Time and Tide, and Something About Train Drivers

They say that time and tide wait for no man. That may be so, but they will each leave their own indelible mark on you as they pass.

Like so many other people, in my youth I had no idea of what I wanted to do with my life, or exactly what I wanted to be. That is neither surprising nor uncommon.

When school guidance counsellors posed that question they invariably referred to the kind of profession or career that one hoped to take up.

That always struck me as an incredibly bleak and narrow way of looking at life — surely the sum total of a person’s life was not simply the job that they were paid to perform? Was that all that would define me?

I fretted over this — as a teenager I had no clear idea of the kind of job that I wanted to do. I knew that I wanted to be happy; to live a life of deep satisfaction. But that was neither a profession nor a job description, so I had no answers the day that I was called into Mr Foley’s office.

I sat there, painfully shy and uncomfortable. Ironically, sitting there that day in the stuffy old school guidance counsellor’s office, being observed disapprovingly over a pair of spectacles perched on the end of his bulbous nose, I came to a realisation of exactly what I didn’t want to be.

Instead I followed my passion. I let the future take care of itself. That wasn’t anywhere near as easy as it sounds — my best efforts were constantly marred by the feeling that I didn’t match up to the expectations of society or of my elders.

I can clearly recall to this day another classroom incident which further served to reinforce this notion.

I still remember a stern and threatening Christian brother publically humiliated Robert Woodcock in the classroom after our meetings with the guidance counsellor.

Robert had apparently confided in crusty old Mr Foley that his dream was to be a train driver. It seems that all of our earnest responses were then dutifully reported to the junior school Headmaster by the balding old counsellor.

‘A train driver?’ stormed Brother Fitzgerald in front of all of us. ‘Son, your parents didn’t spend thousands of dollars to put you through a private school for you to become a train driver!’

I did my best to shake off the feeling that I in turn didn’t make the grade. But I kept quietly following my passion.

One such passion was music. I loved singing and music for me was joyous expression. I revelled in it. I formed a band and sang. Very badly. My parents constantly chided me: “Why are you wasting your time playing in a band?

Wasting my time? Perspective is a funny thing — my reality was that I was filling my time with something that inspired me and filled me with great joy. With deep satisfaction.

And yet, their constant voiced disapproval coloured what I did. It put a damper on my joy. Painfully self-conscious I limped my way through rehearsal after rehearsal. But I kept following my passion, and my drive made me better.

I’m looking at an old newspaper clipping of an interview I did as a budding young lead vocalist with my first band.

The article is an eminently forgettable and cringe-worthy small town parody of the ‘big-time’ rock music magazines like Rolling Stone; replete with the string of stereotypical questions — favourite movie…favourite colour…ending with the loftily posed question of long term goals and ambitions.

My naively earnest response to that was simply: ‘To look back at my life with no regrets’. There it is, faithfully reported and scribed in newsprint for all time, so it must be true. I see my favourite colour was blue even back then, by the way! I was twenty-two years old.

I still weathered a barrage of slanted comments, even outright pleas from my family to put my time to better use. A couple of years later my band was supporting acts of the calibre of INXS.

I went on to do studio recordings and session work for other bands. My passion for music has remained with me all my life. Not so long ago Angry Anderson phoned me to discuss a music project — my band FreedomBLUE — a talented bunch of musos I was working with to raise awareness for conservation issues.

Similarly other passions followed through the years, and a simple pattern revealed itself. Without fanfare, I just followed my dreams and my passions, even in the face of criticism or derision.

I discovered there are many ‘armchair experts’ who will gladly tell you what you’re doing wrong and why you will fail. Don’t get me wrong; not every idea was successful. There are many stories, many adventures and many misadventures to be told.

Let me go back to my boldly proclaimed goal, way back there at age twenty-two: ‘To look back at my life with no regrets’.

In hindsight, one could excuse my youthful exuberance for this lofty, somewhat grandiose response. But all these years later, it poses for me something of an interesting question.

How exactly does one lead a life without regrets? Is there some sort of a magic recipe? Looking back at the path I have taken, I believe that one important ingredient is to make a practice of following one’s heart and one’s passion.

But there is a little more to it than that. To live with passion implies some degree of risk and impulse; it smacks of the notion of occasionally sailing close to the wind. And to do that is to risk mistakes or the authoring of wrong choices and failure.

Surely that must open oneself to the very real consequence of regret? So here’s the thing about failure; about making a wrong choice. Somehow you have to learn not to fear failure.

That is harder than it sounds; schooling, upbringing and society all wire us to view failure and the making of mistakes as a negative. As a point of humiliation or shame.

So here’s the thing — don’t fear failure or rejection. Don’t be afraid or ashamed of falling over, or falling off. Or saying the wrong thing, or singing a bum note. Of being told she likes you, but only as a friend. Or being told you’re not right for the job. It is all part of the ride.

Oh, and those ‘armchair experts’? They’re often the ones who have done nothing with their own lives.

I have made mistakes, as have we all. Looking back I can see, with a hindsight tempered by age and wisdom, how I could have handled situations better. What I might do differently if I ever got hold of that damn time machine. Yet I observe all that with no real sense of regret.

Diverse as my life has been, I can clearly see a common thread weaving through it all. Whether it was standing on a stage singing with a band, or flying a plane, or kayaking in the wilderness — one singular notion underpins all that I have done. Freedom.

The notion of freedom and the concept of being true to oneself seem to be intimately connected. You would likely think that the concept of freedom needs no explanation; surely it is a fundamental right that we reserve and demand for ourselves.

Everyone knows what freedom is. But do they really? History is replete with references to individual and collective battles fought over freedom — it is a right that we will fight and die to uphold.

But these are rights which are accorded to us — the right to free speech; the right to equality regardless of our colour, creed or religion; the right to choose our sexuality. These are freedoms that we expect for ourselves, which are allowed us by others.

When speaking of freedom in terms of the life led with no regret, I would suggest this definition: ‘Freedom is the possession of Oneself.’

Let that thought sink in for a moment — possessing oneself. Owning who you are and what you do. This to me lies at the beating heart of true freedom — it implies coming from a place of peace with Oneself; of loving and accepting yourself unconditionally.

Did I love and accept myself unconditionally when I sat in stuffy old Mr Foley’s office? No. In truth it has taken a lifetime of following heart and dreams, and I still can’t rightly say I have even now fully arrived at that point of freedom.

The more that I learn about it though, the more I have learned that when you approach this freedom — of possessing oneself — you also realise that it similarly does not allow for the possession of others.

That includes our fellow man and includes all the life forms that we co-habit with on planet Earth.

So I seem naturally driven to fight for the freedom of others, both human and non-human. Perhaps that sensibility derives directly from the act of freeing myself. Whatever the reason, that is my calling.

I’m not sure I can put that into words as a job description for the benefit of a school guidance counsellor. But to be honest, I don’t really care.

I never did find out whether Robert Woodcock became a train driver. But I would be overjoyed if he did.