A Break With The Past
My ten year old son broke his arm a couple of weeks ago. He was trying to reach the top of the school goal-posts, mis-timed his jump and fell in a twisted heap. I was in Glasgow at the time, waiting to be interviewed by Herald journalist Anne Simpson, but I felt a million miles away. I felt, in fact, like that Dad-With-His-Priorities-All-Wrong character that seems to crop up in fifty percent of the movies I see with my family. You know those films where the Career Dad has to make a decision between his kids or his boss and chooses his kids? But it all works out right in the end, because the Boss, too, has an epiphany and actually hands over his entire company to the Dad-Who-Did-The-Right-Thing.
Now, I don't think I said any of this to Anne Simpson. We were talking mainly about the new batch of dramas coming to ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio Scotland next year, but my mind was elsewhere.
In fact my mind had drifted back to that day, forty years ago, when my sister pushed me off a low wall and I fell badly and broke my own left arm. The pain was horrific (well, I was only four) and then I was taken to Glasgow Royal Infirmary where I had to stay in overnight! Apparently the break was so bad that they had to re-break and re-set it and this required expert handling by the muscle-bound morning staff.
So I knew what my son was going through but... I wasn't there. I eventually spoke to him on the phone and promised him, as a special treat, a trip to the cinema when I got back to Inverness. I must have been looking forward to that more than him but, in the meantime, he got a better offer from a school-mate and I was told to stand down.
You see, this is what happens when you don't have your priorties right. Do you think my boss would understand?
