When you arrive it is abit overwhelming, like being the last in class on your first day at school and everyone has already got the brief and knows what to do, and the teacher looks really busy and you don’t really want to disturb her.

But you do.

“Hi, i’m here to volunteer what do you need done.”

She surveys the area and we both take in the magnitude and scale of donations and my question seems quite silly much like asking where to put the plaster on the chopped off leg.

Yet there is order to the chaos and she starts pointing out piles that need to be sorted.

“ok, all the curtains, blankets, suitcases, bedding need to go around the garage so that it can be loaded into the container that should be here any minute, all this stuff *she points to furniture and other odd ments* furniture over the fence into the play area and then baby stuff on the balcony, clothes over there and we need all this *she points to piles and piles of sarmies * needs to be loaded into a bakkie for delivery into Masi to the various feeding points. Any toiletries need to go inside as they are making care buckets”

It looks like Cape Town has cleared out its cupboards and garages. Seriously, there is so much stuff.

But there are also 5000 people who have lost everything.

I pick up the crates loaded with sarmies and start loading the bakkie, inside and out and once its ready Sibu is coming with to show me where to go.

Masi on any given Saturday is a chaotic carnival of smells and sounds and traffic and people and commerce.  The further in we drive the more signs of the fire you can see, folks carrying large bags and TV’s clutching small children moving slowly.

“where are they all sleeping? I ask Sibu

“anywhere they can find a space, maybe with someone from a village they are from in Eastern Cape”

I’m wondering how 5000 people who could not even fit into the space that has burnt down are now fitting into even tinier spaces, its almost biblical, like the loaves and fishes.

We are now quite deep in and the smell of the fire is heavy, large trucks are racing past stacked with the burnt out remainders of peoples lives, teams of guys are carrying burnt out corrugated sheets that honestly look like they should be dumped but according to Sibu they will be used for the walls, and IF *big IF* the City issues starter packs which for overseas folks, is some metal sheets, timber and nails which is to help you rebuild after your shack has burnt down. There are enough township fires for this to be a thing, except COVID and now there is no budget left for Disaster Management and coupled with theft from Covid funds there isn’t money left for these residents who are relying solely on this and don’t know if its happening yet.

There is a very strong police presence and a UniMog of Red Ants which is to prevent land invasions because trying to stake out your space after your shack has burnt is critical – there are hundreds who will snake your space and while the ground is still burning you will see people waiting anxiously to secure their place so they can rebuild and not lose their spot.

The roads are super narrow no pavements, cars double parked children running in and out of traffic and Taxis screaming down roads where you throw your hands up and close your eyes because you are convinced they are going to smash your car, but they don’t, they know their space down to a hair breadth, its impressive and terrifying at the same time. 

The road in front of us has been closed and there are Metro Cops everywhere,  our connection to meet us at the first place wasn’t there so we are heading to the next drop off. As I round the corner there are guys with arms around girl friends and hands cradling quarts, the Shebeens are pumping music and braai grids are everywhere covered in chicken feet, small spaces house salons and wriggling kids are having their hair braided while guys are getting slick hair shaved designs – as I said, its a crazy carnival –

I’m waved down the closed roads the cops moved aside for us and i’m still wondering where we are dropping when Sibu quickly waves me over  as I see a very long snake of humans 5 deep all waiting. I pull over into a drain and as I get out i can see its raw sewerage and other rubbish. Its hard to describe but down an alley we hop and skip carrying the crates of sarmies, loads of greetings are yelled to me, there are hundreds of little barefoot people clutching their protein drink and a piece of bread, one child is sipping from a tap attached to the side of a container, barefoot ashen dirty men carrying more twisted pieces of metal they have salvaged, it is beyond description because on any normal day ….this is normal. There are 6 Community Mama’s who have taken it upon themselves to dish out the food, one is breastfeeding a baby but both her hands are taking bags of food from me while she is issuing instructions and telling off a guy for trying to jump the Queue.

They sit there unflinching yet fluid in their task, speaking to each one, pushing back the crowd *who all know and wait patiently* handing out a carton of cultured milk and a pack of bread that’s been made into sarmies.  Looking down the alley way is just a stream of people and children and dogs and garbage, jumping over open drains everyone navigates up and down. Trains of people moving things.

