March? What?

There it is, right up in my face, proclaiming that February's done, dusted, over-scadover. March. Well, I guess I have no choice but so say: "Welcome March, come on in. Yes, yes, you can bring The Ides along too, just dust off all your feet at the door, please."

I have (again) been neglectful of my writing. I've been terribly busy doing Real Work, living life, now dealing with a heartbroken, broken-up friend, and gazing at my navel, to bring myself to write. This, in itself, is ridiculous because (a) What is blogging if not the highest form of navel-gazing? and (b) My navel seems to be expanding most worryingly and I'd do better to not look at it and, therefore, remain blissfully unaware of the middle-age spread happening down there.

I meant to (re)start blogging on the 1st of March and do it daily, at least for the month of March. I like doing stuff like that, starting things in a new month, resolving to be better at it. Please note that I said I like doing it, not I'm good at doing it. Not that I really have to point that out, it's pretty obvious, isn't it? It being the 3rd of March and all.

So here I am, starting. Maybe I'll do every third day, that seems more doable. I have lots of stories - the plans for the country move, a very sad and beautiful funeral, my first meeting with KitKat, the donkey...

Moments away from holiday

We're going away. To the country. Next week. To get there we will mount the silver-winged unicorn and she will carry us gently away from The City Beneath the Mountain, with her fast cars and fumes, bright lights and loud people. Through the dark tunnel where gnomes mine for precious gems we'll travel and out the other side to unpolluted blue skies and fresh air, the mountains towering above us, watching as we trot along the narrow black strip at their feet.

And then toward the gentler, greener, hills, vineyards dotted about (and hopefully a donkey or two) toward the big brown river that meanders through, creating an emerald landscape. On the banks of that river, our silver-winged unicorn will come to a stop and it is there, in that peaceful place, that we will rest. For the better part of a week. No internet access, intermittent cell-phone reception, and oodles and oodles of air.

A place to read, to write, to breathe and think. To look up at the stars, an uninterrupted upside-down paint-by-numbers, no city lights to dull it. A fireplace to stare into, not just at night, but at 10am, if we feel like it. And with a glass of red wine too, if it takes our fancy. It is only just coming in time, before I murder a colleague or jump out of my fifth floor Ivory Tower window myself. A holiday. Away.

Is it obvious that I can't wait?

Computer geek

Yip, you are seeing right. Two posts in a matter of two hours! I just couldn't leave this unwritten. Here at Real Work (long, boring story about why I am here on a Friday), we are updating our access-based database. This involves my having to deal with one of those geek boys who do computer stuff and talk unintelligably about interfaces and blah blah blah...

He's just come in and rattled off at me about the changes he's made. I caught (maybe) every third word. Those were 'and', 'if' and 'perhaps', mainly. I did catch something that sounded like 'parrot', too, but I think I might have misheard. I just nodded, and smiled.

What I did hear, right at the end, though, was: "It's turned out well. It's got a great feel to it, doesn't it?"

He was talking about an access database. A database! And a boring, medical one at that. Is it just me, or are these computer types just wierd? I think I should get him to go outdoors and stroke a velvetty donkey's nose to understand where it is appropriate to use the sentence "It's got a great feel", or am I the wierd one?

Gleeful

I had a conversation the other day that resulted in a discussion on the merits of jumping up-and-down on your housemate’s bed when they’re out, wearing only a pair of your knickers. Preferably on your head. Clean ones, of course… this was not some weird fetish thing, purely a conversation on the feeling of boundless freedom, and great glee.

It got me to thinking about things that make me gleeful. Of course the above-mentioned activity would, definitely, be one (why else would it have come up?) The second one, which I may have mentioned before, is that little hole that happens when you let water out of the basin. Like a little water hurricane. It’s not just the look of it, though, it’s the feel, when you stick your finger in it. I. Love. It.

Donkeys. There’s another. I love them. Always have. My passion peaked at university. Our dusty little university had a plethora of donkeys, just, well hanging about. Many dark nights, stumbling home in our merry packs of happy students or huggy-kissy couple-pairs or just alone (in those days it was slightly safer), one would come around the corner and look down Bathurst Street, into the dip, and see a donkey, gently perusing the dustbin contents, sometimes even two of the lovely velvet creatures.

Our third year digs was across the road from the graveyard (a tragically beautiful place, good for thinking) and beyond the graveyard was the township. It was the perfect place for me, and had a steady stream of donkey passers by (some of whom I coaxed into our garden with carrots. K wouldn’t allow me to keep them, though and I always had to return them to the street.)

So yes, a little post on glee-inducing things. Perfect for a Friday, don’t you think?

The Karoo, desolation and spirits

I love the Karoo. It has a sense of enormity that is breathtaking. The sky goes on forever and you feel like there is just so much air. Like you can really breathe. Not that I'm saying I don't breathe here in the city. Of course I do, otherwise I'd expire (not being some superhero who can take in oxygen through my pores or anything), but it just seems easier there, in the wide expanse of the desert.

It was there, in the middle of that desolation, that I broke, and perhaps that has something to do with it. A chunk of my freedom is flitting about there, an angel flapping in those vast amounts of air, flitting around amongst the scattered clouds. Maybe it's her that I like to go and visit, to see her swirling high above.

Nieu Bethesda. Turning off the tar and driving along the dusty windy road towards it makes my insides squelch and my heart contract with joy. I can't explain it except that it just feels like I'm home when I'm there in that secluded little valley, once home to Helen Martins and still home to her house and garden filled with concrete creatures and owls.

Going into the house, you can feel the spirits flitting about it. Her story is not one filled with happiness and her decoration of her father's room is testimony to some serious childhood pain, but the rest of the house certainly gave me the feeling that this woman had joy in her life.

So, yes, although I only went to that little place in the middle of the desolate Karoo for the first time when I was 31, it just felt instantly like home and I' ve been back, but I long to go back and spend a proper amount of time there. Just breathing, and watching the clouds float by in that enormous, neverending sky. And stroking the velvetty noses of the donkeys there.

I wonder if I'll ever have my own donkey?