The Map is the Terrain

Jamie Shane expresses beautifully my sentiments which I never could put into words, thank you!

Lenz learns to fly

Mom, I want to learn how to fly, my youngest son said when he was thirteen or so. We were walking leisurely on the farm, chatting about this and that and his wish came totally out of the blue. Lenz’ father is a pilot so I asked him if he wants to follow in his father’s footsteps as a future career?  No, he said, I just want to fly around here, now, like a bird. You want to build yourself wings, I asked? And before he could say anything I had that flashback of memories of his brothers and their adventures.

Max, at the same age, was building a sailboat out of an old pallet and my best bed-sheets. He worked tirelessly for days on it. We had to transport it on a trailer to the pond, where we carefully unloaded his sailboat onto the surface of the pond. With that Christopher-Columbus-smile on his face Max stepped on it and, in slow-motion, sank down with his sailboat into the depths of the pond. My heart still aches today when I recall how the expression on his face changed to show total defeat and disappointment.

Felix at that age had the idea to build himself a racing car out of an old wooden shelf, four wheels of a discarded pram and some more bits and pieces. Again days of busy labour ensued until his Formula One racing car was ready. And after strict and repeated parental advice was given to not drive down the steep hill he pulled his car up and raced down the steep hill and straight into the barbed wire fence, from there straight into an ambulance car to emergency surgery in the hospital.

And now Lenz wanted to fly. No, he said, I don’t need wings. I just want to fly. OMG, I thought, OMG. I hadn’t much time to think anything else, because he just took off and flew.

Orange

I spent two wonderful days in the Agulhas National Park. The best part of the whole park is that almost nobody knows how to get in. And if you happen to find the entrance you drive for 15km on the worstest dirt road in South Africa (my humble opinion) to get to the beach. Please, SANPARK, leave it like that, it’s just perfect!!!

I am fascinated by the colours nature produces in unexpected places. You go to a beach, you think the sand is white, the ocean is blue, the rocks range from white to dark grey, perhaps there is a bit of green grass – and that’s it. No way, look at the colour of the lichen.

    

    

So I wandered with my orange in my hand along the beach and played – and then I ate it.

The end.

 

Dizzy…

Early morning at Bulungula, Eastern Cape, and I am walking on the beach, alone, nobody before me, nobody behind me. It’s low tide, the beach is a huge canvas. With a driftwood stick in my hand I dance around drawing wild patterns into the sand, until I get dizzy. Well, if I am already a bit dizzy I can make myself really dizzy and I start drawing a spiral, getting bigger and bigger and bigger…. Took me a while to be able to look straight again.

The Coffee Shop

My dear friend Andree Bonthuys is a gifted writer. I know it, and deep inside of her she also knows it. Sometimes (why not more often?) one of these small gems surface, like this one:

The tatty velour wallpaper marched up the irregular walls, faded maroon and gold with mildew patches below waist-level. The ageing queen host, in his dapper trousers and too-tight shirt, had applied just a tad too much mascara that morning.

Most patrons were seated outside, on the pavement, soaking up the welcome autumn sun and avoiding the last decades’ refried oil caught in the interior’s heavy velvet curtains. The tat might be charming by candlelight after wine, but not on a fresh day.

Inside, no aroma of coffee could mask stale cigarettes, too much grease and last night’s cruising. And behind the film-prop counter hung Irma Stern and Picasso rip-offs in ornate gilt frames, quite at loggerheads with the content.

And on the elbow-polished dark wood of the counter, a candle burned messily beside a tired cheese cake with what looked like dead flies trapped beneath the elaborately beaded gauze dome. The lights were on. Chandeliers of camp proportion, dripping with rubies and shimmering crystal tassles. The six little round tables, bedecked with red linen, were empty.

I crossed the threshold and traversed the narrow room with its pocked screed floor as quickly as possible, aiming for the loo. It was surprisingly tranquil in the womb-like interior and somehow, more inviting than the exposed street.

I decided to settle inside, next to a little low window and as I looked up, after stowing my bag safely under my seat, Gwynne, my dearest, oldest, deadest friend appeared in the other seat at my wobbly table.

“How are you?” she said as she leaned forward to touch my arm. She seemed so ensconced there I didn’t bat an eye, just leaned across to hug my dear old friend. That I hugged warm air didn’t worry me at all. After all, she’d been dead and gone for seven years, but Gwynne always seemed to appear at appropriate times so I launched into animated conversation, thrilled at this miraculous reconnection with my most valued critic, my favourite krone, my wise woman.

