Dances with DS

I think I landed today in the UK in my head. The body has been here for a few days but the head has refused to accept it. I always struggle to adjust after travelling and this time it’s been no exception.

I spent most of the morning walking miles through the car booty crowds that had turned out in full force. I bought some clothes…agggain!  My wardrobe is already in dire overflow but that is the problem with being a small size everything fits and feels good! One doesn’t even need to try things on which amazes me as this used to be the bane of my life when my body was big. All that contorting and effort only to still feel like nothing would ever feel right.

I also bought a deleriously kitsch pottery hen - not sure what possessed me really. Might have been the fact that the young woman selling it was trying to raise money to study. I am a sucker for a kid trying so hard.  This was compounded by the hope that alighted on the young sellers face as I picked up the darned thing. It’s only ‘£1.50′ she said.  Bless. How could I not?   Anyway the hen is now in my kitchen balefully waiting to be put to some use. Maybe it can hold eggs - how imaginative is that!  As if all this shop till one drops was not enough I spotted a turn of the century Japanese cabinet which I duly lugged back to the car. It’s suppossed to be ‘miniature’ but it weighed a ton. Each time I do this I think it is high time I invest in a ’shopper’. One of those bags on wheels my nan used to use. I can see the logic in it more & more.

I have also been reaping the benefits of home grown salad stuff out of my teeny patch. I’m on a salad drive at the moment and especially like eating ‘micro-cut’ salads.  Just red and orange peppers, cucumbers, raw courgettes, tomatoes - all very finely chopped. Into that my home grown salad lettuces again finely shredded, mizuna, land cress, coriander and chervil. The dressing is simple - balsamic syrup and vinegar, salt, pepper and good olive oil with a peppery aftertaste. The flavours and textures are fantastic and a little is acually a lot in terms of nutrient density. It’s great as a lunch with feta crumbled into it and cold meat/chicken on the side.

My garden is a joy.  I have been planting up New Guinea Impatiens in vivid pink colours. The sweet peas I planted before I left for South Africa are doing well and some of the roses are in bloom. Best of all my mud patch of grass (thanks to Ruby’s vigorous bull terrier playing)   that I reseeded, has formed a jewel green mat on the earth.  The Japanese Maples are in full leaf and  the rhodedendrons are heavy with deep cerise flowerheads. I spend as much time as I can out there pottering away getting my nails broken and hands dirty! Nearby is always my Robin friend - watching and waiting for a juicy worm as I turn the earth.  I call him ‘Mr Bright eyes’. He’s a gorgeous creature and getting tamer by the week.  Although I miss having a cat since my Foton died, the up side is that the garden seems to be full of birds now.

I’m slowly sorting through piles of pics of my Karoo trip. As I go through them I smile at the memories.  One day I will go back to this part of the earth and lay a fresh root there in some way. It has to be. I just don’t know how but there will be a way and when the time is right I will be gazing up at a night sky into a star filled galaxy once more.

For now I must focus on where I am. The new blog site needs to be finished so I can upload my pics more easily. There are necklaces to be strung and antiques screaming for restoration. There is loads to be done to my house…is it just me or does summer really show up all the areas of neglect in one’s space?  A belated spring clean is in order for the next few days. Oh the joys!

I have left my mountains and valleys and travelled through a Cape Storm at the start of the flight home that shook the plane so much I thought my DS might vibrate loose!  It was scary but it soon passed and the rest of the trip was okay.

In a month how England has changed!  It’s so pretty right now and my garden is abundantly growing and so green.

It’s wonderful to be with my darling hubby and children and dogs again too!

Still - I have a head of replay memories from being in the Karoo. The thing I love most about travelling is how one is just in the experience - unfettered by all the mental nonsense one perpetuates in regular daily life. Perhaps this is why some of us get the travel bug. When I travel I go into a pure mode of being totally open to the moment and I enjoy each and every hour of the day as if it was my first & last. Living like this is very good for me as I discard my unimportant little self to engage in Life with intensity.  It’s both therapy and meditation for me and each time I come back refreshed and feeling more psychologically free than before.  I always hope I will retain this way of being. But so far, unfortunately I soon get re-enmeshed in my anxieties, stresses etc. Still,  this time I did experience some very deep shifts in my psyche and I hope this blue sky of being that I feel does not cloud over too quickly this time!

I celebrated my  7th DS oppiversary in Cape Town.  I drove up over Boyes drive and looked out over false bay at the blue sea and I admit I had a lump in my throat. To be there and to be here as I am now. In this body that is no longer a prison of effort.  I can’t describe the lightness I feel in my limbs and my heart. There was a time I thought I was destined to become less and less able and eventually be bed ridden due to obesity. Yes, those were bleak years for me. I won’t ever forget but I also can see that in an inexplicable way all my suffering was neccessary. Even those years on the outskirts of Life in a body that was slowly suffocating me on every level.  Because of them I have learned a great deal about how it is to truly suffer, about fear, about the society we live in, about the body and it’s needs and most importantly what matters and what does not.

