The Lunch Box

My father likes to tell the story of my first day at school. (It is determined, by the unpredictable and sometimes cruel twisting of our fates, that good things - even the very good things - do not always last. And so it has been with the love that once defined us, as father and son. To wit, as a young boy, I would take up a position at the big front window and occupy myself with the sensation of expectancy and surety of a schedule always kept. My father was a reliable man; champion of neither deviation, nor surprise, he left the house at precisely six o’clock in the morning, and arrived, barring vehicular annoyance - which he seemed most adept at avoiding - almost as precisely, between twenty and twenty-five minutes past four in the afternoon.

On winter afternoons especially, my memories of the daily vigil are suffused with the teasing aromas of home-fried chips or ham croquettes - hardy English fare to match the rigour of the cold and damp environs. I would sit on the register nearest the window until the heat seared through my pants and threatened my skin, seeking out the headlights from the north end of our street, knowing that his would inevitably appear, my young mind synthesizing all I knew of dimensions and usual speed, and puzzling these clues against the truer indication of the mantle clock - these ones look right, but too early; or these ones are travelling much too fast, and so on. The false leads held little appeal for me, I did not wonder at their occupants or their destinations, or whether their arrival was so closely watched for from another glowing, picture-windowed home. My pre-occupation was whole.

My father arrived to the sight and chatter of a sentinel whose demeanour reflected the vigilance of yet another fruitful watch. I clearly remember the broad smile - the recognition of this daily sentiment - and his hand, impossibly big, resting on my head, as he relinquished his lunch box to my service for the walk up to the front door. Even divested of its culinary payload, the lunch box imposed on me as would have a small suitcase; the big empty thermos clunked heavily against the bowels, menacing the rhythm of my step. Before I was old enough to manage the lunch pail, I simply leapt into his arms; scratchy, mustachioed kisses equally thrilling and paining me for my gatekeeping commitments.

Sometimes my father would produce a stick of gum, or some other from a variety of sweets, from the chest pocket of his work shirt. But this is rather just a pleasant detail of the memory, as is the heady fragrance of electrical smoke and hot steel that clung to his clothes and his skin. The temper of our daily ritual - sheer joy, sheer love - this is the memory.)

My father likes to tell the story of how keenly I anticipated my first day of school. My own lunch box, and a daily schedule of departure and arrival that closely mimicked his own, must have brought me to expect that the filial sutures between would be tightened still. Of course, this was not to be the case, as the responsibilities of our two worlds began to repel and diminish the old customs, however cherished.

Nevertheless, I could not have foreseen this gradual casting aside of the way we were for the way we were become; my young mind saw only the present, and a very specific picture of the near future - and in this picture, my lunch pail and I ventured out toward the business of the day every morning, and returned home, every afternoon, to suitable fanfare and a feeling of having fulfilled my homage.

It is no small matter to mention that of my first lunch pail I can, in fact, recall very little detail - possessed, as I was, from a quite early age, of an acute sense of likes and dislikes in concerns of fashion and iconography. (Through my first years of primary school, before lunch bags swept into vogue, I was the proud owner of lunch boxes that featured any number of heroic decal; Lee Majors, in his Six Million Dollar Man persona, was my hands-down favourite, and I can only assume that its retirement could have come only under the direst of operational failures, such was my attachment.)

In any event, of my first pail I recollect only the sameness that it described between my father and I, and the sense of importance that this practical baggage lent my day; it was to accompany me, after all, into the World, and it signified, for any who cared to notice, that I was suitably equipped, and nourished for the task.

On that first day of school, I was prepared at the front door like a champion decathlete - eyeing the track ahead of me and moving through the first critical hurdles in my mind, picturing the perfect execution of skills well-practiced and sure. I was calm; I saw a glorious result on the horizon. At the bus stop across the street, I stood amidst the small, squawking gaggle of local kids; but distraction from the task at my hand did not threaten.

On the bus, I experienced, intermittently, shock and horror at the casual manner with which other students were chaperoning their respective lunch boxes; so many had been stowed recklessly under the seats, where they were subject to ignominies unrelenting - kicked hither and thither and sliding uncontrollably into the walls and beyond the scrutiny of their supposed wards. Even worse off were those roughly abandoned on the bench seats - these were inevitably slammed into the bench-back in front of them at the first sudden braking of the bus, and then to the floor, to join in the pummelling of that rough locale.

My pail remained steadfast, clutched on my lap for the duration of our transit, guarded, treasured.

At school, after the precursive cloakroom efforts to shed the various paraphernalia of our travelling ensembles, we were beckoned to meet together at the centre of the room. Our Kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Theckston, was a well-tested but indomitably kind career educator (fifty-six years old, and lively at that). I became aware that she was perhaps paying particular attention to me - or to my pail, more specifically - and in turn, I looked about to notice that other children had evidently chosen to relegate their own pails to the far reaches of the small vestibules meant precisely for containing the surplus of our travelling accessories. Again I spied the venerable Mrs. Theckston fixing me with an appraising, quite long glance. She brought the room to order with a series of sharp, meaningful claps that took on a tune of insistent suggestion - they said “this is what you had better do, if you know what’s wise”. We all concurred, and settled into a not entirely untrue interpretation of a horseshoe-shaped gathering, with Mrs. Theckston seated neatly at our open end. I sat demurely. My pail sat very still indeed, my hands resting atop it, palms down - a conscious expression of pride and ownership.

One more time, Mrs. Theckston’s gaze fell upon me, appearing, as I must have, mistaken about the day’s dining schedule.

“Would you like to put your lunch-kit in the coatroom, with the others?”, she asked. I blinked in reply.

“It’s not snack-time yet”, offered a helpful classmate. I turned to this voice and blinked again. This blink said: “I’m aware, thank you; that isn’t the issue at all.”

“It will be perfectly safe back there”, soothed another small voice. I blinked back: “I appreciate your reassurance, but I’d rather not take any chances, I‘m sure you understand.” A sudden litany of commentary and inquisition erupted. I turned to and fro, blinking, politely, as many rebuttals as I could. My fingers imperceptibly firmed themselves over my pail. Momentarily, Mrs. Theckston quieted the room, and the next moment, by some manner of professional guile, she managed to distract the chorus of attention toward some other matter of communal intrigue.

I was not required to surrender the company of my lunch box for the duration of that first day. An exquisite negotiator, Mrs. Theckston, in a quiet moment removed from the usual hounds and helpers, struck a bargain with me: she would - personally, mind you - look in on my lunch-box, at every reasonable occasion afforded her, to ensure its safe situation. This ongoing service was to be rendered in exchange for my relenting of said lunch-box remaining in my immediate custody without exception.

It is a tribute to this particular educator of children that she so easily dispersed the resolve of this communion.

My father likes to tell this story - of a small boy and an even smaller box. I know now that it reminds him that a bond used to tie us - like the widest, safest, loveliest ribbon your mind can see - across distance and time. That this ribbon frayed, eventually, beyond repair, does not diminish the verity of its past. He will always have this story to tell, and any who hear it will know that it is a story of love.