And across the road the party continues, the heads are braided, the beers are drunk, the taxis are flying, couples are strolling hand in hand laughing no sign of the disaster on the other side of the road.

I just could not get my head around this polar existence within this traumatic environment.  Let alone the polar opposite world that exists outside this township.  It is beyond tragic. That people are so desperate for housing they will build their houses in the spaces that are to be left open for fire trucks, knowing what fate potentially awaits them and their children.

I ended the day packing care buckets of toiletries. A toothbrush ,toothpaste, deodorant, toilet roll, razor, face clothe, pack of sanity pads, soap, washing powder, hand sanitizer, mask, shampoo. These are being handed out tomorrow.

And 5000 people will need to be fed again.

Its funny, we lived on the edge of Table Mountain National Park for many years, our rodents were plenty, our snakes were free and our birds knew when to squawk.

The Fish Eagle …bless its socks…would fly by at a very respectable 10.37 am ..maybe 11

( who knows, the fishing may have been THAT good that a sleep in was required) but it would fly over quite high not stoned although, i’ve never tested one, i’m more thinking altitude, and release its gentle bellow over the skies .

I’d stop my work and look up in wonder “aah…that’s stunning” i’d say to myself or whatever dog was under my feet, maybe i’d run out and see if I could see it gliding in the thermals like some adrenaline junky before it plunges to earth and grabs a rabbit or mouse.

My expectation of living on the last wild bit of land with nothing between us and the sea but acres of Port Jackson interspersed with fynbos ,a nuclear lake and some horses was that it would resonate with the noisy sounds of wildlife. The mouse in my dishwasher making pancakes with the cinnamon I sprinkled in the futile attempt at discouraging it from nesting was not the noise I had in mind though and apart from that ….all (as they say in the classics) was quiet in the land.

Until we moved to Suburbia.

Granted the house is perched on the rocky slopes of Elsies Peak and the back of the property has been handed over to a jungle of rock, wild dagga, nasturtians and………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………birds.

Growing up in this house my father was adamant that we could never ever have cats because they will chase away the birds! I’ve had many post life conversations with him recently at 3.45am about this law and that he was wrong. Wrong. Wrong WRONG!

You people moan about Hadeda’s….ffs….amateurs.

Hadeda’s at least have the cognisance to go to sleep so even though their gut wrenching yells at 5.32am are annoying…at least that’s the only time they yell.

Ladies and Gents let me introduce you to the Guinea Fowl!

The Tik Addict of the neighbourhood.

They strut around in their hoodies all pumped up yelling at each other, picking fights with random shiny car rims with no concept of time as its reach for the lazers all night long! They are who Lionel Richie wrote about all those years back but these dudes are next level. Its fights and bitch slaps at 2am…then they move from the front of the house to the back of the house and those that manage to fly somehow perch drunkenly on a wire and screech from there.

When we moved my concern *to be honest* was a host of other things…so when the teens stumbled out in the morning looking more hungover than a teen after Karaoke at the Bell on a school night except this time they were tucked up in bed…I had to say with a worried look

“did Nana’s snoring keep you up last night ?”

“MOOOOOOOMMMMMM” they bellowed….

“Its the birds!!!!!!”

Next thing I see in the Google search is “how to scare birds away without killing them but if they have to die by mistake thats ok as well”

#birds #hadeda #assholes #guineafowl

Its safe to say that we are in the birthing of some major change, and with that change comes alot of blood,snot, trane and wtf.

When planning the move part of the merging was the animals. We have 4 dogs and my mom has 3. It was always going to be messy considering the fact that her two Jack Russels are psychotic. But that was not the issue. The issue was sitting curled up on the foot of my bed purring contently without a care in the world and nor should he. He is 17, has outlived most of the dogs we have rescued over the past 17 years (apart from Bella) he has moved house 3 times and attacked more dogs than I have kept track of. The sign saying “Dogs are cool beware of the Cat” pretty much applies to Tigger. So while gently stroking his furry stomach and then extricating his claws from my fore arm I realised that no matter how much of an issue I perceived the dogs to be……the cat trumps all. His problem is he doesn’t back down, if the dogs are growling outside he scampers out and picks a random fight just for fun, we used to have 2 other cats…..now there is just him…..coincidence? I think not.

