Elizabeth Taylor and I have so much in common. The double rows of eyelashes. The multiple marriages. The millions in jewels. All right. That last one is bullshit. But here’s a true third similarity: Elizabeth and I are notoriously late for everything. I’m so going to copy Ms. Taylor’s last wish too. She had her burial service start 15 minutes before her remains arrived, so that she’d even be tardy to her funeral. God, I love that.
My lack of punctuality goes back a long, long way. I’m pretty sure that I grabbed the inner walls of my mother’s uterus so that I wouldn’t pop out, and she could stop and have Salisbury steak for lunch at the S & S Cafeteria on the way to the delivery ward. After her gyno told her that she was already dilated and needed to hoof it to the hospital, she made it clear to anyone in a twelve mile radius that she was starving and that the medical staff wouldn’t let her eat once she arrived. God knows I always wanted to do every fucking thing in my power to make sure my mother was happy. So I latched onto some womb and racked up my first tardy.
In elementary school, my daddy actually drove out of the driveway and left my ass because my slothful morning routine kept making him late for work. And my daddy hates, hates, hates being one nanosecond late for anything. He warned and scolded and pleaded and threatened. And then he made good on his promise. I was horrified for about no minutes before I realized that I’d have the house and the television (tuned to cartoons) all to myself for the day. I had just settled into the recliner as Josie and the Pussycats started, and I’d almost gotten the spoonful of Lucky Charms ® to my lips when Daddy came back to get me. Damn his heart of gold. Fuck his guilty conscience. I just know that ten hours of T.V. watching and junk food would have taught me a lesson for sure. Alas.
In high school, Mrs. Cherry, my homeroom teacher finally wrote me up and sent me to the principal’s office after my 52nd tardy. Yes. 52. It was nearly the end of my junior year, and the only reason I didn’t have over 100 tardies is because most of the time, I’d pull into the senior parking lot—which was right outside my homeroom windows—and park illegally in a fire zone, rush into the room as the bell was ringing, and then make up some creative excuse for why I had to run an errand. Then I’d move my car over to the proper parking lot across the street and amble back over just in time to be late for first period.
When I meandered to the principal’s office that morning, it was my first-ever visit as I was a classic over-achiever and had never been in an ounce of trouble in my life. Fortunately the head-asshole wasn’t in, so I had to see the assistant principal. Things started awkwardly as my skirt got caught on the edge of his desk, and he had to come around and release me. His laughing at my expense did not help. Then he assigned me one afternoon of detention. One. I scooted into the detention room after school that day…late. There wasn’t even a monitor in the room, and my mom came to pick me up, so the two of us sat in there chatting up all the losers and then cut out early after 15 minutes. So much for my second chance for a life-changing lesson.
I got into mucho hot water during my first teaching tenure because I could not get my sorry ass to work on time. And I was incredibly immature about the whole thing. I just couldn’t understand why everyone had to ride me about being on time and why it mattered in the first damned place. It wasn’t like I purposely overslept or took too long to get dressed or drove the long way. If I rolled out of bed three hours before my usual wake-up time, it would be the very day that my dog had massive diarrhea, which would take me three hours and fifteen minutes to clean up. No one at work gave a shit about my best intentions.
I think the moment that finally made me actually work towards getting places on time was one morning when I was supposed to pick up my priest’s wife to go to a meeting at the Diocese of Atlanta. I was running late, and I called her and made up some crap about being “almost there.” But then my car wouldn’t start, and I had to call Mrs. Holy back and explain that I’d never even left my driveway and that I had lied to her and that she had to come pick me up, which would make us late for the meeting. Shit. It was so chilly in her car on the trip that we didn’t even need the AC.
I have gotten better over the years, especially when it comes to being punctual for work. But I still have my promptness issues when I am scheduled to meet someone for a social occasion. I was supposed to meet my best friend, Lisa, for lunch at 12:30 a couple of weeks ago, and I woke up at 12:20. I actually get all bent out of shape and frantic when I realize that I am going to hold someone else up now. But apparently that isn’t good enough. My darling friend wasn’t even really mad, but I wouldn’t blame her if she quit speaking to me.
And that same damned week, I made a date to meet another Lisa, one of my dearest buddies from high school, for lunch. We hadn’t seen each other in 30 years, and when I walked in late, she said, “Well. If you had been on time, you wouldn’t be you.” Damn! I wanted to explain that I’m not always late anymore, that I really have grown up a little, that I am not as rude and inconsiderate as I used to be. But people hate excuses almost as much as they hate folks being late. I’ll just pretend that my unpunctuality is one of my endearing qualities. And no matter what anyone says, I am still going to do my best to be late for my funeral.
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