update on the 'sabbatical'

What have I been up to?

Well, not blogging clearly. Dammit.

But lots of actual things in the world with real people, which is good right?

I've spent some time with my little nephews. At nearly 1 and nearly 3 they are both just delicious, the older one chatty and funny and busy - the baby still baby enough to have a good cuddle. These are probably 'my' last babies until grandchildren and it's been wonderful to have this time with them.

I've been working out - 4 times a week at least, sometimes even getting up before 7 on a Saturday for an extra class (this is totally unheard of for me). 

I've made some progress on clutter and sorting out my home office and bagging stuff up for donation etc, but not as much as I thought I would.
Ditto personal admin. I've not been great on that. Turns out it's still as utterly boring as ever, I just don't have the same excuses about not getting round to it. I've done some good work on generating more though - namely reversing into my friend's car outside our own house a few weeks back! Ack.
Ditto website updates, inbox clearing and filing - I've spent very little time on all that rubbish.
Because really, do I want to spend any time on my laptop when I don't have to? Fek no.
(See also, reasons I've not been blogging.)

I've done some quality appreciation of this beautiful place I live though.

A cycle tour through the City on a magnificent blue and gold day. From the touristy bustle of the waterfront, up Adderley street in the heart of the city, along pee- and dagga- smelling pavements outside the Station, past City Hall (where 1 year ago I was in the THICK of a massive project), through the serene Company Gardens, up cobble-stoned streets into the Bo Kaap and then down through Green Point and back to the sea.
This city will never, ever lose its allure.

Then the first leg of a summer project to swim in all (25?) tidal pools the Cape Peninsula has to offer. We managed 4 on a very blustery and overcast day, with plans to conquer the rest before the summer is out.

St James tidal pool, pictured on a very different day!

I've been a really great friend.
I've lifted kids and baked birthday cakes and helped arrange parties and run errands and delivered wine and covered bills and been (very freely) available for drinks and hang outs.
This all sounds fairly smug, but I don't believe in altruism and will happily admit I've gained so much from all this. Not self-satisfaction, but genuine happiness in being of service to those I love.

My people have been so solidly there for me the last few tumultuous years, all while going through some pretty horrible stuff themselves. We're all juggling so many balls, all feeling like we're dropping most. It has been such a gift to have the time and resources to help catch some, to do small things to help, to do big things to share.
How lucky to have beloved people in your life to do things for?

I've fostered an appreciation for the small things. How a weekend can be a weekend when you're not spending it catching up on everything you've not been able to do during the week. How dinner prep can be so much more satisfying when you're not slamming it together too late and too distracted to do it properly. How chats on the couch with my girls can wander on uninterrupted into all kinds of topics when nothing else is calling me away.

It's been so lovely to be here for them, my sweet girls. It's been so lovely to be able to give them the best of myself. Well, most of the time.

And finally, excitingly, some real progress on our planned home renovation! We have an architect. We have plans. We have moments of utter weakness at the challenges of packing this place up and subjecting ourselves to dust and builders and massive logistical challenges. But we have progress, and 2020 is set to be the year of the house.

Exciting times.

camera roll: August

August.

Crayfish curry - a taste of summer in the depths of winter.

Always with the rainbows.

Sunny, but icy cold.

My other kind of therapy. 

Crazy eyes found on my phone.

Hidden Cape Town spaces.

Weird Cape Town spaces.

A little bit of nature I left in the bustle of OR Tambo International Airport.

This made me happy.

camera roll: July

For July I'm posting landscapes.

Beautiful big images which open the eyes and the mind. Which don't speak of the frustrations of trying to juggle school holidays and work - parental guilt like I've never before really experienced - feeling awful for being so distracted, feeling cross for feeling awful. 

A pedalo ride of a still, sunny afternoon by myself. A chance to get a different perspective. To collect rubbish floating in the water and feel like making a contribution to something other than just my and my family's own, persistent, needs.

A birthday hike to celebrate my man, their dad, our huge privilege for all being together - essentially healthy and well. To stretch our legs and our horizons. To walk off all that chocolate cake and enjoy each other's company.

A stormy day on the harbour wall. Big gulps of sea air and good friendship.

Big pictures for the most important big things - family, friends, beauty and privilege. I try to cling to these, even as the lesser things feel like they're dragging me under. I wish my head was as clear as these views.
We'll get there.

11

I am enraptured by this kid.

This is not news. I've been enraptured by her since the day she arrived and made me a mama.

But she really just keeps on astounding me, as she grows and develops and changes and yet stays so very grounded and herself.

Frieda just turned 11, but in other ways she's still 8, but also 15, but also 22.

She wanted a phone for her birthday, but also a flower crown with skeleton hands for her self-conceptualised Day of the Dead party. She got both (all hail the glue gun!).

She wanted to serve tacos to her friends and have a dance party and have a bunch of girls sleep over.
We made it happen.