I began obsessing. I couldn’t sleep. I had visuals of Search and Destroy the 2 little psycho’s ripping him apart. I saw him attacking them and then getting ripped apart. I am not even kidding you I have seen these little shits hunt rats in the back garden and those rats are the size of the cat and it was two bites and a shake and the rat was finished and Klaar Game Over! I cried. I stressed some more until my wiser half said “ffs…we are not changing our life plan because of a cat, get a grip we’ll lock it in the room he can live with us end of story.” ………………..and so it went. I did not stress that we were moving out of our house, or moving to another country, or having to look for new jobs, or changing schools for my kid, selling our furniture, selling our house (sob) or any other 1 million other things that lay in front of me…..all I obsessed over was the cat.

So we moved into my moms house as part of our interim plan, the dogs have had some fur flying, most dramatically when one of the Russels chomped the tail of our terrier/type mutt which resulted in a Friday the 13th type scenario where the tip of her tail was spurting blood and the more she wagged her tail the more the blood sprayed everywhere, the walls, the other 6 six dogs, the floors …alles…it was comical and messy and very superficial. The cat stayed in the room.

Until the cat didn’t stay in the room, because he is an asshole like that and basically wont be told what to even if it was by his panicked humans who didn’t want to see him become dog sushi

No, Tigger cruised the house, he found his way outside, he eyeballed the other old dog and omitted a guttural hiss that NONE of us had ever heard before btw, and the Russels have learnt about claws and cat spit and cat biscuits which are sometimes just not worth the risk involved to sneak in and steal them, but they will now not make eye contact, they will not even LOOK at him. Because why? Because HE OWNS THE WORLD.

And here is the sage advice and words of wisdom called the Cat Theory. How many times in life do we spend worrying over shit? I know I did and do. I worried relentlessly over something that never happened. Nada. There never was a cat issue. There was a Lynn issue. As ridiculous as it sounds everytime now that I panic over something that hasn’t happened Grier yells at me “CAT THEORY” and I throw a book at him and I move on.

A soon to be ex-group of friends loaded me onto a “Tuesdays fun at Jacobs Ladder” whatsap group.
They usually meet at 8am while i’m thankfully still stuck in Kommetjie traffic, I say thankfully now because before that it was always a FOMO thing but to be fair by the time I could even get there they are showered, have checked emails and possibly made dinner (except Mel on the dinner bit)
But today I was feeling the need to squeeze out the last bit of dust in my lungs, sweat out the gin remnants and get my steps up for the week.
It started fine, perky in fact is a word I would have used to describe me, me not my boobs, those were elastoplasted down with no chance of movement, the uniboob is a real thing.
I stopped halfway to take a pic of the view sent it to the group “where are you mofo”s…i’m mildly heaving but still capable of talking “
…the pic I get back is of GOT season 8 and a cup of coffee with the words “if you can still talk you not doing it hard enough”
wtf…….so on i continued while my vision clouded over somewhat and I eventually reached the skew 10 steps just before you reach the top, just as you have lost all sense of balance, the ringing in your ears is so loud for a small moment you look for the ice cream guy but the taste of blood in your mouth overrides any thoughts you may have towards eating and you are pretty sure you are chewing your kidney.
As I collapsed at the top nearly taking out a surprised jogger who had the dexterity to nimbly jump over my shaking corpse I looked down at my phone and saw that Huawei Health had kindly done the sums and my reward was…
“you have done 141 steps only 9 859 to reach your daily goal.”
I would have vommed slightly if there were no CCTV cameras.

I  am a  total fan, bought the book, stalked the pics, and when trying to make a comment realized that we were “infact” not friends on Facebook. Sucks, as while i’m trolling through all the privileged  friends who were allowed to comment  I am SCREAMING in my head…”you cant just put LOL on this you chop, its genius! I could come up with more than LOL” So I friend requested Ben Trovato and was denied. Did you even know that Facebook has capped the friends amount at 5000? No? me either.

Now i’m not prone to stalking, he doesn’t need that restraining order just yet i’ve got my quota of kids, dogs and a quite accommodating Kiwi to take long romantic walks on the beach with while arguing over whose turn it is to pick up the shit from one of the 3 precious pooches before it taints the ocean.

Stalking is not fun.

