It’s a date
You’d be forgiven for thinking you woke up to summer on the highveld. If you woke up at say 10am. If you’re barely holding it together and working on being a good disciplined child and rising before the sun, you’d know it’s still very much the end of Winter in the mine dump village in the holy land.
Not yet Spring but close enough that waiting on the equinox on the 23rd is moot. Northern hemisphere readers can look away now.
Still, it’s a date. Like a birth date, a work anniversary, a death date. The date you first kissed, the date you last set eyes on each other. The date of the last phone call. The date of the Prophet’s birthday, the date marking the start of a fast and the date of a feast. A wedding date, a funeral date, the date for tax returns to be filed. The date you entered school and the date you earned your first doctorate. The date the primary school teacher praised your writing. The date you made that shy attempt and handed her a card. It was the 14th. A balmy morning in the east coast fishing village. She; not just from the right side of the tracks but a whole rooftop-garden-penthouse atop grandpa’s high-rise in the city side. The date of the first rejection. The date is still the 14th. A sweltering afternoon in the east coast fishing village.
But it was not the first rejection. That date was much earlier on the timeline. And no one else was involved.
It’s another date. The date of an exam and the date an order is due. The date of a first draft and the date the archive died.
The date you learnt for the first time that being left with a bag of oranges and some books for a few days during the east coast winter was as close to perfect a life as your mind could conceive. The date you ventured into the little book exchange for the first time. In that arcade of shops, parallel to that other less-pretty arcade of shops. The date you returned all grown up and worldly to find the book exchange was gone.
It’s a date is a note to fill in the space between birth date and end date with your whole ineffable being.
© Jesh Baker for Oppi Stoep 2024, All Rights Reserved
