A rainbow in my window

Of raibows and crayons...

Generally, people have a very similar attitude when it comes to traffic; KILL ME NOW.

Think arrogant drivers, smog surroundings, stuck-in-the-wrong-lane-having-you-miss-your-off-ramp incidents, vehicles far from road-worthy, being cut-off, illegal lane changes that have you almost losing your head/tail lamps, the I-can-text-while-I’m-driving professionals. I have no intention of tallying up the number of bad drivers in Cape Town/JHB/KZN South Africa...if you want the specifics (ref. 2008), click here...but oh, they do exist. This I know from experience (I will admit to also being one of them).

Then there is the what-a-waste-of-my-time factor; having to leave your home when its as dark and cold as witches breath outside. Aggravation intensified by broken fans, pathetic heaters, that damn icing over of every window in the vehicle at sub-arctic temperatures that are often to be experienced the length of the drive. In Cape Town, well, just about anywhere, that drive is often symbolically long for all who participate in it.

Yup, you’re all thinking, ‘kill me now’.

But I have discovered a wonderful new way of getting through my on-average three hours a day spent driving in traffic. It came with the sudden realisation that I have been doing it all along.

My car window is a frame to the world.
Cape Town is a particularly beautiful world, especially on a clear, crisp morning.

I have seen works of the most beautiful colour contrasts; sunrises of orange and pink, sunsets of deep blue and red. Vineyard landscapes, rows of perfectly positioned vines – a funny notion considering vines left to grow do so wildly, without constraints they grow across and over one another. The moon, big and round as lemon cheesecake in a splash of deep ocean blue, mountains covered in snow. Small forests, electricity sub stations of enormous wire constructions in contrast. Rainbows and water dancing over glass in heavy rains. Abandoned buildings amongst new architecture, ships coming in to port and eery mist or heavy cloud cover coming in off of the sea, Van Hunks and his pipe over Devil's Peak; works of Cape Town, of the people in this city, its myths and surrounds.

I have found that it is the way of the world, of society, to look and reminisce than to experience first hand the pictures the world paints. This may be because we spend our whole lives sitting in the foreboding traffic, as opposed to filling our time with worthwhile experiences.

MENTAL NOTE: to try and do more than merely appreciate from a distance (that is often my car) but to experience at arms reach the five senses of life.