What IS fun and quite a few likeminded moms who also drink wine and facebook will agree with is delving into the world of the Facebook Community Forum.  Its not to share idea’s on lunchboxes or find the best place for a brazillian wax (please only personal referrals) but generally to read the comments.  The ones regarding kids health posts  fry my little brain and make me question life, the universe and everything.  It shows time and time again that while we need a licence to drive a car and be 18 before purchasing booze, which VERY strangely co-incides with the legal age to drive a car and I do not understand the logic there at all, one (or two) can apparently procreate at will or leisure, make offspring and then go and ask on a forum:

“my child has a temperature for the past 10 days and is bleeding from the eyeballs and growing fungus from its head should I give it turmeric”

What is then equally disturbing is the barrage of “give him an epsom bath ” “use rooibos tea” “have you tried celery?” “vinegar scrubs work well”…….

………………………..and when I eventually wrote…..”ffs take your kid to the doctor instead of putting his health in the hands of 17 895 non medically trained strangers” she replies

“no need to be rude I was just asking”

At least she didn’t use CAPS.

My friend recently posted about a lost dog and some woman got totally CAPS LOCK IN HER REPLIES, WHICH WERE LANK FUNNY TO READ, especially when told politely by someone that CAPS means shouting and she should possibly tone it down and chill out she then replied :

“I AM CHILLED, I AM THE MOST FUN LOVING PERSON THERE IS!!!!!!”

When I thanked her for the funniest thread i’d read all day, she thought I meant threat, it could have gone pear shaped, but I showed restraint.  Forums are funny like that.

With a freshly poured grape derivative coursing through my veins i’m off to check my friend requests Its almost as exciting as the time I was chatting to Jimmy Fallon on Instagram, not so much the time I recently thought Ed Sheeren liked my picture as my friend pointed out that a computer is set up to like all the hashtags – saying #edsheerancapetown.

As they used to say on Hill Street Blues….”lets be careful out there”.

For my 46th birthday I received a chronic hypertension diagnosis.  I’m super stoked because (da da daaaaa) i’m now eligible for all sorts of free stuff on my medical aid, you know, fun stuff like ECG’s, blood tests and medication.  Actually scrap the medication part as they are apparently not paying for pills that cost R135.00 that actually stop me from having a stroke at the tender and young age of …46 ( i need to roll it around in my mouth for abit, like one of those humbugs that last forever) But this post isn’t about that.

Nor is it about my surprised husband who genuinely thought I was 47. All those years of incorrectly written birthday cards came flooding back to him while he silently placed my steaming cup of love next to my bed  and then he started smiling as he realised how young his babe really was! Guess who got the gift after all….

But no, its not about that either.

It was about the photos he put on Facebook.

BTW……Facebook is the best place for a 46 year old on their birthday.  I LOVE IT!!!!!! Gazillions of messages, random pics from friends while doing fun things, whats not to love?

So the photos posted were taken quite a few years back circa 2001 I am holding a super chilled Tara (not much has changed except the length of my hair and her size) but looking at each of those pictures made me realise how for most of my existence I have not been happy with my physical traits.  These are things dealt out to me in my DNA gene pool that my mom and dad carefully …um…cultivated? is that even appropriate? lets move on..so basically not things like a penis on my head, or scales on my back or 3 nipples..(ok, so i did get 3 nipples but the amount of entertainment it caused and endless Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy jokes we could make about the Triple breasted Whore from Erotica was TOTALLY worth it!)

No, it was things like freckles, like being too tall and devising stupid ways to stand in the back of a lineup so that your head didn’t pop out above everyone elses, hair that was apparently too thin, too short, too curly, too frizzy, eyes not blue enough, not having a dimple (damn you Standard 4 Lorna for having those perky little ditches in your cheeks)being too young, being too old, legs too skinny, butt too fat, freckles again, ffs…the list goes on!

And here i am.

Loving my freckles makes my face interesting, height? LOVE IT concerts rock I get to see out and not into some sweaty back, legs too skinny? really..?all the years of hating my hair it turned 46 and gave me the middle finger and said “NOW you can have what you have been bitching about all these years….”

to cut a long story short my gift I am giving myself is acceptance.  As I slowly exhale in relief.

I am privileged to be having a birthday, there are many others who are not as lucky. And for that and everything else I am truly grateful.

