Lighting tigers in my garden?

Each year I strive to do the 'Light the World' challenges approaching Christmas. This week one of them was to have lunch with someone at work that you don't normally eat with. As I do not go to an office or out to work, this was a bit of a problem for me. My choices of having lunch with my workmates were Cat 1, Cat 2 or Cat 3. We all know that cuddly cat would be my first option and not the one who really needed my love and affection. But I decided to think outside the box. I went through some of my contacts that I had not heard from for a while. Who had I not connected to for a few years? And yes, there was my cousin Tracy Bell ... she almost jumped out of the page at me. Funny that. I had not thought of her for about 5 years and yet all of a sudden she was front and centre. Let me get this straight. We have never actually met. Our grandparents were siblings ... so what does that make me? Second cousins? First cousins three times removed? But I have a family orientated mentality where I adopt strangers into my family, so a real blood relative is a no brainer. I think it comes from growing up in a town where every second person was related to me in some way. Johnny Oeschger ... well his mother was my great aunt ... Rose Maytham, Cynthia Bell ... well they were easy to place. And then there was Orson, who's grandmother was married to my grandfather's cousin. All family. When Barry's cousin's son immigrated to New Zealand, it was not so much a Christian duty to embrace him into the family ... it was just plain old normal behaviour for us. So contacting Tracy ... well I feel I know her. The same blood that runs through her veins is in part the same blood as in mine. And if that is not what Christmas is all about ... love of family ... then what is?

I sat down and shot off a quick email to her far across the world in South Africa ... and went to bed happy. I woke up at about 2 am to hear my phone pinging away madly and yes, I got a reply. I had not physically sat down to break bread with her ... so does a virtual 'luncheon date' count on the challenge list? I think so. In fact I am sure it does because it made me all warm and fuzzy inside imagining sitting across a table from her and chatting away about a common interest.

I have become a semi-hermit. My doctor emailed me a message saying, 'You are due to come and see me.' Well, who am I to argue with my doctor? When I arrived she was just as flummoxed as I was as to why I would need to visit her ... and pay the fee. Apparently the message was computer generated and I should have ignored it. But as I was already there it gave me the opportunity to talk about odd issues that I would not usually bother about. A strange looking mole that was growing and itching alarmingly. I know, too much information sharing. Anyhow she gave me some cream to put on it and said, 'It might flare up and become inflamed.' And then peering through her glasses at me she said, 'Put a bit of the cream on your face too just in case you have any pre-cancerous melanoma lurking there.' Well, I had grown up in Zululand where the sun is vicious and I remember plenty of sunburnt days. In fact people would often comment on my white skin and tell me that I should 'get a tan' to look more healthy. In those days 'get a tan' for me required slathering oil mixed with vinegar all over myself and laying myself out in the sun for half an hour. Six weeks of this regime would change my skin colour from 'whiter than white' to 'slightly peach sprinkled with numerous freckles'. Anyhow, I went home and applied the cream to the mole ... and my face. The mole had no reaction to it at all, but my face now looks like I have the plague. I can put concealer cream on the marks, but it is the devil to remove and hurts like Hades. So I stay home ... and out of the sun. The doctor sent me a message asking how I was doing with the cream and I informed her about the reaction ... she said, 'Oh dear, that might last for a few months.' What? Months? Some times the cure is worse than the disease. No, not really. Melanoma is awful and if there is anything I can do to avoid it ... well hail to the plague face for a few months! I have a business meeting on Monday ... might have to brave the concealer cream for that.

I was at the green grocer a few weeks back buying cream. I noticed a large sign on the fridge that said, 'buy one get another of the same size free.' Well, who can say no to that offer. Something for nothing, love it. So what if I didn't need two bottles of cream? I was sure there was someone I could 'gift' the cream to ... or make it into a delicious dessert and give that away. Clutching my two bottles of cream, I stood in the queue behind a well dressed lady. I don't like to judge people, but the three large diamond rings and flashy gold jewellery were shouting 'rich, rich, rich' at me. The lady at the counter said, 'Madam, you can get another bottle of cream. It's two for the price of one day.' She looked down her nose and said, 'I only require one bottle.' I really had to restrain myself from leaning forward and saying, 'Then give the other one away to someone more deserving. A neighbour, a friend, a person on the street ... it will really make you feel good to give something away.' But then she turned slightly and saw me holding my two bottles and cream and she sniffed. Sniffed. In a 'you are really too fat to need all that cream.' kind of way ... so no, I did not inform her of her civic duty to the poor. Or the benefits of being kind and generous. I just grinned widely and said, 'Hi. Beautiful day isn't it?' She looked me up and down and said, 'Do I know you?' Well no, she didn't know me but there was one thing I could have told her, was that I was a happier person than she was ... even with her three carats of diamonds and ten of gold weighing her down. Oh okay, I was lusting just a little bit for that shiny rock on her finger in the beautiful platinum setting. But I can live with never having diamonds and gold ... after all I have cream to give away.

I went on to the library to get my weekly fix of fiction. I saw two friends and said hello and chatted for a moment, then wished them a good day and went down the aisles to look at books. I heard the one lady say to the other, 'She is doing so well. You wouldn't think her husband has been dead for less than 6 months.' And I almost lost it right there amongst the romance section. I logged out the books and barely made it to the car before dissolving into tears. Yup, still do that at times. Of course I had forgotten my wallet and phone on the counter in my rush to escape... so had to go back inside. But only after the tears were gone.

Enough of the doom and gloom. I was wondering about the Carpenters. Yes, really. Richard and Karen Carpenter. As a young girl/woman I looked at them as having the world in the palm of their hands. So beautiful, so talented, so rich and famous. They sang so sweetly ... and even Elvis was enamoured with Karen. Who wouldn't love a life like theirs. So when Karen died of starvation ... a self inflicted eating disorder because she wanted to please her mother and never could ... I found that difficult to comprehend. She had been so eager to have children that she had married a man ... who later admitted to having a vasectomy. When she wanted to cancel the wedding her mother complained that it was all paid for, so she should just get over herself and marry the man. He then proceeded to spend all her money until she was broke and had to move back into her mother's home. It sounds like something from a soap opera and not the life of dreams that I had imagined. Richard pulled himself back up by his bootstraps after his sister's death and got himself married to his adoptive cousin and had five lovely children. Well at least he lived out his dreams, but I am sure it was never simple. I find it too easy to judge others by their covers, which I shouldn't do. Obviously. The grass on the other side is never that green ... we just imagine that it is. Did I say that the doom and gloom was over. Oh shucks, just me being a bit sad at the moment.

I am off into the garden for a session of weeding. I am apparently supposed to be looking out for a stolen wheelbarrow in the area. The gardener from across the river had all his tools stolen at 2 am and he asked me if I had seen the culprits absconding with the goods. No, I was asleep. Well apart from the few seconds it took me to register that my cousin had pinged my phone with a message. But not enough to get out of bed and peer into the road to find offenders and garden tools. But if I do find a few odds and ends I know where to take them. At the size and height of my weeds it is a possibility that there might be tigers hiding amongst the growth, let alone an odd wheelbarrow or two.