In the Absence of Absalon

by Simon Okotie

  Frustrated by his failure to make progress in this area, he noticed that the branding on the electronic key matched that of the car that he’d seen parked haphazardly, facing, as it were, in the wrong direction, at the side of the road behind him.

  22

  How, though, did he know that the car was facing in the wrong direction, he wondered, as he noticed that the key ring also had a metallic fob attached to it with a short section of chain? After all, cars did travel in that direction along the street that the car was parked alongside (albeit on the opposite side of the road). It must be a combination, then, of direction of travel plus side of street that was critical in these cases, he surmised, noticing that the metallic fob had a sequence of numbers stamped upon it; he must have used his expertise in this area instinctively in his determination in this instance, he thought.

  But how did one know which side of the road was which, he now wondered, as he realised that some of the numbers matched those scribbled in ballpoint inside the book of matches? If you need assistance in this area then imagine, he thought, that you are standing in the middle of a conventional two-lane road and that it is a quiet road – this will help you keep your mind on the example since there’s nothing quite as distracting lorries, combine harvesters and tractors passing you when you are standing in the middle of a conventional road about to be given a briefing on which side of the road is which. Note that there is no need to actually physically move anywhere, unless you believe that would be of assistance to you in visualising the scenario more clearly and distinctly; and if you do feel the urge to actually move to a nearby (or more distant) similar highway (and more imaginative souls could skip the foregoing passage, he thought) then you should take care, in a number of ways: firstly you should ensure that the road is as quiet as the rural road under consideration in the imagined counterpart to your actual physical experiment; this means not too many vehicles (including cycles) – the number of pedestrians is immaterial. In fact, it would be useful to have as many as possible there, pedestrian-wise, because you would be able to pass on this briefing directly to them, that is, without bothering our investigator with it, or without them having to refer to the scenario that is currently (still geminating) in his mind – that, then, would be the most efficient means of conveying this briefing, taking as many friends and family and acquaintances with you to this quiet road so that you can demonstrate to them directly, without them having to bother themselves with the source material, as it were, how to work out which side of the road is which; you, your family, friends, acquaintances and anyone else who doesn’t fall into those four categories should all wear bright clothing (this only applies to those people who are actually going on the excursion to the quiet road; other people who fall into the now five categories (which in fact now encompass the whole of humanity) but who are not going on this excursion do not need to wear bright clothing unless, that is, they have other reasons for wearing bright clothing, including safety issues related to excursions to some other road or roads, just simply the desire to be seen or the fact that wearing bright colours immediately puts them in a generally and genuinely positive state of mind); in addition, if the excursion takes place at night, then you and everyone else (defined as previously) should also affix a reflective strip to your front and rear; that is to say that you should affix one of said strips to the front of your bright clothing (your white T-shirt, say, if it is a warm evening or other period of the day that you are planning to sojourn in, or your orange coat, say, if it is a cooler period or epoch that we are concerned with here) and you should affix the other of said strips to the rear of your bright clothing (same examples as given above – in fact, it should, ideally, be affixed to the same item of bright clothing that the previous strip had been fixed to, and this should be the item of bright clothing that you are actually wearing on the excursion to the road that you have selected as being similar to our investigator’s imagined example (and wouldn’t it have been so much easier if you’d just stuck to that imagined example rather than going through all this rigmarole just so that you can have an actual physical experience of what is going on in his fine mind?), that is, rather than affixing a strip to the front of your group as a whole and one to the rear of your group as a whole, although this would of course serve a similar safety purpose, but only if those people who were at the front and rear of the group when the affixing was taking place remained, for the duration of the excursion, as the front- and back-markers; nor, for extra clarity, does affixing to the rear mean affixing anything to the backside – some in your group may argue that this was what was intended, and they may perhaps argue this as a means of being able to man- or woman-handle other members of the group for their own ends but you should vigorously deny it, saying that that was not what he had meant at all and that if they wanted to do that then they would have to sort out their own excursion, with all of the preparation and reference to source material that that entailed. These preliminaries having been carried out you should be ready, assuming, that is, that you have all, individually, catered for the non-safety issues of the excursion, or those areas at least that are not so directly safety-related, for, it could be argued, that making sure that you are wearing the right footwear is a safety issue in a sense – you could cut your feet if you fail to put on your shoes of course; similarly wearing trousers or a skirt is important, in a sense, for safety reasons – making sure that you are warm enough so that you don’t catch pneumonia (or even just a cold). There are still other aspects of being ready that might, indirectly, be safety-related. For instance there is the issue of personal grooming: many people wouldn’t say they were ready for the excursion unless they had combed their hair; a sub-set of this uncombed-so-unready group would even insist that they were not ready because they hadn’t combed their hair even if it was an excursion in the middle of the night. Similarly with teeth brushing, although not, perhaps, with the caveat about time of day. Are these personal grooming issues also a part of our personal safety? In a sense they are, for in not taking good care of our hair and teeth we risk lice in the first instance (although it is said, not by the lice themselves but by observations of their behaviour presumably, that they prefer people with clean hair) and tooth decay in the second. He couldn’t imagine that the first affliction could be fatal, although if it went on for long enough he thought it could drive you out of your mind, and he could imagine people in purgatory engaged in incessant scratching of the scalp, but he couldn’t imagine what sin would have occasioned it, insufficient personal grooming not being a sin in any religion he was aware of. The second affliction, that of tooth decay, could be fatal, he thought – lack of a means of chewing would surely result eventually in the life force being drained away (although there was always soup, of course) – although not within the period of time it took to embark on, and return from, the excursion to the ‘test road’, as he now thought of it, although it was out of his hands which road you chose – it could be some distance away, in another country even, in which case combing the hair, brushing the teeth (yours and your dependents’)16 and attending to other areas of personal hygiene and grooming would be important – imperative even. All he is thinking is that he will not provide any advice on what constitutes readiness in these areas in the same way that he has given advice on readiness in the areas of bright clothing and reflective strips. The reason that he is not giving such advice is that, although these areas (e.g. personal hygiene and grooming) may pertain to safety, the way in which that safety is potentially jeopardised is much less immediate than in the case of being run over by a combine harvester, say, or other farm or non-farm vehicle, because the driver of that vehicle – the one involved in running you over – had not been able to see you until it was too late, in which case the draining away of the lifeblood might be more or less immediate and Marguerite’s unnamed investigative colleague would feel responsible, even though you had acted simply on a stream of thoughts in his mind that he had not even verbalised but which had
, in some way, entered your own mind as an idea generated by him. He would feel responsible in that scenario; rather he constantly, or as near to constant as is possible for him, feels responsible in thinking what he does (based on this vague incipient notion that somehow, from somewhere, his cognition is being monitored) that people should not get the wrong end of the stick as it is known; people die all the time, but let it not be said that he brought anyone’s death forwards significantly by not just taking an extra moment to define, as precisely as he possibly could, the terms that he was using to express himself during his thought processes.