For too long now as a young girl and now as a woman I have kept quiet.  Afraid to offend, or worse, afraid to embarrass myself by assuming that the insidious whistle, clucking, smootching, “heybabyyyyyy” that was just belted out was not infact for me but for some beautiful girl walking behind me that I cannot see and by yelling back “youdoes!” i’m actually lining myself up for a fat snotklap of laughter as if i’m not worthy of these noises.  Pathetic I know right?

So it would make sense that when my daughter came home stupendously pissed off after receiving such “insert whatever kak it is that men decide to hurl at woman as they drive past” remarks my head hit panic.

“Scream and yell and tell them what assholes they are”….wait no….what if that pisses them off and they come BACK and instead of verbal abuse actually physically attack her.

“Ignore them my love just pretend you didn’t hear them”.  HOW the fuck can she not hear them??? What message am I telling her to lower her head and keep quiet? To allow this verbal wave of abuse to flow over her and that it shouldn’t affect her. To pretend it didn’t happen.

But not to antagonize them.

Not to enrage them.

So that she is safe.

When in the history of manness has “tssk tssk” ever landed you the woman of your dreams? That they think …strike that. They don’t think.  I don’t get it and it pisses me off.

SO….imagine that while i’m running my little 5km route along from Fish Hoek to Glencairn, its pretty, no wind and the ocean is chilled and i’m in my zone and counting off the minutes and paces as my buddy Mel has coached me to do “we’ll get you back in the mountains in no time!! Just do this 3 x a week “.  If  that sage advice was an antibiotic i’d have relapsed i’m afraid as this is possibly the first time in 2 weeks…mmm…3 ok. Anyway, I digress.

I’m running, or doing that thing i do that isn’t quite a walk, and the only stares or interaction i’d expect from anyone is to ask if I need medical assistance, apart from that i’m pretty sorted. Sweaty, old orange hat, husbands T-shirt, my socks don’t match my tekkies, glorious, just as advertised on Runners World  #nailedit

I’m digesting the latest remarks about “sexist harassment while running” from my  daughter and trying to find some pearls of wisdom on how to cope with it when a man rides past on his bicycle dressed in overalls, i’m assuming on his way to work, and as he glides (a generous use of words as his style didn’t lead to me believe he does this for fitness)  by he lets off a “heybaybee” with a few lip smacking adjectives. Now seriously, the tyre around my waist is bigger than both his on his bike I look like shit, nothing “haybaybee” about me at all!

and my years of silent rage erupt. “FUCKYOU IF I CATCH YOU I WILL STAB YOU!!!!!!!!”

It was at that point that he turned around and looked at me, him nearly clipping the pavement (the beauty of that moment would have been sweet to savour but alas was not to be) and he saw me break into run, as if I was chasing him. Obviously he wasn’t to know that my weapon of choice was  my Toyota key and the only reason I was running was that my 40 paces of recovery ala Mel was done and I had to start running again.

No, he was not to know that at all.  All he saw was a sweaty, ridiculously pissed off woman with wild hair chasing him. In all fairness I would have run as well.

It felt so good, to be SO loud and SO vocal and SO angry!  So it appears I have found my solution and my voice.  Do not be silent, do not accept these words passively but give them hell and sharpen your key.

I remember listening to this over and over again, even the techno version.  I sang along to the words driving somewhere, most probably to the beach.

His monologue moved me!

But his opening and closing words seemed to have been lost on me and I rather chose the bit about dance, because Baz didn’t seem to have scientific proof that  12 hours of dance at a festival will extend your life and I felt it only respectful to try gather some data for him, you know, incase he wanted to release a Part 2 …imagine if i’d only put on sunscreen for 30 minutes prior to baking myself!

So here I am 25 Days into my “Efudex Challenge”……that is according to Google…WTF….why is it a challenge?? Its not as if you are randomly challenging your mates to put this stuff on their faces –

“hey Mary-Jane…ive just done 25 days of Efudex see if you can top that!!!”

Mary-Jane looks back at me and says “why? i’ve got slightly olive under tones with a Mediterranean heritage, ive been applying sunblock since before I was born and I wear a hat…. YOU on the other hand are Celtic by descent sorrrryyyyy”

“oh”

“Does that mean I win the challenge?”