She wanted the cake to still be a surprise, as it always has been since the very first birthday.

And the next day - our house in tatters, every surface sticky and every eyeball grainy - I looked at this photo and felt so grateful for this shiny, radiant being. 

I have moments of sheer terror at this next phase of parenting, but then I remember that I'll be doing it with her - all my parenting firsts have been with her, and I think we got this. I think we'll be okay.

camera roll: April

April. I like April, always have.

At the beginning of the month I astounded myself - and a few others I think - by passing my motorbike drivers licence on the first attempt!
My learner's licence would expire in June and I was determined to get my drivers before then. Buying a gorgeous new bike was very motivating (more about that later) and while I was still not working to any extreme deadline and had the time I decided to get it done.
3 hours at the traffic department to book the appointment, a 3 hour training session with a highly-recommended local motorbike training school, another hour or so arsing about in the road outside our house practising emergency braking and stuff - and I got it. Yippee!

Awetumn continued in all its magnificence. I don't think I'll ever tire of taking photos of this view. I've been thinking I should be collating them somehow ...

My wee nephew turned one. Actually he turned 1 in March but everyone was away and his party delayed by a few weeks. My sister-in-law asked her mum to make a sugar-free cake - and this was the utterly amazing result!
All the elements came to his beach party in various tupperwares to be constructed on site - watermelon, sweet melon, pineapple, dragon fruit (totally tasteless, but very pretty), kiwi, grapes, gooseberries, naartjie, strawberry, pomegranate. It was so delicious and indulgent, and very, very impressive!

Frieda and I squeezed in another night away with my parents in Betty's Bay. We'd so enjoyed our stay there before that we had to get out there again while they were still in residence.

We left on a Saturday morning - the plan was for both girls to go with me -  but Stella was dragging her feet, still sloughing around in her pajamas when I was ready to leave. 'Actually I think I'll stay with Dad' she declared. And so she did. We split 50/50 and I had a great time with just my big girl, Stella and her Dad an equally good time without us. Funny that we hardly ever think to do that, but so good for us all. 

23 April - first fire of the season! It was lovely (especially for dogs) and got us all excited about cooler days and wintery delights.

Of course being Cape Town that didn't actually mean it was winter yet. We've still had glorious still sunshiney days.

A national bus strike left me without childcare for a week or so, necessitating doing the school lifts myself, and reminding me how fun it can be to kill time between pick-ups with just one daughter and a slushie at the harbour down the road from the school - spotting seals and boats and cheeky seagulls.

I'll never need to be reminded of how lucky we are to live here though, and be able to do these things on an arbitrary Tuesday afternoon.

And then some REAL rain, bringing joy to all our hearts. The 5000l rain water storage tank we installed in mid December is finally nearly full! It's only taken nearly 6 months ...

Apparently good rain in April sets the tone for the rest of winter, we're holding thumbs this is the case!

And then, just at the end of the month, this little girl turned 1. Nacho the Naughty she is - from a very mild-mannered puppy she's become quite headstrong and stubborn, chewing furniture and any unattended toys. We've had to be very vigilant of late, but we still love her to bits and she's a real member of the family.

camera roll: March

March just blew by in a bit of a blur to be honest. Most of the month was spent feeling very much out of things, not myself at all, just trying to keep head above water really.

I read a lot of books and watched a lot of mediocre TV. I cried by myself, with others and while reading books and watching mediocre TV. I kept to myself a bit. One doesn't like to burden others with ones gloominess, there's a feeling of needing to maintain a stiff upper lip, but there's also the inability to to do so, or even really care ... sometimes it seems easier to just keep to oneself.

Awetumn arrived in all it's annual loveliness. And dogs (even naughty ones) proved to be a very comforting balm to the soul. I spent a lot of time admiring both.

There was of course, a birthday, and then another one a week later for my dearest friend's daughter. Both were hard, but there's nothing somber about gaggles of 8 yr olds, regardless of the circumstance. Both were healing also.

Late in the month we had a magnificent thunderstorm. It started with the above sunset which had all the neighbours outside. Gasps, exclamations of delight and shutter clicks echoed up and down the lake. Minutes later the first rumble rolled in and for the next few hours we were treated to an exceptional light show, followed by heavy rain - hallelujah!

The next day I heard from a friend whose car had been struck by lightning, with her in it, while driving down a narrow urban street! In the grasp of an ear-splitting, retina-scorching Faraday Cage all she could think was that an airplane had landed on her car. She came out unscathed - the car's electrics fried, tyres smoking, later a numbing migraine but best of all - a great story to tell!

The month ended with the beginning of the school holidays, a road trip to our friends up the coast. A few days of lazing, catching-up and the best the local sea and vineyards have to offer.

