I'd hate to begin this post with a massive preamble about how "I'm no writer", so I won't. All I will say is that I'd like a little kindness if you decide to troll through my first ever attempt at writing.
Below is a short story I wrote for a competition in O The Oprah Magazine. - I decided to take up writing as a mode of expression after drawing no longer offered me the drainage I needed ( probably because I've dried my passion out by doing it in my professional capacity.) The theme for the short story competion was Change. Let me know your thoughts...perhaps this could help me hone my writing skills. - I will try to be impartial to the criticism. Be warned...it is a bit strange. I'm open to discussion though. :)
A New Day
The change came in the aftermath. When we had broken everything
finely into powder memories of what we knew as life. The change came when
nothing was sure anymore and all we had was each other. We had been living in a
deluded state of certainty - in the buildings and concrete streets we had
placed all hope and reason. Now the structures had fallen and we were stark.
Stark, with no choice but to hope, to believe and to change.
Change was not the gradual process of informed growth that
we had been taught it was. I had always personified change as a benign old
African man who would lead you down a windy path with calm and authority. Perhaps
this was a different kind of change. It was neither soft, gentle or wise. It
was an incessant hammering, heating, sanding, melting and moulding. It hurt. We were the crude
metal and change had come as the blacksmith to create – without our permission,
we were made different now.
My little sister is small and eager even in this sullied,
post apocalyptic time. She is too young to ever have been hung up on anything,
so this day means nothing to her. That the buildings are gone doesn’t scare
her, she only wonders fervently what is next. She asks, “Where will we go next?”
– Not with the heaviness that I, with all my years wonder it, no. She wonders
it with a strong forward-looking surrender of expectation, like never having
had control, and therefore never having had to struggle into a defeated
handover.
She is teaching me a lot. Now that I have no one to look to for
answers I look to anyone, drawing little bits of wisdom from moments in between
the storm. All those who led us have been proven wrong, they had assured us we
would be safe and that the system would remain sturdy. It didn’t. The way forward
is ours now. I am calmer. With uncertainty, comes endless possibility, this
calms me.
We walk hand in hand over the rubble. It’s a little
fascinating to see the materials of the grandest buildings in such micro detail.
How the skyscrapers had been reduced to my level. Under my feet are the
millions of Rands that once tamed our
people into tiny cubicles of production. I don’t know why this makes me smile;
perhaps it’s a small revenge, a small-unexpected victory.
Nothile asks if we will walk much further, this vexes me a
little bit because she has stubbed the delicious thought that I was caught in
for a moment. “We will walk until we see people or food or water, which ever
comes first, nana. Do you want to ride on my back?”
Before she can respond, my senses awaken like Meer cats on
the lookout for a snake. I doubt it for a moment, but with the second droplet I
am certain. My body absorbs the smell of the first few drops on the soil - one
of my favourite smells
ever. The rain! It drizzles for a couple more seconds and then it pours. Open
skies falling in mercy to wash away our bruises and take away the saudade. I remember when Gogo said “Imvula iqeda usizi. Imvula iqeda nesizungu.” I hug my Nothile. I
hug her long enough for her brilliant red dress to make tie-dye-like marks on
my once white vest. Looking at the marks on my top, I giggle a little and tell
her “This is a sign, both the rain and
how your clothing has marked mine. We’re going to make it together”
Now we have been walking for a long time. Through cool,
muddy passageways created by rubble that has fallen equally in two piles. I’m
getting weak with the load of
Nothile and the water-bag I have created by filling old plastic bags with rainwater. I hope the next group of people we meet are not
men. I won’t be able to fight them off this time. The very act of telling them
off feels like war when one is as tired as I am. It gives me heebie-jeebies how
they hiss “sss, sisi, sss sweety, bheka.”
Disgusting that even at a time like this they remain the hormone-led idiots I
have always known.
