We hop on a bus. It’s moderately full. We stand downstairs, next to the doors. The bus pulls off and I study her from the side without her noticing it. In a Sunday newspaper style magazine that I read recently, there was a piece by a woman writer about ‘the ten things women really want from a man’. These ten things were contrasted with the ‘11 myths about what women want’. I read both lists closely, having no idea either about the myth or the reality, even at my age.
It is a myth, she claimed, for example, that women like their men to take a serious interest in what they wear. They don’t, apparently. ‘We want you to say, “That’s new. You look fantastic,” not have an opinion,’ she said.
We are at that early stage of a relationship where I am astonished to see her wearing clothes, any kind of clothes at all. And as the bus lurches and kangaroos from one red light to another, I silently study hers with the curiosity and wonder of an aboriginal from a hitherto undiscovered tribe encountering a fully clothed individual for the first time.
While the bus is briefly motionless at a bus stop, she moves forward to consult with the driver about his route. The driver answers conscientiously and at length, entailing a small delay. Some of the information he gives isn’t clear to her, and she asks for a restatement and clarification, which the driver patiently supplies, extending the delay by perhaps a further 10 to 15 seconds. She thanks him and makes her way back to the standing area.
Seated close to the front of the bus is this Valkyrie-type woman. Her heavy make-up and thick blonde plaits suggest a frantic fanning of the dying embers of her former youthful beauty. She’s built like an ox. Seen from behind, the rigidity of her seated posture adds to the impression of a formidable determination allied to a fixed outlook.
As my new bird returns to her place in the standing area, the Valkyrie swivels her massive blonde head to the side and hisses an imprecation at her for the delay to our progress. The accent is Slavic.
The imprecation stops her in her tracks. ‘What!’ she exclaims. She’s amused at first, then astonished, then angry. ‘How dare you!’ she says to the Valkyrie. ‘So you’ve been slightly delayed! And clearly such an important person, too! My God! Are you being met at the other end? Are they sending someone?’ Then she takes a step back, to take in the whole, compared with which she is only about half the size. ‘A forked lift truck, is it? And a specialist team of social workers?’
The Valkyrie cannot fully take in the depth of the rudeness at first. She yells back that she hasn’t got all day to wait for people who don’t know where they’re going. ‘Or are you a bearded lady in a circus?’ adds my bird. ‘And late for a performance?’ Then she continues on back to the standing area, showing only the mildest signs of amusement at the encounter. It’s not even significant or unusual enough for her to comment on. She’s a tough one, all right. I can see I’m going to have my work cut out.
But the Valkyrie’s determined mind has been dwelling on the comments directed at her. Now she’s spitting feathers. She stands up and shouts, ‘If you weren’t such an old woman, I’d come back there and teach you a lesson.’ A collective groan issues from the lower-deck passengers at this unexpected resumption of hostilities. ‘And you’d do what, exactly?’ my new bird replies.
I look at her. She’s asking the question in a spirit of enquiry, good humour and hopefulness. She is utterly calm and composed. She is one of those exceptional people, clearly, whose minds, in the thick of a battle, become more tranquil, not less.
Another of the ‘11 myths about what women want’ was that women like men to get into fights for them. ‘No,’ declared the writer. ‘But there with the crushing put-down? Oh, yes, please.’ But I get no sense, here, of being tacitly enlisted on her side. She doesn’t need me. All the same, I prepare to get between them and push them apart. I have a mental image of a sticker given to me in my Sunday school days, of a sweaty Samson pushing apart the massive stone pillars of the Temple, with lumps of masonry falling all about him. ‘So come on then!’ she says, smiling eagerly at the Valkyrie. ‘We haven’t got all day, you know!’
I close my eyes and bow my head, lightly supporting my brow with the tips of my fingers. I’m going out with a warrior, it appears.
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