Air

From the very first breath, I have inhaled an uncharted future. I have suckled on this air. It has sustained me.

More than sufficient. One day blends into another. An endless sky of opportunity. It is so vast that I cannot possibly grasp it. I cannot capture the end of it. I cannot see where it will lead me. Rolling clouds obscure the route ahead. And yet, I walk on, treading tentatively on a path that no other has explored. This is my air. My sky. It is my future, and it will change as sure as the clouds expand and diminish in an everlasting blender.

Behind me violent winds have blown my memories away, like leaves swept up in heaps beneath the autumn oaks. I can see them all, but I don't know which are mine, which came first, which I chose and which chose me. They tumble together in a confused vortex, and I am unable to claim even one from the mayhem. I leave them there. What use are they to me now?

A breeze turns my head to the east. Always to the east. The horizon is glowing orange in anticipation of a new day. I breathe. In. Out. It is a wonder how this air keeps me. Always enough. A life offering a life.

The sky is tattooed with pearly clouds. They swirl in gentle synchrony, guiding me, calling me. I am reluctant to step out onto the invisible pathway. I breathe. In. Out. The clouds billow and beckon, growing heavy and grey in their urgency. I wish I didn't feel afraid. I am buffeted by strong winds blasting at my back. They push me forward. Forcing me into a frightening uncertainty.

I choke. The air has become thick. It presses on my chest. My lungs are heavy. I falter. I fall through the heavens, and the heavens break my fall. There is no escaping this air. This air is my life. It holds the past in windswept troughs, and presents the future in mutating cloud formations. I cannot adequately describe just how big and completely inescapable it is.

I breathe. In. Out.

Tomorrow there will be more.

Water

I am tentative. And nervous. Even though I can swim, I hold back. I place one toe in the water. It feels cool. Refreshing. And still I hold back. I seem unable to dive right in, like you do. I might get wet. I might get cold. I might enjoy myself too much.

You splash me with cooling beads of salty liquid. We laugh. We watch. We wade in a little deeper. I have goosebumps. I am wet. You pull me deep into the waves. We sink under blankets of liquid. For the first time, I feel alive. Here in this pool. I am energised. I feel cleansed.

The water covers me. I feel new. Here I am not me. Here I am anyone. I drink in a new persona every time I slip into these waves. I am moistened. Here I can grow. Watered at the root.

We swim in the twilight, quietly, lest we disturb the little fish. We keep our ripples small and silent, straining to hear what we might have disturbed as we cavorted in our private pool.

When I emerge from the tranquil silence trapped beneath these breakers, I am naked. I am reborn. For a short while, I live in a moistened cloud of ecstasy. The sweat and the tears are dissolved in these bubbling waters.

Too soon the water clinging to my skin evaporates in steamy droplets, mini memories of our underwater frolicking. And suddenly I am dry again. It's just me.

My lips are parched and blistered. My skin is burnt and cracked. I am not beautiful away from those tranquil waters. I want to feel the splash of those waves again. I want to stand beneath that waterfall, and be engulfed in a soothing rain. I long for the spray of cool mist against my thighs. I will be replenished in that oasis.

Sometimes I stroll along the streams on my own. I dabble in the shallows. A toe. A foot. Up to my knees. It's a cathartic and rejuvenating experience. But I see those surreal ripples spreading away from me, and I wonder what effect they might have on the shores across the oceans. Could I cause a tidal wave upon someone else's conservative beaches? I gaze over a never-ending sea, the water supporting thousands of floating bodies. They come here for different reasons. Some to rejuvenate, like me. Some to escape the shore. And some come looking for themselves.

The air is humid and clammy. I see dark shapes gliding in the deep waters, and it makes me feel afraid. There are things in this carnal ocean that I cannot understand. Things lurking in the muddy depths. Watching. Waiting. Preying on the seekers who swim out too far. I take a step closer to the shore and shudder. For a while, I am worried about entering these waters. I wait for you to come and take my hand. To pull me into the alluring azure deep where I can find myself again.

Fire

I walk through the fire. I step on the hot, demanding coals. I expect some relief, but it comes in short blasts of steaming air. It stings. It burns. My lungs are aching.