My little sister is heavy on my back but I’m glad she is at
least getting some sleep as we journey forward. Onward down the meandering
pathways of the forest. We are now outside of what used to be the city. I know
this not only because of the trees, but also because there are no more fallen
buildings or ruins. It is strange how the buildings have been wrecked by the
disaster but the trees have not. They stand tall and steadfast; as if they were
arrogantly sneering at the now annihilated man-made jungle so as to say: “Look
at how weak you have been – Oh how the mighty have fallen.”
I suppose if one thinks about it, it makes sense. Nature has
killed the man-made faux-forest of buildings and roads, but she has protected
her own. It’s almost murderous and vindictive. If it is out of nature’s malice,
I think to myself, then we had it coming.
“Hello, sorry mama!” I yell as loudly as I can with my now
weary body. “Hello!” we both shout. Nothile’s shrill little voice somehow
providing a sort of harmony alongside mine. The tall slender old woman stops but she does
not turn back to face us, which creates an eerie feeling in my stomach. “Yebo” She replies, “nigobani?” I am a little bit frightened by her hidden identity but
reassured by her voice which sounds like that of anyone of my three great
aunts.
Cautiously I reply. I tell her how we are the children of
the legion of the lion, ba tau – tau tse
rorang – tau tsa mariri – tau tse jang tseding. It is as though I sing the music she had
loved in her childhood as she sways to my slightly rhythmic explanation. She
turns to reveal her aged yet radiant face of dark skin contrasting the white of
her wide smile. “I have been sent to you.” She says with all the accomplishment
of someone who had finally found gold.
I know now that we are part of something colossal. We are at
the foot of the change itself. I wait only to hear my destiny and to serve it.
I don’t feel the need to contest or question. This is what happens when ones
entire world of certainty comes to an untimely collapse. One existence has made
way for another. Save for my sister, I am willing to let every fibre of the old
world go.
The old lady gestures for us to take a seat on a near-by
rock and as we oblige and descend, she begins to bring bread, fruit and water out
of her bag.
I think to myself, if I were casting the role of an oracle
in a movie I wouldn’t have dressed her quite so modernly. She is not wearing
long black robes reminiscent of the gothic era or traditional beads that denote
her role in the community. She is simply wearing a long overall style dress
with a tiny navy blue floral print – the kind one would find at a store like
Queenspark or Milady’s. This is a strange observation for me to make considering
the circumstances. Although, in my defence, everything that is happening and
has happened feels a lot like a movie, but I am in surrender, I will question
nothing.
She begins to speak. Nothile is ravaging the food while I
eat slowly and with caution, concentrating least on the food and mostly on her
words, which I now anticipate eagerly.
“I am Nobesuthu. You are not to call me by anything else,
not even as respect of my age.” She says in her cool rustic voice that leads me
to think she might have been a blues singer before. “I am a messenger and I
have been sent to bring the answer to your question. Your duty, however, is to
find the question and ask it of me. I may not answer otherwise.”
I wonder if the question is as Nothile asked, “Where will we
go next?” or if it is “What will happen next?” or if maybe it is “Where is God?
Is there a God?” I answer the last question myself. I know there is a God and
he is here, I know this because I am here and all the beauty of the forest
still moves my soul even in the face of imminent doom. God is here.
I look up and I see a perplexed look on Nothile’s little
face. Something erupts in the centre of me and all of a sudden the question has
arrived and settled in my mind. I have found it in my little sisters face like
someone had printed it on her forehead.
I take a deep breath and I ask “Nobesuthu, who are we?”
She replies to both of us, talking to us
equally, giving the message to both of us in exactly the same serving. “You are
not the children of the legion of the lion. You are not the children of your
parents. You are the children of change and she has come for you to serve your
purpose. The earth has been crying for change to come to the hearts of men and
to their minds. That she may come and show mankind how they have pillaged their
own mother. Earth was helpless at the hands of man, and change has come to save
her. Change is here to save the earth from immorality and suffering and greed
and disregard - which mankind has been feeding her for eons. You are the ones that she has called to see
the downfall in order to realize the rise. You will carry change on your
shoulders and be the custodians of our new world. Do not let kindness out of
your sight. This is a new day, open your hearts and be in it with joy – Joy
will teach you how to love change” and with this, we were new.
