‘Have I ever told you of the time my father took us by road to Rhodesia in 1947?’
In the last years of her life my mother-in-law asked us this question many times.
We would reply, ‘Oh no, do tell!’, and the long story would come out of their adventure to and from that country, little stories of each relative they saw, the animals and even the punctures along the way.
We didn’t roll our eyes in exasperation at hearing the story for the umpteenth time, because it was evident how much pleasure it gave her to in recounting the story of the journey.
As she talked, you could imagine the young girl she had been, only 18 and proud to be entrusted with a share of the driving.
Each memory was as fresh as if it had all happened yesterday and not 70 years ago.
It is not uncommon for old people to revisit their younger selves in their memories.
She slipped away recently at 92 (not of Covid-19), so there were many memories of a full and rewarding life to recall, and it is a tribute to her that the memories she most recalled were those remembered with fondness.
I met Rose’s mother when we were still dating and there was no thought of marriage.
But I was awed by her gentleness and kindness, and it didn’t take me long to reckon that if the theory that a girl turns out to be like her mother was true, then maybe I should pop the question!
So I did and never regretted it, neither in choice of wife nor of mother-in-law.
In the 44 years I knew Joan, I never heard her utter an unkind word about or to anyone.
She was no pushover: she was firm in her beliefs but did not impose them.
She gently turned people to her view, or was as gentle in conceding another view might be preferable to hers.
Her way was to encourage and praise, support and reward.
Her only and glaring fault was that she cheated at Scrabble.
Rose, her daughter, would defend her stoutly: she did not cheat, she just had her own interpretation of the way words are spelled! (It runs in the family – Rose can’t spell, either).
* * *
Wasn’t the sea just perfect on Sunday?
I took the opportunity for a long paddle, in celebration of the beginning of the return to the new normal, whatever that is.
The sea was crystal clear, the sun was warm and it didn’t feel quite like the middle of June. Only a week ago it’d been cold enough to freeze a monkey’s…
Reports that people have been seen fishing for the parrot fish in the Shaka’s Rock tidal pool are simply too much.
I really wish the mess over who is responsible for policing the beach zone would get sorted.
Sea Fisheries is clear not capable of doing the job: they don’t have the manpower, nor is there the will.
Ezemvelo Wildlife was doing a perfectly good job until Fisheries took over some years ago.
It’s time to bring them back.
* * *
Interesting to see a municipal road crew busy on Friday, smoothing out the newest speed hump (or sleeping policeman) in Ballito Drive, which Lesley Naudé had complained in her Perspective column last week that it appeared not to be regulation height.
It’s a pity that the job had to be done twice – once to put it there and the second time, to do the job properly.
But there are still no signs warning of the hump.
* * *
I am so happy that the hair and beauty industry can return to work this week.
I have had my hair cut by Tiz Pieroni for ohh, more than 20 years, and I am determined that to stick it out until she can get back to her salon.
It was out of protest as well as vanity.
I’ve had an odd-shaped nut since I fell down a flight of stairs as a toddler (explains a lot of things!) and only she can cut my hair in a way that doesn’t make me look deranged.
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