I no longer smelled the stale shop as I brought her up to speed of things in my life. The fact that I was about to become a grandmother, that I was happily creating in a new studio space. That I was no longer firing ecologically damaging ceramics, but wrapping rocks in cast off clothing and recycled plastic – sort of Eco Earth Balls. That I was building sculptures out of broken coat hangers and had taken to riding a horse – at the moment, a rather fine steed,  called Sanchez Gamba, because he was descended from spanish racing stock. Horses fertilise perfectly wherever they go, as long as  kept out of noxious weeds, thus preventing the digested spread. I told Gwynne how I really tried to walk Shanchez around my garden a bit, before setting off  anywhere, so all manure was deposited like gold on my turf.

And I asked her.

“How can I live and work even more respectfully of this dying planet?”

Gwynne smiled at me fondly, her softly wrinkled skin changing shape completely around her lovely mouth.

” What you do is creative. It always has been. And creativity is a positive in this world. You build. You don’t destroy.”

I thought about her words. Creativity. Build. Destroy. She had always been wise and a constructive critic. I felt so safe. So happy to have refound her. She had been one of the finest artists I had ever known. I’d met her quite by accident and we had both recognised a kindred spirit and had been best friends for years, despite a more than two decade age gap.

“So,” I ventured, “I’ve been thinking of creating living sculpture gardens on rooftops throughout the city. Right now there is a beautiful building just off The Parade, in the centre of town. An empty Victorian of only two storeys and with a flat roof and curlicure folly, posing as a garden wall. It’s up a little sidestreet next to The City Hall and overlooked by modern monsters, but I’ve been exploring who the owner might be. It’s conveniently vacant and I would love to own the first floor and the roof. And, of course, the ground floor as stable and studio, if I can afford it. I’ve been thinking of creating a beautiful uplifting loft space on the first and then bringing in truckloads of beautiful loamy earth, craned up onto the roof. I’m thinking of planting trees, a subsistence vegetable garden, a fig, a lemon and a generous bird bath. A bit of lawn for the dogs and a gazebo for dreaming. It would make me very happy right now and bring endless pleasure to office workers in the surrounds.”

Gwynne’s eyes twinkled.

“I know the building. It’s opposite those elegant and beautiful City Hall windows all covered in glass butterflies? It’s red and the folly has white trim?”

“Oh Gwynne! I am so happy to have you back. At least you understand my dreams!”

“Always follow your dreams” she said.

“It’s the passion and energy you bring to projects that makes the world go round. If you stop creating, you might as well be dead!”

The astonished waiter was standing beside me, expectant, pencil poised above his notepad.

“I’ll have a cappuccino, ” I said, “thank you. Foam, not cream. And a bucket of hay for my horse.

For my sons

When my sons where young I remember once sitting with them on a beach near Cascais in Portugal looking west into the setting sun. What’s there, what is the next place west, they asked. Well, I said, can’t you see New York over there? They looked with much concentration. Yes, they said, I can see the sky scrapers! And I can see the Statue of Liberty!

Recently I sat on a beach near my home in South Africa, looking south, alone, while the sun was setting. Next place south would be the Antarctic, I realized.  Yet, no penguin or iceberg in sight as hard as I looked.  Was there something wrong with my eyes? I decided to sculpt a figure out of the stones lying around, and I would give him, the stony observer, the ability to see beyond the horizon for me, like my sons could, when they were young. 

