Desmond HenryTREASURE BEACH:
I'M SURE glad as hell, I don't have to thumb a ride on our highways. Judging from what I see, it must be one of the most frustrating (even threatening) past times these days.
Time was, when the practice of begging a ride was far more solicitous, and certainly not nearly as abrasive as it is today. Most of today's ride-beggars would have you think that it is their right to almost highjack you and your car, forgetting that they are the ones asking a favour. Compare the gestures.
In the past, someone begging a drive would at least try to show a demeanour of some penitence. They would respectfully and non-demandingly, point a finger in the going direction indicating by gesture and body language, a sense of civility in the process. Not so anymore.
The entire arm now rises in an abrupt and threatening fashion, resembling that well-known vulgar gesture of 'giving the finger'. Only this time it's the entire arm for you.
Facial gestures follow suit, and they are anything but warm. And if it becomes obvious that you are unlikely to stop, body languages suggest a kind of "how dare you." The moods are abusive.
In all of this, the most susceptible thumbers are young school girls and working women. That's because most of the drivers on rural roads are now young men driving deportee taxis, and not bothering with any other form of life-skills development anymore. The results for the females are almost predictable. Talk now has it, that a new concept in fare exchange is being directed at rural school girls. It is simple.
You can get a free ride in my cab in exchange for a free ride on your body.
The result is that there is now a worrisome growth in the number of teen pregnancies among the rural school population.
Ongoing lament
I have a basic attitude towards civilians begging rides: I don't pick up strangers (man or woman). I make only two exceptions the obvious elderly, and nurses in uniform.
My attitude was never always like this. In previous, safer times I used to enjoy travelling the countrysides, especially on weekends. The chances of picking up pleasant, compatible company were far greater than today; and the prospects of witnessing an engaging rural activity (like a cricket match) were also more likely. On both scores, I now have only a kind of ongoing lament.
In the first place whether by inexplicable design or cruel twists of faith, most of the pleasant fashionable young ladies I past these days, all seem to be on the other side of the road going in the opposite direction.
As for the cricket matches, whenever I pass one in progress it is always at a point between overs, or between batsmen going from, or to the wicket. Never when balls are being bowled, or shots are being made.
And so with that kind of personal luck, coupled with the mood of the times, offering ride is out of the question. Unless of course, I could still be flattered the way a young lady did some long time ago, when I picked her up in the Porus area.
She was attractive and standing alone, and when she got in I was curious to find out what judgements she used in determining whom to ask for a ride. She pointed out that she normally has no more than a split-second in which to make a decision about the person she should ask. "As the car is approaching," she said, "I have to make a quick decision based on how the person looks, how he's dressed and the signals he sends out." Asking if I had personally met those standards would obviously have been superfluous. For her flattery I took her straight to her home, instead of the nearest bus stop.
Which takes me back to where I started. There is not much of a choice for commuters these days. They have to risk their safety between drivers who are leachers; or for drivers, among potential riders who are without grace. What a choice.
Street People
I sincerely hope that the advance newspaper stories about street people being rewarded $20,000 a month, are completely false. Can you imagine the kind of conspiratorial behaviour this could invite among future street dwellers?
But worse than that, there are many senior legitimate public pensioners who do not earn anything near this, after an entire life of productive public service.
THE BOTTOM LINE:
Take time to think. It is the source of power.
Desmond Henry is a marketing strategist based at Treasure Beach, St. Elizabeth.
