No TV, Just Life: What's in a home?

As I expected, this is not turning out to be a good weekend – the main interference being the power-outage scheduled for tomorrow from 8:00 – 17:00. We’re not 100% sure whether we will be affected, but it’s quite likely. Which means that everything requiring electricity has to be done today. Laundry, dishes, everything. Worst of all, since there’s no guarantee the power will definitely be back no later than 17:00 – there’s a good chance I won’t have hot water tomorrow night. As in not before ten at night. The municipality sees no problem with cutting power all day for maintenance then switch off my geyser from six to eight tomorrow night – and it takes more than an hour to re-heat 100 liter from cold in winter.

The weather has been weird all day as well, it was overcast when I got up, then cleared up then turned cloudy again and now it’s all clear. Not a drop of rain, though. Not much to tell today, spent half the day doing laundry, etc then spent an hour or two, maybe even three, in the garden.

While in the garden, I got thinking. Home. What it means. I guess most people associate Home with their childhood, the place where they grew up. You ask anybody where they’re from and they have an answer – actually, I don’t know anybody else who, like me, has no answer. My sister, maybe, but she may think of Neulautern as home, I don’t know. I just know that I don’t. I’ve lived in and around Pretoria for thirty years – but it doesn’t feel like Home. Never has. Sure, it’s familiar and there are a lot of memories there – and the cemeteries are full of people I’ve known. I was watching an episode of Bones, and they described this hoarders flat as ‘an anthropological microcosm of this man’s life’ – and that really is what Home is all about, isn’t it? Not the hoarding – I’m working on that, promise! No, but Home – a welcoming, warm home is full of memento's, photo’s, books, papers collected throughout one’s life. Some stored in the attic, some out on display. The cutlery set I have was a wedding gift to my parents. I’ve always loved that set, and when my mum bought a new one shortly before she died – I was glad to bring the cutlery I’ve used all my life home. Take a walk through my home, there’s Ernie, the teddy put into my crib even before I was born. In front of him is the monkey we got at Pals – yes, there’s a story, but it’s too long for now. And there’s the photo of the three Menzels in the Kruger Park. It was so funny when we were driving back my mum navigating, I was driving and kept asking if she’s sure we’re on the right road, yes, of course she’s sure! She’s a tour guide and she’s been here many times before. As we drove on her certainty began to evaporate until she finally, in a small voice, suggested that maybe it would be a good idea to turn around. All the way back she was lecturing herself – I had a really hard time not laughing out loud! Then, in the spare room, the books. Oh, how I lost myself in those books so many rainy days – and sunny ones, too! And there is the diary I tried to write when I was ten. I could go on and one – my home truly is an anthropological microcosm of my life. Ups, downs, good and bad, happy and sad.

I may not have a home-town, or a place where-I’m-from – but, like a snail, my Home is where I live. It’s all here. We all need some form of home, somewhere we belong. And in my case, it’s not geographical – it’s in the contents of my home. Most of which is not worth much – but the memories are priceless!

I was going to add some of the photo’s I took in my garden today, but for some reason I can’t access them, so I’ll Update this post with the photo’s tomorrow … either early morning, or evening. Or maybe I even get lucky and the power outage won’t affect me! Yeah, right – I know, not likely. But I’m an optimist!

And here the promised photos!