  Satisfied, at last, that you and your entourage would be prepared for your excursion in the right way (and with all legal disclaimers duly in place: that despite his best efforts he cannot be held responsible for any loss, damage, personal injury… etc etc) then you should set off on that excursion, if you haven’t done so already. On arriving at the road you should make sure that no-one steps into it: remain on the pavement, if there is one; otherwise remain on the sidewalk, if there is one; otherwise find a place of safety, away from the road, where you and your entourage can stand – or sit, if their level of preparedness included bringing with them portable seats; or lie, if they have brought some sort of mat upon which they could do so; and even if they haven’t brought anything to lie or sit on (standing not really requiring any particular piece of equipment to enable it to take place comfortably, notice, at least in many cases) they can sit or lie or stand, whatever they want to do, so long as they are not obstructing the area in which they are standing/sitting/lying, obstructing it, that is, to other people or other creatures (such as farm animals) who wish to either traverse that area, or remain within it for a time, or a combination of the two, even at regular intervals. You may have to find another quiet area of roadside in which to do this – be flexible in your approach whilst ensuring that all of the conditions set out above are adhered to (and even if they are, he cannot take ultimate responsibility for what are, after all, your own independent actions). This period of waiting is included so that you can take in the following passage, just into your mind, that is, without acting upon it, with him not being aware, remember, of how this transfer of thoughts, if that is what it is, can possibly be taking place. Leaving the remaining members of your entourage in the place of safety, look both ways along the road (the ways will be defined shortly – your purpose in being there of course). Having satisfied yourself that there are no vehicles coming then walk out into the middle of the road. If there is a vehicle coming then wait for it to pass and then follow the instructions from the start of the previous sentence. Stand astride the white line in the middle of the road facing in the direction of the white line (either one way or the other, down or up the road – those are the only options). If it is a series of lines like this: - - - - - - - - as may be the case, then choose any line that takes your fancy and stand astride that line. It is best, however, to choose a line that enables your entourage still to see you, in all your bright reflective splendour – in other words, don’t go making a big deal of choosing a line and tearing half way across the countryside (along the test road that is) in doing so. In standing astride, you do not need to strain yourself (and if, contrary to previous instructions you have chosen a road with a central reservation then you should abort immediately, recap on the salient points from earlier and then find another, more suitable road). Remain alert to any vehicles that may be approaching – if you hear or see one then get out of its way as soon and as safely as possible: your enduring presence on this earth is much more important than any silly test demonstration. Then point, with your left hand to the left-hand side of the road and say, as loudly as possible ‘from my point of view’ (an important caveat that, to prevent confusion in any of your viewers) ‘that is the left side of the road’; similarly (having dropped your left hand down to your side, or put it back in your pocket – having brought it, in short, back to rest in roughly the position from which it was called into action) raise your right hand, point at the side of the road to the right of your central axis, and say, more loudly now, ‘from my point of view, this is the right-hand side of the road’. That will be an end of the matter for you, but you may wish to reflect on the original point: that in some states, cars (and all other vehicles) drive on the left-hand side of the road; that is, they travel, in a forwards direction, the way that you are facing, but travelling on the left of the line or series of lines that you are currently standing astride; in other states, cars (etc) travel, in the direction you are facing, but travelling on the right-hand side of the line or series of lines that you are currently standing (don’t sit!) astride. That is all there is to it. You may wish to encourage the rest of your entourage up, one by one, taking all due precautions, to experience this simple insight from their own point of view, that is, standing astride the centre or dashed line of their choosing (they can’t, of course, choose a centre line – there will only be one in that instance), seeing as though they have followed you out there, willingly or otherwise, to take part in this useful demonstration.

