Blind Terror

• 4:30 sharp: Wide awake yet again after vivid dreams of getting into a car and losing control and hitting some children, and of meeting with my high-school acquaintance Mabbie and having her turn Syd against me.
• 4:31: Brain circuits fully firing with anxious thoughts: how will I negotiate the wild streets of Auckland in a car in four hours? How will I find my way out? How will I avoid hitting children?
• 4:35: Down the cold hallway to the bathroom.
• 5:30: I have risen.
• 5:31: No tea or coffee in the kitchen. A glass of tepid water and half a dried cheese muffin doesn’t quite cut the mustard.
• 6:00: Dressed. My pants are getting bigger. I weigh 54 kilos.

• 7:45 (now): Having a latte in a cafe, wishing I knew how to accent my e’s on an iPad.

A question for my mother: can a bird catcall? That’s what I heard in my predawn walk just now.

I’ve been inexplicably disinterested in where I’m going next, and am oblivious as to why I’m even going there. Come to think of it, where am I going? Give me a minute. Okay: Whangaroa (remember I taught you how to pronounce that) Harbour, about four hours north of here. Why am I going there? I don’t know. The good thing about having someone with me is that the burden of making plans doesn’t rest fully on my shoulders. The bad thing is that I’m not nearly as engaged as I would be, had I to be on my own. Last night on the ferry I asked Syd not to say a word about how to find out way home because I really want to try to do that on my own. She agreed, and almost succeeded. I told her this trip is, in part, about rebuilding my confidence in being self-sufficient, and I don’t want anyone to help me too much.

. . .

Now it’s the end of the day. I’m in Kahoe, 12 kilometers north of Kaeo. Talk about confusing. Anyway, it’s about 4 hours north of Auckland. We’re at a great little B&B called Kahoe Farm. This is what it looks like.

People told me this trip was good for me because it gets me out of my comfort zone. Comfort zone, schmomfort zone, as aforementioned Mom would say. Let’s talk more about terror zone. Scottie, proprietor of Scottie’s Car Rentals, picked us up at 8:30 at our hostel in an old Mazda which is to be our car for the next month. We filled out the paperwork. I’d lost my driver’s license but he didn’t seem to care. I cared, and found it later. I would rather jump out a plane once a day for the next year than to have to pull into Auckland traffic. Now, I’m not saying that I would have done any differently, or that it wasn’t warranted, but when Syd shrieked loudly only seconds after I pulled into Auckland traffic, I thought I was about to collide with someone and my heart nearly jumped out of my mouth. In fact, I’d missed the first turn. I told her more firmly than I usually do not to scream any more, at least not unless I was about to kill us or someone else. I do not envy her position. Being a passenger in a car piloted by someone who is in the throes of a full-blown terror attack is not a piece of cake. To her credit, she interspersed her driving suggestions with praise. For three-and-a-half hours I white-knuckled my way up north. Every time I turned the car, I turned on the windshield wiper instead of the turn signal. The sun was directly in my eyes the whole way, so while trying to pilot the car clear of other traffic and the ditch, I was slapping the controls and swinging the sun visor down and to the side and up and sideways. Though I couldn’t see my face, I imagine I looked rather like the captain of a crashing 747. The worst part is, it’s not over. I have to do this every day for 28 more. So concentrated was I on the road that I couldn’t begin to tell you what kind of scenery we went through, which sort of defeats the purpose of driving through scenery. Later in the day, after we landed at our countryside B&B, Syd took a turn, and I’m not going to say that I felt any better about that. I could hardly be a hypocrite and issue blood-curdling screams, so I tried as much as possible to keep my criticism soft and sweet, but my left hand was clasped to the door handle as white-knuckled as it had been on the wheel. I hope this part gets easier. Last time I drove on the opposite side of the road, it was much easier. My brain was more facile in the act of mirroring at 100 kilometers per hour, with projectiles coming at me from all sides.

I’m going to try not to make the remainder of this blog a story about my intense fear of driving.

The main event of today was a visit to the little beach at Taupo Bay, which was very pretty.

And this:

The owner of tonight’s B&B  has been incredibly helpful, and her husband made us a fabulous fresh pasta dinner. We are the only guests here tonight, and are sitting in the kitchen at a giant table with a fire at my back. It’s the first time I’ve been warm since I’ve been here.