A Pa like mine

My father with the four of us, at some beacon somewhere
on one of our excursion, back in around  1969.

When we were little, Pa took us to the places he discovered during the course of his working week as an electrician. It sometimes took him deep into the bushveld and later into the rain forests around Tzaneen. We even did a spell of six months down in Cape St. Francis where he worked on the electrification of a brand new 5 star hotel.

      We lived in dire conditions in a little house we called "the train house" and I hated going to school in the nearby town of Humansdorp. Mainly because there were no grass playgrounds, only concrete and we traveled by bus, leaving home in the dark and wet of the Cape winter mornings. Accustomed to the dry, mild winters of the Lowveld,  we felt truly miserable. But I remember best how we used to run up and down the corridors of the hotel, the smell of brand new carpets and a newly thatched roof. Looking through the windows from the second floor one could see far out over the sea. We often pretended to be princesses, living in a huge deserted castle.

       Soon we were back in the Lowveld though, and we spent many a weekend scrambling after Pa up some mountain trail and picknicking at a waterfall or mountain stream. Some of these places became firm favorites that I still visit whenever I have the chance, especially the Debegeni waterfall in the rain forests of Magoeba's Kloof.

Us sisters with my father on his 77th birthday in March 2013

     My parents, having spent their own childhood in cities, decided to venture into the unknown to raise us in a more rural setting than they themselves were raised in. My sister and I were mere toddlers at that stage. I will be ever thankful for this brave move. 

     Even though we never settled in one place for very long, nature was our constant companion and played a big part in nurturing in each of us a deep respect and love for the natural world. 

      My father outlives my mother, who passed away nearly ten years ago, and he is becoming frail now. He seems to be slipping away into his own world more and more lately. Not much brings a smile or any sign of excitement to his face. 

     Quite unexpectedly, this morning around the breakfast table he regaled a few of the memories he has of our childhood days. I haven't heard him talk about those days in many, many years and at times have wondered whether it was so unimportant to him that he has forgotten about them.

      It touched me deeply as he sat laughing, his face lighting up at the images that were jumping into his mind soon to disappear like thin morning mists at the sun's first rays as he tried to put words to them. But I could fill in the gaps. I was there when we couldn't find the Eerste Rivier in the Cape where we were to meet family for lunch. We picknicked on some obscure little beach instead where my father packed a fire and braaied the meat that would have been our share for the meal at the family getogether. We used flat rocks, washed well with salt water, for plates. What a grand, wild day that was!

Lucky me. To have a Pa like mine. 

Matilda