My Arrest

My arrest
Yesterday the police came to arrest me. What was really annoying was that the painter was busy painting my front door and door-step shiny white and the colour was not yet dry. The two police constables couldn’t care less, they stepped onto the freshly painted door-step, stood in my lounge and told me they are here to arrest me. I was a bit surprised and not really in the mood for getting arrested, so I told them I wouldn’t want to be arrested right now. They insisted. Then it dawned on me to ask them for what I was being arrested. I was told for not paying a traffic fine for not stopping at a stop sign.
Now I remembered where from I knew the face of the one constable. He was that charming guy who had given me a R1000 fine for allegedly not stopping at a stop sign in the village and I had lodged a letter of complaint to the traffic department. Weeks later I had gotten a letter back from them stating that the prosecutor had dropped the case. I told them these facts and showed them the letter. They weren’t interested. They were totally focused on arresting me. I was hell-bent on not getting arrested. I said again and again, THE CASE WAS DROPPED BY THE PROSECUTOR, just phone him or the court! Finally they took the letter and went back to the station to make a copy. About 5min later they were back and brought a warrant officer along, who explained to me that they are arresting me now.
What would that entail? I asked him.
Well we bring you to the Magistrate Court to the Prosecutor. He leaves at 4pm and its now 3h15pm so we should get going.
I asked him what would happen if we come too late?
Well, he said, you stay in a cell overnight.
I wasn’t exactly keen on that. Ok, I thought, it might be a good idea to talk to the prosecutor and get this sorted out quickly, so I said, Let’s go, I drive with my car and you with yours, so that I can get back.
No way, he said, you are arrested, we bring you there. You can drive with me. We must go to the Police Station first. So, off we went. At the station, they started to fill in forms, many forms, and it was 3h45pm.
Might be a bit late for going to the magistrate court? I said.
For the first time they agreed to something I said.
OK, he said you come back tomorrow morning at 8am, and if I say 8am I mean 8am and not 5min past 8am. And then we will arrest you.
I walked home, reflecting on what had happened and was going to happen. I felt at a time amused and a bit nervous. I wrote a message to all my friends in the village and informed them about my adventure. Next morning at 5 to 8am I was at the police station. A journalist friend came and took notes, asked questions and more and more constables and warrant officers appeared, not wanting to miss the show. A friend of my friend came, a lawyer and we started all over again, to no avail. They seriously wanted to put me into that police-bakkie and drive me to court. They explained me my rights and had me sign some forms to make my arrest official. There I stood, arrested. Seven police men watched. I didn’t even know that there were so many in our small village. Then, to everybodies surprise, another warrant officer came out from the back and said, he had just phoned the magistrate court, I was not to be arrested, I should just drive (myself!) to the court and show the letter to the prosecutor. The show was over, excitement deflated, no apologies, no nothing, six police men vanished into offices. We said thank you to the one who had phoned and left. Perplexed.
I had some copies made, thanked my friends who had helped me so much, drank a cappuccino and drove off to the court and guess who stood in the foyer to welcome me? Right, the warrant officer who had been so keen to arrest me. He was so happy to see me, smile, chat and all! And soon I realized why: the fact that he was there and I was there made it look as if he had arrested me and was now handing me over to the prosecutor. He did not loose his face. I played along. He delivered me to the court room, holding my elbow, like you see in movies, made me sit and made sure that the prosecutor saw that he had delivered me. I waited 10min, other arrested suspects were given the dates for their court-cases, then I was called in the stand. The judge briefly looked at the papers and said: The case is withdrawn, you may go.
I wanted to hear it again: Say it again please?
And he said it again: The case is withdrawn, you may go now.
Thank you, I said, gave him a big smile and left.
Back home, when I turned the key in my front door and opened it, the first thing I saw were the footprints of the police constables on my freshly painted door step. They are there to stay, to remind me on my arrest.

2012 – The Year Of The Young Wet Rat

“Is there any better way than to start the first morning of the new year swimming naked in the pool”, I thought when I woke up this morning. I jumped out of my pyjamas, grabbed a towel and was already half way in the pool when I saw a tiny young rat which had had the same idea. Following my (very loud and urgent) requests for a life-saving boat or a floating ambulance Jill came running with a salad sieve and saved the squeaking rat. So we declared 2012 to be The Year Of The Young Wet Rat, which will bring you wet dreams, good-looking rodents, hopefully not too many holes in your cheese and somebody with a sieve when you need it!

Nasturtium

As I walked along the Klein Rivier in Stanford I noticed masses of tangled nasturtium plants and I thought that I’d like to somehow separate them from the mass so as to enhance their very lovely shape and colour. The still blue-black water of the River seemed to me to be the ideal back-drop.

Cats, fleas and a shifting axis

I love my landlady’s tom-cats. We sort of share them and the garden. I just came back from my Sunday-morning-cappuccino-free-wi-fi-cum-newspapers session at the Art Café and found Sam, one of the cats, sleeping on my freshly washed 100% cotton red duvet cover. What a peaceful scene. That lazy elegance of a cat, combined with his unwavering trust that my duvet cover is just the right place to linger on a late Sunday morning. Then I saw a flea jumping off his shiny fur onto my matching red pillow case. My mood changed. I caught the flea between thumb and index-finger, carefully moved it onto my thumbnail and crushed it with the other thumbnail. I took duvet including cat into the garden and briskly shook them, hoping that all fleas would fall off in the process. Sam run off into my bath-tub, one of his favourite places to be, and licked the hot water tab. He only licks the hot water tab, never the cold water tab. Just half an hour ago I had read an article in the Huffington Post that the earthquake in Japan had shifted the axis of the earth, which would mean that my point of view had shifted. From this new point of view I sat down and wrote this note in order to share it with you, watching from the angle of my eyes Sam sneaking to the bedroom again. I am about to hit the “share” button on my keyboard, when I see another flea sitting comfortably on “enter”. I shall press “enter” now, the flea will enter after-life and this note will be posted. How wondrous, is a flea on “enter” the first sign of a shifted axis of the earth?