Friday, May 18, 2012

Fantasy world

Last week this time I met him and his faded yellow backpack at The Rhino outside the ICC; I was rushing into our weekend - the bubble space - from a going-nowhere-fast cocktail event that heralded the start of the 2012 Tourism Indaba.
I've just switched off the radio, sitting in silence now except for the two cats scrunching their ugly pellets; but it's good for their teeth. Then, after these words, I'm off to Celeste and Werner for a farewell dinner. They're leaving for a 7-week amble through Austria and the UK; Celeste, so kindly, has filled my freezer with 19 cooked-and-wholesome meals. I've already thrown a beer down my gullet, which was after two glasses of wine at Hazel and Francois; I bought a truck load of mostly moist firewood from him (chopped and packed by Fish), and Hazel inspired me though her garden amble. Their house, most likely the nicest and most intriguing in Waterval Boven, is up for sale.
The minute I set eyes on him at The Rhino, time ground to a halt, while I simultaneously, and ironically, became conscious of its preciousness, and of the fact that all things come to an end, especially the good things. We bought mushrooms on the beachfront, gasped in awe at Humpty Dumpty and old Mrs Hubbard, walked past Joe Cool's, before taking a yellow no.22 cable car ride over the neonly garish beachfront.
Then to dinner-intense-and-love, and wine - red battery acid for him, white vinegar for me - at the Beach Hotel, before driving back to Hibberdene.
On a high, his Pan-primeval feet against my chest, while the sea hissed-and-roared through the top floor open sliding door, took me to a place not been before.
How do I scratch-and-claw back time? Only through the reminiscing-processing of words, thereby painfully-because-of-longing reliving last week right now.
Sore. But free. And liberating.
[Who are you, where did you come from? How? Where did you scalpel-and-tear-and-clutch-a-hold into my heart?]
Pass 'welcome' and collect R2-million.

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