CROSSING THE LINE

About a mile from home I pull up behind a slow moving vehicle with flashing lights and black and yellow chevrons. Assuming it’s a street cleaner I weave a little with view to overtaking. Unexpectedly, an arm extends out of the offside window and flaps wildly. It’s a signal I vaguely remember from my driving test days back in the eighties, but I can’t remember what it means. It’s charmingly manual, presumably deriving from a time before light bulbs, and reminds me of when driving was still unpredictable and full of mystery. Rather than something that just happens when you’re between places, as it is now.

I cross once again over the crown of the road and the arm flapping changes into something a little more erratic, as if the driver is attempting to slap the side of his truck immediately behind the window. I wonder whether he’s having some kind of fit and signalling for help.

I pull in closer behind and swing out again in an effort to understand what’s going on. That’s when I notice the second vehicle in front, a kind of small yellow steam-driven contraption - like a roller, but I can’t see what it’s rolling. Is this what it’s all about - a roller in transit between jobs? Surely they’d put it on a truck wouldn’t they? Unless I’ve happened upon the world record breaking Endurance Rolling Team in the process of completing the Scottish leg of its round the world endurance rolling attempt. I suppose I’m honoured to be delayed by such an heroic undertaking. 

But I’d still rather get home, so after the next bend I throttle hard and, with a jaunty toot and a friendly wave, surge past both vehicles. I catch a glimpse of the truck driver who seems to be shouting something out of his open window. No doubt an apology for the inconvenience caused.

Twenty minutes later I’m in the driveway trying to chip the thick white paint off my tyres with a screwdriver.  It never occurred to me that people painted white lines on roads when anyone else was about. Without telling them. The white goo is becoming stiffer by the minute, and I chip away with increased vigour, afraid that at some indeterminate point in the future it will become permanent. I’m in new territory here and have no clue about the properties of this substance. Other than that when you put it on a road it stays there a very long time. Which suggests that if you put it on a car it won’t be going anywhere fast. Other than where the car’s going of course.

I’m also a little worried about where this little incident leaves me from a legal perspective - am I a criminal or a victim? Can I sue the highways division for ruining my tyres, or can they sue me for ruining their road? It’s all very unsettling and, I feel, unjust. Because, thinking about it, I can’t see what I could possibly have done to prevent this happening. I mean how was it possible to overtake the truck without driving over the still-wet paint? What other option was there? Just crawl along behind until they ran out of paint? Or pull over obediently and wait until the paint was dry? But how long does that take? And by that time the trucks would presumably be gone anyway and there’d be nothing left to overtake. 

"You’ll have to drive forward a bit to get at the bits underneath," offers my wife, crouching down with a cup of tea.

"Don’t you think I know that," I snap. "I’m not that stupid…!"

She takes a look at the white paint chippings all over the drive and shoots me a glance that says 'it takes a very special kind of stupid to drive all over wet paint without even noticing' and leaves.

“I’m sorry,” I call after her. “It’s all just so bloody unfair!”

“Deal with it…” The back door slams.

And so I continue dealing with it, chipping away as the gloom thickens, the paint now brittle and unyielding. The cat shows up and sniffs the paint remnants in the gravel. I shove him away. I’m not a great fan of the cat at the best of times. Something about the way he has of introducing himself into any given situation without contributing anything to it. Other than something to trip over. And anyway, I’ve more to worry about now than the toxicity of road paint to small mammals. 

By the time I’m done the mysterious birds up the hill that squawk only at night have woken up and are squawking mysteriously. It transpires that chipping paint off car wheels requires a very particular set of muscles, and mine are woefully out of shape. Understandably. I straighten up slowly and painfully, throw what’s left of the tea in the direction of the mysterious squawkers, and head inside.

The following morning I drive back along the same road and notice the broken white arches feathered across the tarmac. Tangible evidence of my special kind of stupid, there in black and white (mainly white) for all to see. The trauma of the previous evening floods back, like someone who dreamt they killed someone and woke up to find a corpse cemented into their driveway. I feel marked for life, condemned to an eternity of guilt and fear of apprehension. Will they be able to trace my car from the tyre marks? Is it only a matter of time before there’s a knock on the door and I’m bundled into the back of van.

"Daddy’s done some bad things to the road kids…”

I consider the need to find a new route to work. Or possibly a new home. Somewhere at the end of a road untarnished by idiocy. If such a place exists. Does anyone travel this far, I wonder, without looking back with regret? 

Over the weeks and months the anxiety subsides but the white lines remain. And, to be honest, I’ll be sad to see them go. They’ve become a part of me, no longer an emblem of foolishness, but a mark of distinction. Now I celebrate the role I played in decorating the A823 west of Muckhart, and point them out to passengers. “Look,” I say. "I did those, with no prior training, and using nothing more than an everyday Mini Countryman.” 

And, after all, if you’re going to make a ridiculous mistake, it’s best to make one you can keep an eye on. It may be permanent, but at least it’s not going to get any worse. And I know exactly where it is. Not like one of those sneaky mistakes you don’t know you've made, that lurk beneath the surface, controlling and unseen. This one I look at twice a day, and I look forward to it. 

It’s not hard to find, my mistake, just across from the parking spot next to the reservoir. Come and have a look sometime. You can park up and get a good view without even having to leave your car. But don’t worry if you can’t make it. I’m going to get some limited edition prints made up, and possibly T-shirts. Because, if you think about it, there aren’t that many examples of improvisational road markings out there. I mean how often do the official white lining people hand over their kit to total amateurs and say - 'here, have a go'? As far as I know, road art has not yet been invented. But this could be the beginning.

And like all great art, I like to think that my white lines speak of a profound and enduring truth. Of course, you could accuse me of overthinking it, but what are white lines other than the boundaries of a prison in which we scurry to and fro like hapless hamsters? Do they not preside over a devilish apartheid, denying us communion with our fellow counter-directional travellers? And don't we all burn away our lives, along with our hydrocarbons, staying meekly on the right side of them, without even daring to thinking that perhaps - just perhaps - each and every one of us has the power to move them.

Or perhaps they just tell us I'm incredibly, and indelibly, stupid.

Epilogue

The safe distance (sd) between a white lining appliance and support truck (i.e. that which prevents overtaking vehicles under the control of imbeciles encountering wet paint) is a product of the speed (s) divided by 60 multiplied by the drying time of the paint (dt). Therefore it can be seen that for a convoy travelling at a speed (s) of 10mph with a paint drying time (dt) of 10 minutes the minimum length of the convoy (sd) is 1.67 miles. However, if said convoy insists on only being 0.012 miles (20 metres) long (d), as it stupidly does, it must assume a speed (s) of no more that 0.15 mph or deploy paint with a drying time (dt) of no more than 4.4 seconds. 

Or better still, get the hell off the road until everyone else is asleep.

@jesoverthinksit