  There are exceptions of course: combine harvesters and other very wide vehicles do not travel only on one side the road, they straddle the centre line, much as you have just been doing, at least on the narrower and quieter country roads. But the principle is the same: where they can be accommodated on just one side of the road then they will stay on the side of the road that is the ordained side for travelling in the particular state that they find themselves in. What about roads that do not have any central markings, he wondered to himself (as though waking from a long, but not particularly illuminating dream)? That is a more tricky situation. It requires one to imagine a centre line (which could prove tricky, to his mind, for those difficult, unimaginative people who insisted on actually getting out there, finding an appropriate road, and doing their own demonstration of the issue) and to drive to the left or right of that, according to the custom. The important thing here, if you are driving on such a road, is to ensure that if a vehicle approaches your vehicle but in the opposite direction, that either you ensure, by judgement, that you collectively have room to pass one another on the correct side of each other. And this is a key point – from her point of view she will be driving on the left, if that is the case in that particular state, just as you are driving on the left; similarly with the right; similarly also, in fact, with driving in the centre, although there are no states that he is aware of where the default is driving in the centre – it would not be a state in which the economy would flourish, he ventured, although there are some specific cases – one-way streets for instance – where the intention was that you should drive in the middle of the road, but in that case you would be unlikely to meet a vehicle coming in the opposite direction, at least a vehicle whose driver was acting lawfully, unless, of course you were driving the wrong way down a one-way street, as it is known, in which case you would be acting unlawfully in this, and perhaps other regards – you may have just robbed a bank, for example, in which case you would be acting unlawfully in that regard too, and this might, in fact, have occasioned your driving the wrong way down a one-way street in the first place, as a ‘getaway’, as it is known. Alternatively, if there is no room to pass the oncoming vehicle in the no-line two-way road scenario then you should stop, reverse, and let the other vehicle pass you at a suitable passing point – many narrow roads have passing points just for this purpose, although they may be used for other purposes too, such as parking, which, for those people who want and need to use them as passing places can be highly irritating. The other alternative is that the other driver, having stopped, reverses to his or her nearest (behind him or her) passing place to allow you to pass them. There is room for kindness here, and it brought a warm feeling to his stomach to think of you and the other motorist vying with each other to give way to the other, crunching the gear stick into reverse in your haste to serve, to defer to the other. Common sense should come into it too, however: if you know that there
is not a passing space behind you for some way, or if you have a series of cars or other vehicles behind you then you should perhaps look to the other motorist to reverse; if they are in a similar predicament then they should give way to you if you are a woman and they are a man, and vice versa (and this is not to say anything about men’s and women’s relative capacity for reversing – it is just an echo of a previous chivalric age that our investigator continues to uphold in his mind); if you are both men then work it out amicably between you; if you are both women, simply let the more proficient driver reverse; rather, let the more proficient reversist reverse (that is, just because she’s good at reversing does not mean she is the better driver overall); the driver of the car (or other vehicle) behind her will, we hope, see her ‘reversing lights’ and will select the reverse gear themselves – she will, in short, set up a (probably short) chain reaction which will precipitate a collective reversing to a wide part of the road, the wider portion also being long enough to accommodate all of the vehicles in the reversing column, as we now come to think of it. Then the pleasure of the ritual of thanks: as you pass the line of motorists parked, temporarily we hope, in the passing place, simply raise your hand – either hand (but not both) – to each motorist in turn, as a sign of thanks. In fact you don’t need to raise your hand each time, just keep it raised until you have passed the whole line, then lower it again. Your passengers, front and rear, can do the same if they wish, although it isn’t mandatory. Continue on your way until you meet another vehicle, at which time you may have to go through the whole rigmarole again.

  The point is the same throughout: pass on the left if they drive on the left in that state; on the right if they drive on the right. That is really all there is to it.

  And for those more imaginative souls who have skipped that whole passage – that is, the practical steps – the way to work out which side of the road is which is this: imagine yourself standing in the middle of a road facing along the road in one direction or the other. The area of the road to the left of you is the left-hand side of the road from your point of view whilst the area to the right is the right-hand side of the road, again, from your point of view. It really is as simple as that.