My DS remains a beautiful amazing blessing in my life. Without it travelling would have been a nightmare for me.   In the past month I have climbed mountains, walked miles without tiring, sat on a plane with much space in the seat and no dreaded pregnancy belt! (Will I ever forget that humilation pre-op - no.) I have eaten like a horse and had dessert every other day (and way too many sweets everyday too! South Africans have a dire sweet tooth and I am at my worst when I am in my birth country!). I only gained  2 kilo’s which is not bad considering the amount of illicit food I tucked into. I needed to gain a little more anyway…although old habits of panicking on any regain do die hard and I did baulk on the scale at first!  However in the mirror it’s not too bad at all! Little bit of a curve there now and I kind of like that.    I feel healthy and energetic. No one stared at me at any time, no one made shite comments about my weight. I only got positive comments from family and friends. My DS held up very well and since using high dose acidophilus it has only got even better…which I did not think was actually possible!   Best of all I could truly enjoy being with my little nieces.

And now - I enter year 8 of my DS this fine month of May.  If the next 7 years are as good as the past have been (let’s subtract one year worth of the bowel obstruction probs I had, maybe a month or two for when I curse the dratted piles!))…I’ll be made up.

I have regained my life and my zest for life since the surgery and I still thank my lucky stars for my DS every day.

I no longer obsess so much about bodily stuff. At least recently I have not…just one wee moment of old rehash on the scale which I was able to move past fast! So perhaps this phase of the journey is over?

I am aware of my DS, I support it, I am infinately grateful for it,  but it is only a part of my bigger picture now. For a long long time it was my entire picture and this was fair enough as living fulltime with a big surgery is a major longerterm adjustment (and it does’nt help that I am a slow learner!). But this has shifted recently into a more solidified state where  I see it as a catalyst - something that has given me the courage & wings to fly deep into my being with. Something that has brought me back to my real self (as long as I remember just who that self is!). And that is my greatest joy…not my DS per se.  But that is another story and one I am not sure I can fully verbalise just yet without it sounding like the mutterings of a mad hatter!

I was going to write a bit more about my time in the Karoo, but I think photo’s will tell it better so I will post up some in the next few days once I have re-located myself fully  and sorted them out.

Off to bed now - knackered after the long flight and subsequent ‘high’ of being back in my own home with my much loved family around me.

I’m having day disorientation. It must be 5 days already and I have not been able to clock into either time or internet! So I am scrapping the days idea and just writing as I land … right here, right now.

We have travelled deep into the Karoo now and stayed en route in an old B&B in Aberdeen. A typical but very sleepy Karoo Village with wide dirt streets and heat and dust. In Oudtshoorn, the day before we visited a wildlife center and saw white tigers and lions.

As we left Aberdeen we stopped for a coffee at a coffee shop called ‘Moer toe’ . I have never laughed so hard before as moer toe is a word that turns the hair on old religiously conservative people. I can’t find an exact english translation as it means so many things. Let’s just say it’s profoundly rude and tongue in cheek…basically it means ‘ totally fucked up.’  Still after deliberating the meaning with my family we can’t quite reach the meaning in English. The woman who runs it, Poppy is a fount of humour. The place itself is an artwork of discarded car parts, wire bits, bones, bobs. I went a bit fucked up myself and took so many pictures that today I had to buy a new memory card for my camera. I’ll post up my pics once I am back in the UK.

We are now on a farm deep in a bowl of mountains, 26 kilometers out of Graff-Reinet where the stillness is tangible. It’s incredibly beautiful. It places me back into being and sanity.

Yesterday we walked up the ‘Valley of desolation’. So aptly named. It’s a soul landscape of craggy mountain outcrops and towers where the land converges with the sky in an endless panarama. I don’t have words half the time to describe how vast, how profound it is. Better to just be quiet and drink in the mountain air and feel the hot rocks under one’s feet.

Right now I am sitting in a courtyard under an ancient vine eating yet again! Karoo people can cook a storm and I have not stopped eating it seems! Karoo lamb is often on the menu with sweet potato and spiced pumpkin. Breakfast this morning was eggs, bacon and mushroom, fruit and yogurt, muffins and thick sweet apricot jam. Preserved green figs in syrup and coffee to finish off. I am stuffed but still at it here in this restaurant courtyard.    Chicken livers and fresh salad and a milkshake that would feed 10 baby dsers for 3 days.

Problem is the food is so good and tasty! I have gained some weight I think but so be it! I’m not going to body fixate right now!

Yesterday and today we walk in ancestral land here in Graff-Reinet. In a local museum I saw my groot-oupa (great grandfather’s) photo. He shone off the walls. He was deeply loved by the people here and some still remember him for his kindness. He worked with underpriviledged children here and was a man who exudes light and peace. In remember him well.

I doubt I will get a chance to blog again before I get back to CT but who knows. I hope all of you, my friends and family are keeping well. 

