Heading Backwards Going Forwards

Maybe our grandparents/great-grandparents were onto something.

My maternal grandmother was weird.   She would get up at around 4am every morning and zoom into a frenzy fetching coal for her stove, cleaning her house, cooking, baking, feeding the chickens etc.  By 6am you could eat your breakfast off her floor it was so clean.

And I thought “Dude, you’re a pensioner.  At least sleep until 7am.” … No, I seriously did NOT think “Dude”.  She would have probably klapped me.  She was known to all as “Ma”.  Just “Ma”.  As to whether it was short for “Ouma”, because essentially she WAS my Ouma or whether it was just that she was quite a strong, stubborn woman and her children called her “Ma”, so everyone called her “Ma”, I will never know.

Anyhow, I digress.

Farm folk are usually up well before the sparrows to accomplish their many chores and early to bed because (1) it’s dark and there wasn’t – in the old days – much else to do; and (2) well, because they were flipping exhausted!!

Ma didn’t live on a farm when I knew her.  She, along with my Grandpa and his youngest brother, had moved to a beautiful semi-detached house in blissful suburbia.  And yet, as I’ve seen over the years, old “rabbits” die hard and she was rather set in her ways.  As a result she was always up at around 4am ...

Fast forward to the 21^st century where we’re all supposed to have flying cars (not just prototypes in obscenely wealthy countries) and I found myself thinking of Ma and what she accomplished.  The reason for this is because I was actually forced to slow down.  And let me tell you, we don’t realise how frenetic we’ve become, until we HAVE to slow down.

As you may, or may not, have realised, blissful suburbia (well at least good old Jo’burg) is heading backwards at an alarming rate.  And this past weekend found us (as it very often does) with no electricity, no piped water and precious little cell phone signal.  It makes one feel positively Victorian!  But, life must happen (that should actually read “dishes, washing, and general chores must happen”).

There I was fetching water from our Jojo tank, one large pot at a time, and boiling it on the gas stove to wash dishes.  Fetching water to flush the toilets.  I dusted and swept and tidied and in between, when I needed a rest, I boiled some shop-bought water (girl’s gotta draw the line somewhere) for a cup of tea which I drank while relaxing with my crochet work.  I will admit to checking my phone from time to time but due to the defunct cell towers there wasn’t much to be found there.

And you know what?  Perhaps it’s because I’m getting older, but I actually enjoyed the day.  A lot !!  I took my time and methodically did what needed doing and at the end of it all I was surprisingly not as tired as I expected to be, and I felt accomplished and quite relaxed.  It was almost therapeutic to get my chores done in a measured, fashion and I thought of all the therapists and woke-folk who like to promote mindfulness.  Yes, I tackled my housework mindfully.  Perhaps that’s what my grandmother did.  Perhaps that’s why many of the previous, previous generation didn’t need therapists (or LSD like the generation between them and us).

I loved my grandmother very much (even though I thought she was weird).  I could learn from her.  Perhaps the lack of constant rush and social media coupled with some good old-fashioned hard work is what we need more of.

Happy Day! 😀