Day Late & Sorry

She was always a day late and a dollar sorry. Julie wasn’t sure who said it first but it definitely applied to her.

She could run fast in third grade, but was the last pick to play soccer after classmates saw her kicking too late, missing the ball altogether.

She could jump high, and run fast but no one wanted her on the basketball team, throwing the ball after a foul.

she could swim a mile and was on the swim team but became the “towel girl” after missing the start of several races, standing on the platform while others were swimming laps.

She was a strong tennis player but only played for “warm ups”, too early at the net or too late at the back of the court.

Julie switched her attention to music, but her lack of timing was even more noticeable, an extra note here or there, or missing notes altogether when she rushed to catch up.

Desperate to be an accomplished pianist she practiced for hours, with her family laughing in the next room. They asked her to play the clarinet in the garage.

The metronome ticked a steady beat that Julie could not grasp. Fast notes, slow notes, sound came out of the piano, clarinet or violin, but no “music” was ever made. Mrs. Wade the piano teacher closed the lid over the keys and told Julie to go home.

She joined the choir, with a beautiful voice, but had to quit when she couldn’t keep up or jumped in too fast to sing a chorus, everyone turning in her direction at the mistake.

”Don’t you hear the beat”? the teacher asked. “No.” was the answer.

The girl took up dancing: she went to folk dances, tried ballet, jazz, modern, and the tango, she loved the tango. “Dancing with you is like driving a truck.” her partner said leaving her in tears. “Maybe a truck is easier!”

”You have to move with the music, not against it.” the instructor said, trying to show her the steps to the foxtrot. “You have no sense of timing whatsoever. I suggest you pick up a solitary interest.”

“Face it lady you got no rhythm.” one of the kids break dancing outside the dance studio jeered.

She faced a harsh reality she didn’t have rhythm, couldn’t hear a beat, had poor timing, and some days just couldn’t move at all. Inertia crept in to her life and made her watch from the sidelines, stay on the perimeter, peer from the edges.

Julie tried hard to think of solitary activities to pursue. She made cookies in the kitchen, she climbed high in trees, fed babie rabbits in the barn, pet the calves at the farm across the street, collected leaves and skied deep into the woods by herself.

“Face it, not all of us are team players. I wasn’t one.” her father reassured her it’s ok to be good all by yourself.

”You’ve always been a day late and a dollar sorry.” her mother said and gave her a set of pastels and a sketchbook, a notebook and a new pen.

Julie sketched and painted for hours with no one commenting or complaining, she wrote ten pages a day just to see the blue ink fill a page.

The town librarian was the real lifesaver, and helped her choose books in the adult section.”Don’t worry about what the other kids are reading.” Julie read the entire encyclopedia. Her parents bought another, different encyclopedia for her to read.

While her sister spent her Saturdays on the phone looking for friends who would come to play, Julie slept in late, wrote letters to Lassie, Stonehenge tour guides and Cambell’s soup. The Gilman paper company sent a team of paper to all her class

”We have a writer in the class!” a teacher yelled, jumping to his feet waving a thirty page term paper. “You win for having more words than anybody.”

Julie wrote letters and essays, poetry and jingles, short stories and criticism. She wrote speeches and plays. The kid finally found her niche, but she was always “a day late and a dollar sorry” arriving at the theater after the doors closed, at the bank driving as the shade was being pulled down and the tellers turned off the lights.

Being slow to react and having bad timing made Julie very philosophical. If a door is closed it’s not meant to be opened or she’d change direction, almost as if someone was directing her path. While some would kick the door or swear at a late train Julie wondered what disaster she was avoiding by not being punctual, what bridge was collapsing while she was tied up in traffic. She learned not to rush. She learned to be slow, to watch, to wait: like the salamander laying perfectly still playing dead under a rock.

life is different in the slow lane. It’s not better or worse it’s just different. She could point fingers at people who were impatient, who were sloppy or made mistakes in their haste. She didn’t jump to conclusions or end stories before the plot evolved.

”You listen to the beat of a different drummer.” a professor said looking at 5 rolls of photos. Other classmates submitted one or two shots to her abundance. “You either get the shot when you take the photo or you don’t, it’s not something you can fix developing the photo. That’s the most important thing about photography and you’ve learned it. You can’t rush a good photo.

”Hurry, you’ll be late, you’ll miss this or that.” were words that rang in her ears her whole life,.A turtle probably hears that too. There is no doubt she had missed plenty of opportunities and would miss plenty more not able to move faster, not grabbing the carousel ring or even seeing it.

it was ok to be different. Given a different life she’d like to try to be quick to have quick reflexes, to be first in line instead of bringing up the rear, Never on any team, she might try one, but in this life, she’d always be “A day late and a dollar sorry.”

Everyone is unique, you can’t download skills onto another. Julie ran with what she was good at and didn’t worry for the skills she lacked. Rich in honesty and integrity, hardworking and resourceful, she’d look for the key to that door.