Breathing

I am a small town girl, happiest when I can see more sky than land. I have lived in The City Beneath the Mountain for twelve years now, and I love it, and am eternally grateful for it’s beauty (and its vast sky), every day. But. I still miss small town. I miss being two minutes away from a mielie field, in any direction. I miss the vast open space of it. And every now and again I get so claustrophobic that I feel like I can’t breathe.

It happened last weekend so, on Saturday morning, the morning after the hoardes of people and the excitement of the World Cup opening, we packed a little bag and set off out of the city, allowing the car to choose which direction we’d go. I could feel my lungs expanding as we headed away from the city and the emerald winter landscape opened up ahead of us.

We drove through vineyards dressed in their red-and-gold Autumnal finery, past little farm stalls and into Small Town. We ambled through slowly, looking for a possible place to stay and a place to watch The Rugby (I know, I know… me? Rugby?) Almost as soon as we’d driven into town, we found ourselves on the outskirts again, just the way I like it.

We continued driving, up the mountain pass, and up, the view simultaneously breathtaking and lung-filling. At the top we turned and trundled back down… rugby time. It’s not hard to find a place to watch the Springboks play an international game in Small Town South Africa. We found a cosy litte pub and were soon happily ensconced near the fireplace with a beer each, me with my book, G staring fixedly at the TV. Ideal rugby-watching situation for me – I could read my book and still look up at the exciting bits (given away by squeals/roars/’yeses’ from G and our fellow pub inhabitants.)

I spent the time reading, finding a spot for us to stay (with thanks to the lovely guy who owned the pub) and listening to the conversations of the people around us. I'm a terrible voyeur that way, it fascinates me.

The rugby finished, we switched to football and made friends with a guy called Koos (I kid you not, I have his number in my phone, seriously), who I tried to convince to make up with his brother who he hasn’t spoken to for years, due to his horrible wife. I have a knack of eliciting full family histories from people I meet, almost instantly.

We ate, bid farewell to Koos and went off around the corner to the warm quiet of our little house where I slept, solidly, for almost 12 hours, waking only briefly to hear the rain falling on the roof, and the fabulous cries of the hadedas off to church or something in the morning. Bliss.

I wanted to stay there, where I could breathe.

Sheep-shaped clouds

This morning when I got into the office after a night of storms thrashing through The City Beneath the Mountain, the rain on my tin roof soothing my awake times, I saw the silver lining on the clouds over there, across toward the mountain which pushes the sun up each morning, literally. Funnily, it was a long-bodied cloud, with a sheep’s head. A sweet, woolly, long-bodied sheep. With a silver lining.

Then I heard a pair of hadedas flap past, shouting hello to the world. I love them. Almost as much as I love donkeys. Their not-so-graceful pre-historic bodies, long beaks and oh-so-very-loud voices are just so, um, African. I am prone to shouting “Hi”, back to them. It gives people a fright sometimes. Especially when I do it in the office.

My point? To apologise for my whinging and griping, and shloomphing around like a teenager these past few weeks. Yes, I’m sad, I’m in a weird kind of limbo, I’m unsure, I’m confused, I’m all-over-the-place BUT I’m okay, I’m still talking, I’m still loved, this story is far from finished. I have plenty to be thankful for, I am far luckier than a lot of people, there are far worse things going on in other people’s lives.

So I’m going to buck up (or, as that Australian guy says: “Harden the fuck up”) and get back to my Pollyanna ways and work things out and find the happiness and the humour in it all and then, things’ll be okay. Won’t they?

Anticipation and the sound of hadedas

There is something wonderful about the sound of hadedas on a grey and rainy Saturday afternoon. It’s just a beautiful sound, an African one, it makes my heart contract. I’m all emotional. It may be the rain, it may be the impending aunty-hood, who knows.

And the aunty-hood is seriously impending. This Friday, the 17th of July, 2009, at 9:30am, if all goes according to plan, my sister will produce two tiny beings who have been growing and squirming in her tummy for the past nine months. It hardly seems possible to have so much love gurgling and swirling in me for two little creatures who I haven’t even met yet, except for their little kicks on my cheek from in the womb, but it’s there already, an overwhelming love.

We will be leaving the City Beneath the Mountain on Wednesday and driving across the country (I love road trips) and to The Big Smoke to welcome them. I’ve organised a birthday cake, we have champagne, it’s all ready. My parents are beside themselves with excitement, as am I (or did you work that out already…) These are some precious babies, much anticipated.

At this point I’m holding myself back and have been speaking to my sister, or N (my sister’s partner, my sister-in-law, and other mother of the twins) about four times a day. She’s taken to answering her phone: “They’re still in.” We end with me saying: “Keep them in.” I’d hate to miss it!

Excuse me now, I need to call her. Oh, and pack. My stomach just did a triple back flip with excitement, again.