Just Turn Left At The Big Criss-cross

The Sunday Age

Sunday April 7, 2002

Andrew Dyson

I HAVE yet to learn the fundamentals of celestial navigation. I have learnt other complex things; how to double-knot my shoelaces, for example, and how to kick a tyre knowledgeably. But I have never plotted a simple course without coming to grief. Smug bystanders (there are many smug bystanders in my life) loftily explain that night navigation is a piece of urine - simply fix your gaze on the Southern Cross and all falls into place. They lie.

I once tried to find our local convenience store using this ``infallible" method. The map confirmed that it lay due south, one kilometre hence. Fixing my gaze correctly on a cruciform pattern above, I began a strenuous four-hour journey that ended abruptly in a large body of water which I assumed, judging by the chillness lapping around my ankles, to be the Baltic Sea. I have avoided celestial navigation ever since.

As a responsible father, I must address this yawning chasm in my knowledge. One must prepare oneself for all eventualities; one evening we may be evicted, and I shall be duty-bound to steer my brood to safety. I cannot depend on my partner, whose errant internal compass has awarded her the distinction of being the first, and only, person to be hopelessly lost in Myers' lingerie department. The expensive services of a search and rescue team were required to extract her, and she, poor woman, cannot view a peignoir these days without suppressing a shudder.

So we went to the planetarium, the perfect solution - under the cover of maintaining the children's education during the holidays, I could right my own ignorance. Four shows were available, graded by age group, and I selected the eight-year-old one. Not too challenging. For the children.

We were shown to comfortable reclining seats, similar to those used by caring dentists, the lights dimmed, the narration began. What a relaxing voice this man had, I thought, as the night sky extended above us. Must have had special training, no distracting glottal slurs, consonants bathed in honey; come retirement age he could pad his pension by doing voice-overs in a nursing home . . . Emergency. ICU to the Pleasant Pastures Suite. Have a nice day ....

A sharp dig in the ribs. ``Dad! You're snoring!!" ``Waaa? Not me, it's the dog." I reached down to cuff the spaniel and found thin air. Above me the earth was rotating gracefully round the sun, its little moon in close attendance. Hang about . . .

"The Earth rotates around the SUN!!?" My outcry was greeted by a chorus of Sssh!s, and the word ``Idiot", uttered by a childish voice, which I realised, as I regained full consciousness, belonged to my seven-year-old. ``No pocket-money for you next week, serpent's-tooth!" I hissed. ``Leave the kid alone!" whispered my immediate neighbour, a thick-set stranger with a ragged moustache and the biceps of a stevedore.

The woman was bent on making a scene. I would not oblige her. I would hold my peace, not least because I was finally about to learn how to navigate by the Southern Cross. Notebook and pencil at the ready . . .

One week later I'm still nonplussed. To the imaginative eye, the night sky holds a variety of Crosses, some Orthodox, some resembling the Cross of Lorraine. Further intense study also reveals a multitude of Noughts, of varying diameter. One can't help thinking that one is witnessing some vast, and remarkably silly, cosmic game.

And I shall not be toyed with. I, a grown man who can tie his own shoelaces, shall never go south. It's a matter of pride.

e-mail: adyson@theage.com.au