We leave Prince Albert and move towards the Swartberg Pass. It’s gobsmackingly beautiful. My mouth hangs open at the sheer natural beauty of it. At first it reminds me of Petra in Jordan with a narrow cliff flanked entrance of mountain through which one drives. At the base of the mountains a pure river runs in small waterfalls and the rocks are full of yellow linchen, a sign of pure air. The road is steep and winding with precipuces (sp?) at the side. I get height fright but it soon evaporates in the light of the scenery.

Here rock & light and elements have created amazing sculptures. We drive and stop frequently to take it all in. I take a thousand photo’s knowing already that they won’t get close to the whole of it. I shall have fragments of recorded beauty only. But my mind will remember.

The landscape changes from dramatic cliff face to rolling farmland valleys as we leave the pass. Green and verdant pastures.  Farms nestled in crooks of the mountain base. It is wonderful how humanity survives out here away from the mainstream.

We visit the amazing Cango caves. We are taking into the literal bowels of the earth and for a moment I feel like I am standing in a huge colon!  Perhaps if I could climb into my body I would see similar if it was put under a microscope!

In the vast echoing cave sound is amplified. There are incredible formations of stalagtites and stalagmites. It’s hot and humid and I am glad I am no longer morbidly obese. There is a sweet lady infront of me and she is drenched in sweat. I feel for her silently.  I know her body is rubbing itself raw.

Not long ago a morbidly obese woman got stuck in the caves as she tried to enter a chamber. Took ten hours to get her out. Some say she deserved it. She’d been strongly warned she should not attempt to do what she did, but I still felt sorry for her. The humiliation must have been ghastly. I remember when a garden chair stuck to my bum once and how embarressed I was. It was small comp0ared with ten hours wedged into a cave wall gap, but it felt like an age to me. Poor woman.

On the way to Oudtshoorn we pass Ostrich farms. I feel bad that I eat Ostrich meat - a sudden sense of living flesh and guilt! They are such magnificent birds. I apologise telepathically, but they go on scratching in the rocky ground with prehistoric feet.

Later we arrive at my uncles and are joined by other family. We have a wonderful get together.  At the table my uncle says grace. I’m not religious but silently I too thank God for the blessings and family I have.

My Aunt cooks us ‘boerekos’. ‘Farmersfood.’  Bobotie,rice,potato’s,stewed dried peaches. Wonderful! I must get my Aunts recipe for Bobotie. It’s protein rich mince & egg in mild Cape curry. We talk and laugh at the table. My uncle Piet is a story teller by nature. He regales us with tales of the past. I’m so happy to be here.

So inordinately happy.

I’m sitting on the verandah of an old Victorian Guest house in Prince Albert in the Western Cape. Mai runs it - she’s a welcoming warm landlady of strong Irish roots with a big smile and a lilt in her voice. She has 12 cats! I love Mai instantly. She’s kind and authentically caring. She goes the extra mile to make one feel at home and has a bubbling sense of humour. Her home is an act of love and it shines with her joy in it. My room is big and spacious with crisp white linen and space. I’m in my element. Only wish we could stay longer.

We drove up from Cape Town. Through the Du Toitskloof Mountains, oh my heart!  As a child I used to drive through those mountains to visit my nana, my lovely nana. I was always filled with anticipation of seeing her again.  These are soul mountains and memories of my childhood came to me thick & fast.

We stopped in the little Victorian village of Maatjiesfontein and had lunch and tea there.  It’s a wonderful history preserved. Old Victorian houses flank the only road there is! We drove from there to where I am now - a stunning small Town called Prince Albert.  It is located in a ‘bowl’ of mountains, a wonderful place to be.

The Karoo is as it always is. Everything changes but nothing does. The shrub bushes in soft grey and green shades still die and grow. The mountains accompany the car for miles on end. It’s beautiful and mysterious.

It’s known as ‘the cradle of civilization.’  Not that you’d think it! One can drive miles and see only a few scattered settlements here and there. The sky is endless and blue. I’m filled with inner space too. A strange effect when somehow the inner and outer merge in a human being. My troubles are gone - evaporated into the splendour of everything. In cities I feel always a background hum of collective consciousness but here the stillness is striking.

In Prince Albert people just look so healthy. It must be the pure air and mountain water. People come to visit and end up staying. I can see why. The people are warm and helpful. Many would have fabulous sories to tell. Outside stories of life in other times and how they came to peace here. The food is simple but wholesome.  We ate out at a little restaurant for dinner.  I had feta ,spinach and lamb pie (left the pastry) and spiced pumpkin.

Before we left the village we stopped at Gays Dairy Farm. DSers paradise. They make wonderful cheeses and yogurts to die for. Reckon my gut will be very happy with an infusion of good bacteria. So far it has held up well.  Mind you I am bathroom conscious. If I see a window in a bathroom I feel happy - very pathetic I know!

In a bid to reduce the pong I’m taking mega strong acidophilus - double the dose. Only just started but interested to see if it helps nip the poopie pong in the bud.  Will probably take a few days.

I’ll clock in here when I can to update my journey. Internet connection is an on off state of affairs but so far so good! It could yet dry up on me, but with any luck I’ll be able to put down my thoughts here on and off.