That's our lopsided tent in the background, pitched on our friends lawn. That's the long table at which we spent an afternoon eating delicious food, harvested from the sea down the road and prepared outdoors in the garden by these sweet menfolk of ours. That's the wine we washed it down with, pressed from grapes grown withing a few hundred kilometers from where we sat, made by the hands of the friend sitting with us.

These are the magnificent things of life, the bountiful things, the precious things - it was good to end March being reminded of all this. Life is bitter, but also very very sweet.

camera roll: February

February always starts with a bang for me - the last few years at least - I've worked this big conference in the first week of Feb and then only really caught up with myself, my family, and summer in general after it's over.

This February feels like it's been windier than most, apparently this is a real thing because climate change, but we've had a few magical still days - and evenings. Above pic was taken at nearly 8pm, a still warm evening at the lake.

We spent a gorgeous afternoon at Silvermine too - a mountain reservoir where you can just step off soft green lawn and into the cool water. You wouldn't think we were in a drought from either of these photos would you?

The drought churns on, but it seems less likely we'll hit Day Zero this year. That date has been pushed out to 15 July and we have to have some winter rain by then, surely?
How much rain we'll get over winter is unsure though, and we might be back in this same predicament next year. Water restrictions will remain in place.
As a family we've gotten down to 37 litres per person per day - no mean feat. We're quite proud of our stinky, sticky selves.

Apparently, for the first (and last) time in some hundreds of years, February is unique this year in that it had no full moon.

Twice in Jan and again in early March left Feb with just the rinds, not the full cheese. Ag shame.

Back to school is a real thing now, everyone in full swing. Frieda had her first away school camp and came home exhausted, and - pictured above - had a blast in red frock and gold nails at the Valentine Ball. Ooo la la.

This person missed her big sister terribly while she was away at camp and spent all her time pining and wobbling her snaggle tooth.

'I'd love to do something special with you today Mum, because I miss Frieda so much. Maybe something which includes food.'

If there was ever a moment for a fully-loaded waffle ...

Stella has also decided that she and I go running in the evenings. Just to the park and back - a short run/walk/run/walk circuit - but I'm very pleased to be bullied into it. As you can tell, we're not an innately active family ....

But really, what better way to spend a weekend afternoon? Trevor Noah, Philip Pullman, Hunger Games and two ridiculous dogs? Yes please.

And then, on the last day of February, the loss of my dear friend. I'm not ready to write about it here, I'm not even able to face it irl actually. It still feels so surreal.

As I said to someone this week, grief is a gaping chasm in the periphery of my vision, it's there but I'm not ready to look into it yet. I can't.

I can't believe she's gone.

the day it rained

Sad news made me very sad yesterday morning.
I was actually pleased that smaller daughter was off school with a cold so I couldn't really wallow -  it's hard to get properly emotional when someone keeps asking for toast with syrup and strawberries and your assistance getting to the next level of Angry Birds.
I imagine this is how mothers the world over keep on keeping on.

I got busy with tax submissions and other frightfully stimulating domestic tasks, popped out to buy some leeks and a bra ... you know, keeping on.

In the background the slow, agonising demise of Zuma churned away ... not for us the excitement of an overthrow, an assassination, a fit of conscience or a public resignation. No, just the living embodiment of the very South African phrase, now now. As in, Zuma is leaving now now. But when exactly remains unclear.
It's hard to drink celebratory champagne in slow disjointed sips. Not good for the bubbles really.
Can you believe it's been nearly a decade since this?

On the horizon thunderheads bubbled up, Google told me 'it's raining in Cape Town, stay dry' and the sun beat down unabated.

Later that evening my lovely parents came for supper.

We had a leek tart, mounds of roasted baby potatoes, beetroot, piles of fresh summery salady things, a fine wine, homemade panna cotta for dessert topped with juicy strawberries and figs, then more figs with blue cheese ... and more wine.
And while we were eating the storm outside got serious.

Thunder, lightning - after dinner we squeezed onto the stoep couch and ooh-ed and aah-ed at the light show playing out around us. At the rain pouring down.
The air got momentarily warmer, as the heat was released from the ground, and then deliciously cool.

My parents dashed out to their car, the girls off to bed, and I sat outside with the last of my wine and just one more fig, listening to the rain, watching the lightning and marveling at how one day can encompass so much.

Even in loss there is gratitude, even in drought there is rain.

UPDATE: He's gone! At 10:55pm on 'Zumatines' Day the old fuck finally resigned! Yippeeee.

colour blocking

This time last year I was doing this. And it hasn't really let up much.

To be honest the year has been brutal.

Sometimes one needs to hide ...

... and spend a day faffing the shelves.

I painted these shelves, turns out almost exactly 3 years ago. Must be a spring thing then ... sprucing.

It was so good to not think. To handle things which have a story for me - the books and the figurines and the things - to dust, to sort, to place. To use my eyes not my heart, my hands not my head.

Regaining control over some tiny corners of my life.
Let's go October.
Be gentle.