Yet again I was stymied in my ongoing struggle to gain legitimate experience in driving from Point A to Point B in and around the city of Boston. For the however manyth time, I got absurdly lost driving children from my school to an activity off campus.
Bad Omen # 1 came that morning when the brother-sister co-res. life directors turned to each other, asking "is it starting?" in reference to the Durango keys she just placed in my hands. Let it be noted that as of late my confidence had been relatively higher in my vehicular adventures, partly because of the GPS my father gave me, and also that, albeit slowly, I was learning the area.
The two kids and I jumped in the SUV and were off on our way towards Boston. Bad Omen # 2, one I should've recognized and learned from courtesy of MisDirection, was leaving campus with a cryptic set of handwritten directions on the back of the actual directions and no general idea of where I was going. The end is always scrawled with the normally easier-said-than-done phrase "Just look for signs."
These kids were in for a treat.
So an hour and 40 minutes after leaving we arrived at our destination, the U.S.S. Constitution. The oldest commissioned ship in the world, 'Old Ironside' (211 years old) floats comfortably in the Boston harbor, nestled within walking distance of the North End, Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall.
As my luck would have it, we missed the 11:00 tour, even though we were there 20 minutes prior. I neglected to inquire whether the tour started at--where I thought the most likely place--the museum, not at the actual ship docked 100 very cold yards away. We hustled to the frigate, went through the airport-like security and went to stand on the deck for five minutes. Realizing the two middle-schoolers would succumb to hypothermia if we waited the 20 minutes for the next tour, we shuffled to the visitor's center to thaw. Interest was waning, but the time passed quickly and we once again bundled up to head back onto the ship. Unbeknownst to me or the residential life directors, the Constitution was undergoing massive construction. The masts lay on the dock like enormous TV antennas as a roof-like structure was being fixed onto the deck. Wood chips, circular saws and 'No Trespass' tape littered the historical monument. This naval senior citizen was now as glamorous as the skeletal structure of a new condo development. Our tour guide, an active duty communications specialist, led us from the gun deck down to the sleeping quarters and back up to the gun deck. That was it. All this aforementioned hype ended in a disheartening, bitterly cold 20 minutes. I've had longer bowel movements.
But going on principal, the Constitution was the "you can't miss going to this Boston historical fixture!" place that I spent over an hour driving in some moronic loop that brought me to within a mile of school before turning around to drive another 13 in freezing cold weather with two kids, one of them who had visited it before and the other being a Korean 10 year-old who could give less of a shit about seeing some old boat. And that's all it really is, a fucking sailboat in Boston harbor.
So this is how the tour went in just about exacting detail:
Upon first heading down below, I couldn't breath because one of the 40 high school kids also on tour broke wind and once we headed down another level to the sleeping quarters, I not only couldn't breath, but soon thereafter developed scoliosis from the five foot ceilings. She mentioned how the officers and the sailors slept together and that Marines were in the way or something like that and then the group headed back up to the gun deck. This was the peak construction hour, because saws were busy sawing, drills were busy loudly drilling and hammers were hitting the shit out of something mere feet from the tour group. The excitement was palpable. She mentioned some stuff about why it was called 'Old Ironsides', tried to recite a poem about the ship and probably mentioned why there was construction, but kept being interrupted by the noise. (I'm guessing the renovation is part of the decades long effort to de-gay after the not so flattering endorsement song "In the Navy" released by the Village People). But it was far too loud to understand her even though she was all but 10 feet from me.
There you have it. A breathtaking voyage into America's maritime history boiled down to not listening to our probably insightful tour guide because some schmuck with a high-powered drill was busy penetrating the wood of the ship for some unknown reason. $7 suggested donation, my ass. I wanted to to go back to the museum and break the plexiglass to get back every dollar I shoved in there, even if it was the school's.
At the end of the tour it was 12:10 and we had to get back to school for lunch at half past. I legitimately knew how to get back so I was 93-North and the Mass Pike away from school. I paid the parking fee, saddled up the Durango, put the key in the ignition and...
Nothing.
I couldn't even turn the key. You've got to be shitting me, Durango.
It wasn't.
I had to ask the garage attendant to get his Black & Decker 'Shitty Kar Kit' to jump the defunct SUV back to life as the two kids sat there, frozen and bewildered that so many awful things could happen to them in one morning.
Of the laundry list of unbelievable shit that had already happened to me as a grown-up, this was a blip on the radar screen, but it still amazes me that it continues to happen. Maybe this is telling me I shouldn't be in education, or maybe it's God playing an elaborate prank on me because I quit CCD, or maybe it's some invisible force fervently shoving me away from a career as a cab driver or trucker.
Or who knows...it could be just because I'm a moron.
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