I've got the TV on - it's Olympic season after all. And I'm reading my book, but also snoozing just a bit because late night last night. I look up at the TV, and there she is: The Mother City. The Fairest Cape of them all. It is also Lion Rugby season.
I don't think I'll ever tire of that view of the place I was born. I look at it with true fondness and love. And yes, the front of Table Mountain wasn't the view I had every day (the back of it was though) BUT I can look at this frozen image on my TV screen and memory walk 'there's where my Nana lived, there's where we walked on the Prom. There's where CG went nose to nose with a squirrel, where Nhandi lived. Where Su and I had our near escape with death. Co-ordinates of my tattoo. The place where I had my belly button pierced. Where Catty took me jolling. Where I played pool - danced on a table - did tequila, danced in a sweaty room with my favourites. Oh the places I have gone. In that city. The emotions I have ridden. The place that will always be in me.
I look at the date and realise that it's been two years since my feet touched African soil. 2 years ago I was walking around my apartment in Pretoria, making sure I had everything. I was ready to head to the airport - I had made some choices and then decisions, and knew that there would be difficult conversations ahead with an individual. I thought I knew what the future held. But Covid and 2020 truly put all that to rest. But not wholly in a bad way. It is what it always is. But I did think I'd go back to Pretoria and I can't see that happening because travel is just not what it was yada yada yada.
I wonder about if it's Africa or if it's Cape Town that squirrels it's way into you. I think it might be both. I know it's a place with a lot of difficulties but I'm not here in this moment to talk about that. I'm thinking about how fierce I feel - how passionate I feel when I look at the city bowl and yearn to just be there. The love I have for the city and surrounds. I'm not even sure that makes sense. I'm not even sure it's about memories. It's about a feeling. My heart swells. I look down there and I can pinpoint The Gardens, a place I still know every inch of (well most of the inches, I'm sure there's inches I've missed) and maybe it's just about connections. If I swing back to where I am now, I know that I can look at certain bits of Hastings and feel that same kind of connection. Or maybe it's the sense of belonging. I know when I'm in Cape Town, I feel that I belong somewhere.
One picture, I look at one picture and that's what I feel. I don't think many people get that.
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