A burning sensation rises through my body. It is a radiating pain spreading over my abdomen. It claws at me, sending long thin fingers of singeing pink malice up my sides, ripping at my chest. I keep moving, treading an unseen path through the burning embers. If I stop, I will be engulfed in hungry flames.

It wants me, this fire. It chases after me. It wants to flow over me in hot billowy waves and leave my empty ashes in its path.

I keep running.

My eyes are burning. My feet are barefoot and raw amongst the cinders. I don't feel the searing intensity of these flames so much anymore. It doesn't hurt to let them lick at my legs and twirl in a manic dance across the palms of my hands. In fact, I am mesmerised by this enchanting hell. Whimsical sprites flit through the conflagration in a crimson ballet. I am enraptured. For a moment I feel drawn into their dance. I swirl and leap with these fiery nymphs.

As I dart and prance with my imaginary partners, a hazy mirage catches my eye. I squint through the sweltering blaze and imagine that there is relief beyond the inferno, a kind of dry oasis, a place where there is nothing left to burn. That desert beckons to me. I want to be there, away from this insatiable flood.

And still I endeavour to escape the fire. Even though it can never be outrun. Always lapping at my heels in wispy orange waves. The heat is immense. My cheeks are hot and flushed. I am tired from trying to flee this blaze.

Let the fire consume me. Let these flames eat their full of my tired body. Engulf me. Envelop me. Finish me. I am brittle and dry. I will incinerate quickly. I will not fight it.

I stand still, awaiting the refining power of this daily blaze to swallow me.

Then. Crack.

A spark.

Beside me two small shrubs wilt in the heat of the approaching inferno. Their sap is boiling. Their branches droop and bend away from the bulldozing warmth. They are dying. They must not die! I cannot allow it. They must grow and provide refreshing shade for others. I am yanked out of my dull stupor. I must keep moving. I turn from the affected saplings and entice the waves of flame away.

Today is a premature tomorrow

It's late on Sunday night. I'm really tired. No specific reason, really, just that it's Sunday night and tomorrow's Monday. And Monday means that it all starts again, this funny 7 day carousel that we ride over and over.

I don't have a job that I have to obligingly arrive for at 7am, fresh and ready to trade a service for an income. I don't have pressing meetings to prepare for, business trips to get through, corporate ladders to climb.

My Monday is no different from my Sunday, really. I don't dress differently. I don't put on any more make-up on Monday than I do on Sunday. Sure, I have obligations and commitments tomorrow which vary very slightly from my obligations and commitments that I had today. There's a little more driving around, and I do have to wake half an hour earlier tomorrow than I did today, but the work will be the same. Dress, feed, wipe, answer, cream, pack, rush, drive, drop off, kiss, tidy, fix, sort, mend, plan, collect, feed, wipe, pour, rush, drive, provide, educate, wait, entertain, negotiate, explain, answer, wash, feed, brush, wipe, kiss, cuddle, tuck in.

And even though tomorrow is the start of a new week, I wish, for some inexplicable reason, that the weekend would stay around a little longer, and I'm not sure why. It doesn't make much difference. For some reason, I'm not ready for this ride to be over and the next one to start.

Vrot

I feel vrot. Annie, my dear American friend who I have lovingly taught naughty Afrikaans phrases to, vrot means yuck. Blergh. Sicky. Snotty. Puffy eyed. Blocked eared. Concrete in the head. Rotten.

Lekker vrot is not a good combination, unless you're referring to compost, which you really want to be lekker vrot.

Vrot is a lot like kak, in a way. If I said, "I feel kak," it could infer the same experience as I feel vrot," except kak would include that morning-after-the-night-before, drunken hangover feeling that I have never ever in all my life felt. Er hum.

Vrot is the state of existence that has me putting the milk into the linen cupboard, and throwing my soggy tissues into the cutlery drawer. Vrot makes me a hazard on the road. It is a known fact that you cannot sneeze with your eyes open, right? It is also a known fact that you cannot drive (well) with your eyes closed. Thus there should be some kind of law about driving while sneezing. (My apologies to the guy in the red beamer who flashed his lights and threw a bird at me after swerving to avoid the red faced, eyes closed, oncoming vrot woman who seemed to be having an epileptic fit in her car this morning. I was just sneezing. Sorry.)

So, being vrot is lekker kak. Wish you were here to make it all better