puppy

We went there today, early, for a picnic and swim. In 1665 someone reckoned there might be silver to be mined here. There wasn’t, but the river was dammed in order to check for it, and the dam is a big and glorious lake now. Many, very many, come here to swim and to enjoy a day by water in what is now a Natural Reserve. There can be baboons, there can be snakes, but with the shouts of delight and the ebullience of human voices, an encounter is a rare thing, thankfully.

We arrived with swim kit, dogs, food, a rug, a few towels and we found a space. The space was small and spiky grassed, but it was good enough. We had walked by many larger spots, already taken, even though we came early. We settled. Just behind us, on the slatted walkway, we heard others walk by, also looking for a place to land. You always hope for good neighbours, at this point if you come with two dogs, one a puppy. We found them, or they found us. They also had a pup, a curious but beautiful mix between a terrier and a something else with long legs. She barrelled into our midst, soaking and shaking, eyes bright and we laughed and said hallo. Then our resident pup did the same, only he has a much fluffier coat. I heard, through the big ass grasses, children squeal and chuckle as they cuddled him. That’s the thing about the Silvermine. Although we are all on the same shoreline, we are naturally divided, with these big ass grasses and they are so big ass, a total view block, some even taking out sky. And, yet, we can still, if we want, connect.

We swam, we played table tennis in the water, we watched the dogs swim, catch ball, and all the while the afternoon moved on, tick, tock, as more people came and as others left. I wondered how this place will be when the gates are locked, when the sun is gone and the night falls dark on the Fynbos.

Silver or not, we found it on this very happy day.

I had a dog today. Well, it’s better than a hissy fit or a conniption and certainly more rewarding. She is a black spaniel puppy, well trained and, for the first time, away from her human parents. She knows me, but that is so not the same thing as being left with me, not in her world. At first she was anxious, a lot of looking out of windows and eye-snapping me every time I moved from one room to another, a whole load of following and looking and those eyes were laden with doubt and insecurity. She is beautiful and soft and sweet and I reassured her a thousand times, creaking down on my hunkers to eye-level her, telling her ssshhhh, we’re ok, you’re safe and so on. I proffered toys, kept since my wee Poppy died, and for visiting dogs, and she rushed everywhere, with a pig, or a bird or a hedgehog or a something that has no name I know in her mouth, that spangle tail wagging like a metronome. We walked a little and she was keen to fly. I could feel that in my old legs, less under my own control than they were before. Before what, or when? I think since all this dying struggled me, and cancer too. That’s a something I flap away as if it was a mere cold, but obviously, my body is resulting. I doubt that is good grammar but, as you know I love to sideswipe the rules on that.

Around 1pm I was knackered and that thought me. She, the Spangle, asked nothing more than cuddles. She made no barks, chewed nothing, responded with cocked head, ears full forward whenever I spoke. I could have said Fancy a trip to Ibiza? and that tail would have told me Yes! However, I knew I needed to lie down. So we went upstairs and I did, inviting her onto the bed. She jumped and landed right on me, her paws either side of my face, her eyes staring right into mine. I looked back and she remained with that looking thing until I got the giggles, initiating a whole shenanigan of mischievous palaver, and I just knew rest was wrest from my grasp.

The sun was bright with a hail storm up his backside. We watched it, the hail, storm by, and then we walked again. We dillyed and dallied, endless sniffs abounding as the wind, latent, for now, still creaked the old trees. I switched back to hear their voices. You only speak in the wind, I said, and they creaked back, like old friends, like old memories. We are quiet in the calm, just like you, they said. It is only in troubling times that we need to speak out, much like you will do in your own troubled times, because nobody ever learns a damn thing when everything is easy. Yet, beyond the easy, In the after of an assault, when someone creaks and speaks from experience, there will be someone else who needs to hear, and who will catch the words.

And then, in my looking up, I saw the flying things. I haven’t seen them for many cold months. Insects in a whirl, a lift, coasting the sun warmth, a spin of hope. I watched them whilst the Spangle sat looking too, with no idea what she was seeing. But I did. I saw. And then we moved on.