Sunday, April 25, 2010

Ornamental warmth

My trampoline is warm. Wonderfully, wickedly warm. I love to lie on my stomach, basking like a lizard in the sun. Usually, I just lie and think about things. Today however, I am typing.

It’s an old-school kind; wrought iron frame, old rusted springs, a mat with missing thread. Repair jobs here and there. It has one repair, my favourite, with overlapping gray stitching. It was my mothers, as a child. On a Johannesburg plot. 1973.

My father made us dig the hole. Most of it anyway. Ok, some of it. He relented to hiring someone when we declared the digging of the hole an impossibility. One man dug the hole in an afternoon. We were three siblings, one boyfriend and two friends. My father had said we would appreciate it more. We did.

It came out of a big (enormous) steel box. The box was beautiful. Like a chest holding our new-found treasure.

Lying here, you see things from a different perspective. Like what the grass looks like at eye level. I love to look through the net, at the small pebbles and rust coloured autumn leaves beneath it. A splash of pink, fallen bougainvillea blossoms from across the yard. Some unexpected delights; one of our puppy’s many chew toys, a sucker wrapper faded pink (Cherry Fizz pop – the best kind). A small plant makes its way through the cracks of hard earth. The winter rains will drown it in due time but for now, it’s growing strongly. Maybe I’ll take the time to climb under and replant it – Geraniums usually – maybe I won’t. A hairclip?! The black mesh of the net provides a quirky offset to what lies beneath.

A lizard disrupted by my antics; funny company for a Saturday. It’s ok though, I’m in a funny mood. The springs are full of webs. Jumping spiders, always. Yuck. Peach pips, an indication of summer past. A Powerade label; my brother the obvious culprit.

I like the sides of the hole the most; deep crevices into the earth from the pick. Erosion from winter has worsened the cracks. Some are now deep caves. By July, this underground cove of wonder will be full of think green moss, exploding with little black beetles.

I like our trampoline. I like its imperfections. We don’t really use it too much anymore. Yet it is always here for us; for topics of heated debate that are sent outside, for a little midnight star-gazing, a quick way to get dry after swimming, some quiet time (my house is chaotic…always). Or a simple lie-in-the-sun. It’s always ready to share its warmth.

Not necessarily an over-sized ornament yet but already perhaps a sort of memory.

2 comments:

  1. Kez I love this! It's so descriptive and I really enjoy how you are able to take a simple thing like a trampoline and turn it into a description of your home life. Loved this!

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  2. I loved it also. I loved how you took the reader into a whole picture of your life - your use of descriptive languages was impeccable! By far, one of the best reads I've read in a while!

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