Who would have thought that tanning with babyoil while lying underneath a hole in the ozone was not advisable for Celtic Skin. I mean we practically sprayed ourselves with Spray and Cook and baked.

Any hoo…so here I sit alone at home….because not a damn am I venturing out in public- well this is what I’ve been trying to not do except this term was my time to be class Rep at school.  I kid you not.  At the start of the year the teacher asked enthusiastically “And who wants to be class Rep?” clearly she was expecting this to be a position that moms and dads would arm wrestle over.

Nope.  Nothing.

Not one hand went up. We all looked down, I tried to see if there was any artwork I could look vaguely interested in, while balancing my butt cheek on the tiny chairs calculating the distance to the door wondering if I could slip out unnoticed I awkwardly made unintentional eye contact with another mom who was possibly planning the same and we both gave a slightly constipated smile to each other. The teacher then says “come on guys…its not that bad, lets split it up, each person can do one term.. SURELY you can do one term?  Its not a hard job basically you are just sending messages to the other moms and dads telling them whats happening  so I don’t have to……….  please??? (she was kind of pleading at this stage)”

Five of us gingerly put their hands up, much like that game we played as kids at a party when there are 8 chairs but 9 kids and you have to run and run and run and snatch a chair when the music stops the winner gets a Fizzer or a giant Chomp? ….it was just like that except without the Fizzer…..she saw there were too many moms and not enough terms and quickly pulled her arm down before any of us could…we all silently cursed her but totally gave her points for speed and agility.

I was given Term 3 because at that time apparently “nothing much happens in term 3” ……well, nothing much except 25 days of  bloody Efudex and an International  effing Food Fair! Bad planning doesn’t even come close.

So I did what I could. I Chose South Africa as our country …delegated my mom to cook 20kg of Tomato Bredie and signed up my kiwi husband for 2 shifts of dishing out food dressing in a Springbok Rugby top. I hid in the school kitchen/ tuckshop  doing backoffice stuff like heating up the 20kg of Bredie and washing dishes.  But we were also responsible for the kids puddings  and it was this little honey pot that drew over one of our friends I haven’t seen in a while.  He is holding his kids hands while they plead for the jelly/custard/ice cream combo laid out in front of me, he makes deadpan eye contact and is super friendly lots of “hi’s” and “how are you’s” and “i’m good” ….etc ….and I eventually say the standard words “excuse my face i’m doing this chemo cream thing and I look like Deadpool at the moment I hope I don’t make your child cry”.  He leans over and grabs the counter “thankfuckLynn did you see I didn’t even flinch?? I wasn’t going to say anything jeezus its bad, I really need to do this as well but i’m going to go away up coast where no one knows me!!!”  We laughed, I laughed more because I know he thinks he is going to be able to surf for three weeks up coast and what he doesn’t know is that your face feels like its been gently sanded down and then sprayed with lemon juice.  Salt water is the LAST thing you can have on your face.

And so it goes, each day slightly worse than the rest, maybe I should have Youtubed my self with a little #efudexchallenge Day 1 – 25 but I really couldn’t be assed, and I’ve been so depressed wondering if i’ll ever look normal again. It really sucks.  But not as much as cancer.  So I’m grateful.  Except I’m still going to moan, what I have realised about myself is that I will never be that person that my family say   “she bore this thing so bravely…”   nope, that is not me, Stoic is not the word that is going to be linked to my name, i’m more of the toddler having a tantrum in the supermarket kind of gal, I know its selfish but if I’m gonna feel shit you suckers are going down with me.  Possibly not that bad but you get the point.

My girls have three different responses

CHILD 1 – “mom you don’t look that bad” sweet pea, thank you for trying to make me feel better but I know I look like shit, what you have now said makes me think that my normal is not that great either….*and we laugh and laugh*

CHILD 2 – doesn’t say anything just grimaces and says “looks sore mom” ….eish…that it is!

CHILD 3 – ” mom it cant be THAT bad as Dad is still sleeping with you!!” ….HE FACES THE WALL AND THE LIGHTS ARE OFF!!!!!!

I’m clinging to the fact that i’m going to look 23 very very very soon….and not the 45 that is recorded on my birth certificate and I’ll look back at this post and laugh and laugh but not now, now I can’t laugh as I’ll crack my face open like a perfectly cooked pork sausage!

FFS ……………….Always wear Sunscreen!