Picture Perfect ~ Nostalgic

Welcome to

Picture Perfect

this week the theme

is

Nostalgic

Liv

Silk and Denim

It was cream silk, with a gathered waistband.

It was daringly off the shoulder and although the hemline fell just below the knee, I used to hitch it up under a belt and wear it short too. I sometimes let it fall off one shoulder, sometimes both..either way I loved the feeling of the cream coloured silk on my skin. I loved the way it fitted and moulded around my body, the way it showed off my skin tones and shape of my hips.I felt glamourous, feminine and grown up. I wore it with high heels, and with flat sandles, I wore it barefoot. I wore it in every season, with jackets and without, to dine in and to play in, and to classes. I think I slept in it on a few occasions.

I bought it with my first pay-cheque when I was 17 as a first year student nurse, and and I wore it for almost 15 years. Long after I had given birth, breastfed and burped three children I discovered quite suddenly that I loved that dress even more with baby puke on the shoulders.

I bought that dress the same year I bought my bib overalls, those I wore with white t-shirts and white sneakers..never with anything else Im not sure why. I rolled up the legs when it warm, and left them down when it was cold. Those dungarees wore straight through the knees and the buttons came off the sides, and I kept them hanging on the end of my bed for ever, waiting for the day i would find time to mend them and sew the buttons back.

But I never did.

My hair was always short in those early student days, I drove an old blue 1200 Datsun with mismatched hubcaps, into Johannesburg to college all the way from the East Rand. A commute of about 30mins in dense traffic, music blaring. I loved the sense of bohemian freedom, and that the sense of responsibilty of my studies never weighed too heavily on my shoulders. I was doing what I loved, and the rest would take care of itself.

Those were the days of late nights and little sleep, nights spent listening to live renditions of the Mama's and Papa's with friends in the then Ambassador Hotel in the middle of Hillbrow, the hub of Johannesburg's nightlife.

They were the years of Rag queens and all night float making, the grand Rand Show and weekends spent travelling back to Swaziland to visit the folks. The years of gathering stuff from flea markets and acquiring my eclectic taste in furniture and fabric.

My years of silk and denim.

Of sitting through the Rocky Horror Picture Show four times in four days, of LM radio and the crazy crazy voice of John Berks. Those were the years spent pouring over anatomy and physiology books late into the night before exams, and taking patients home with me in my head after each shift at work, it was about the tears shed for the homeless man who had lice and bedsores because he had lain in the gutter for three days before being admitted to hospital, and of becoming personally involved with a child who had been purposefully burned with a cigarette butt by her own mother ...and then testifying in court. It took me years to learn distance and objectivity. Im still not good at it.

Those were the years when I hadnt yet learned that every action has a reaction, even though some actions have a really remarkably long time between their execution and their come-uppance.

The sweet time before personal pain and true loss. It took years for me to realize that I had gained more, learned more, retained more in those years than I would ever have believed possible.

My silk years edged with denim....

Winter V People

wasnt me?

Dont you just hate days like this?

Then and Now

Happy Birthday

on Inauguration day

4yrs ago I was here

with you

Stair Master

too cute not to share

Resting comfortably...

..verrrry comfortably!

my motto for the new year

Senga

My little girl is having surgery for exploration of a mass in her abdomen tomorrow and the removal of a tooth which she broke a few days ago, which has fractured down into the root.

So spare her a sweet thought at around 10am tomorrow...

Life is a walk in the park...

I took my camera with me on my freezing cold walk today, gosh we had a high of 40F today, with overnight lows in the 20's...jeesh its been cold, but oh the winter sunsets are spectacular in these parts! Im so lucky to have this open green space near my apartment, I walk the dogs here everyday and run along the bicycle route. Pools of water have formed everywhere after the heavy rains, and often there will be a random duck or goose swimming away as though the little psuedo lakes have always been there.

today the clouds were wild and imposing, the sun hitting the windows on the nearby houses made it seem as though the lights were on..

becoming more and more dramatic

I loved the hole in the sky reflection in this one...:)

the sun popped through the clouds for a minute

and blazed gloriously

before slipping into black

The last photo..

I was looking through some pictures for a friend of Jonathan's and found this last family photo..bittersweet...my beautiful children....Dec 1995

About a Boy

The day you lose someone you love more than life itself shouldn't be one with such clear brilliant skies, it shouldn't smile down on you with promises it cant keep, there shouldn't be rainbows..or a light wind..it shouldn't be the perfect day for fishing...

If it had rained that day, or if there had been even the slightest hint of a storm, of lightning..of high winds, then two boys wouldn't have pushed a little row boat into the middle of a lake, and sat and cast out their lines into the blue green depths of the Dap Naude dam. They wouldn't have chatted about this paradise, they wouldn't have shared a hurriedly packed breakfast as they sat dangling their feet over the edge of the small wooden craft.

They wouldn't have had to wake so early, and sneak out to the nearest fishing ground, they certainly wouldn't have caught their biggest rainbow trout, and they wouldn't have stood and wobbled the boat as they did so. They wouldn't have laughed, and maybe Jonathan wouldn't have slipped and he wouldn't have bumped his head, not even a little, and he wouldn't have made that quietest deadliest splash.. he wouldn't have disappeared beneath cold cold water on a hot summers day, to the world beyond.

There wouldn't have been police, and divers, and reporters and TV cameras trying to pry the horror that was my world, there wouldn't be newspaper reports, and typing errors, and pictures of his beautiful face. There wouldn't have been a vigil for 4 days by his father and his brother..and me, while his sister cried bitter tears waiting at home. We wouldn't have had to wait, and wait, and wait until Wednesday.

There wouldn't have been rainbows across darkened skies, and rain on the road, on the car as we drove home silently with one less child. I wouldn't have had to hate God or need him this much. I wouldn't have had to be brave, much braver than this, or sad much sadder than this.

Yet if that January day hadn't been so brilliantly beautiful, and the rain had poured and kept them safely indoors, or if he had contracted some weird and wonderful debilitating tummy bug that would have kept him in bed all day and all night, then perhaps I wouldn't still see rainbows and feel love as deeply as I do today. Maybe my children wouldn't be as tender to others, and maybe my grandchildren wouldn't be this happy, or even born, and my grandson wouldnt share his middle name. My mother wouldnt cry as easily Im sure, and others wouldnt have to ask why. Perhaps the sun wouldn't shine as brightly, the rain wouldn't fall as gently and maybe songs wouldn't have a deeper meaning.

Because maybe just maybe his life was all lived, in exactly the way it was meant to be. I like to believe that somewhere still he chases rainbows made more brilliant because they shine through the tears of all those who across time and in far lands.. love him still...

RIP our Jono 7.4.1979 ~ 8.1.1995

Apartment update

I found some fabric that I loved, sheer enough to let in the light but enough privacy protection

A closer view. Oh i fiddled with various blue bottles before settling on these

now that Ive sanded the chairs, I keep draping different fabric over them trying to make my mind up...lol

my zebra oil painting which I bought yesterday, is my new delight..gosh it just brightens the whole room..I love it. An original oil on cnavas for $80 in a thrift store...:) Im so glad I spotted it, the shop was sooo packed with stuff!

and then these are my new (old) little footstools..

Cats are sooo entertaining....

Wordless Wednesday

wherein I take the picture and you post the caption

(taken in south africa ..LOVE this shot!)