Everest-like mountaintop. It’s the final frontier – please, please Mr Scott, beam me up now. I focus on my little steps and big slalom sweeps. To tell you the truth I feel woozy, as if I’ve consumed two large margaritas on an empty stomach. I must look ghastly because Olaf is studying me, clearly alarmed. Maybe I have altitude sickness.

  ‘What did you have for breakfast this morning, Melanie?’

  ‘Er, a cup of coffee?’

  ‘No, no! That will not suffice. It is important to eat correctly. You think Cadel Evans won the Tour de France on a cup of coffee? Of course not! Your body needs good quality petroleum like an engine.’ He takes a zip-lock bag out of a pocket in his compression pants and reveals a stash of multi-coloured jellybeans. ‘Here, eat some of these.’ Still running, he passes me the bag. I choose a pink one and pop it into my mouth. The instant blast of sugar is fabulous. It’s a restorative surge of neon wattage packaged in a jellybean. Amazing. I gobble a green one, followed by a purple one.