The Journey of two innocent souls

All kids get sick and have health issues as it is a natural process whereby the immune system gets tested and strengthened. I was no exception to this, and I don't remember much until I was in school and it affected my holidays. I would, for some strange reason, get sick or be affected during our July three-week holidays. In grade two my passion for soccer began, and I loved playing it. I was sleeping in the granny flat, and it was built of brick and plastered. I dreamt that I was playing soccer, and I kicked the ball, but I physically kicked the brick wall with my right foot and immediately got up in pain. I knew what I had done and therefore thought that the pain would go away and didn't bother getting anyone up.

I got up the next morning, and my foot was just a little bit sore. I don't really recall whether anyone enquired, but I did have a slight limp. As the days went on, it got worse. I told my mum what had happened, and she applied the traditional medicines as was normal at that time. My foot just kept on swelling and was getting really sore, so much so that I was now avoiding walking on it. Different remedies were applied, but it just kept on swelling. There was a time when I was unable to put the foot down, and it had become really spongy like a ball and looked like it was full of fluid. I tried to see if there was any indication it would burst like a pimple or a boil, but there was none. Finally, I was taken to the hospital and had to have an operation — my first ever. It was an abscess, and the swelling was just fluid. After the operation, I had to stay in the hospital and was put into recovery.

As I was only little, I had no idea of what was going on and what the procedures were. On the bed next to me on my right was an old man who also had been operated on. I don't know what time it was, but I was woken by this man's cries in pain, and he was groaning really loudly. Nurses came and attended to him and left, but he didn't stop. I was scared and covered myself up to my face and just stared into the dimly lit room. This man suddenly sat up in bed and started staring at me with his eyes wide open, and I was shaking with fear. Everybody else was asleep, and just as suddenly as he had gotten up, he fell back into the bed. The nurses came in, and there was a bit of shuffling going on around him, and they all finally left. I peeped, and he was fully covered. A little while passed, and a doctor came in, and I heard him mention that he was dead. I wanted to run out of there, but I was also in pain, and I started crying. The nurse came to me and asked me what was wrong, and I said I wanted to go home as I was scared. I was told that I had to wait till the next morning when I was discharged. When I went back to the hospital about a week later for the dressing to be changed, I looked at my foot, and it looked terrible. There was a hole in between the big toe and the one next to it, and all that was left in between was the skin of my sole. The flesh was gone, and I could see the bones on either side. It took quite a while, but eventually, it all came good and I was a kid again and up to no good — well, not really, I was a good boy.

There were other instances that also kept me from enjoying my July holidays. There were two finger-like protrusions on my left foot, and the memorable one was when I had something in the heel of my right foot. We would play around bare feet and often would get splinters or thorns or anything really as we were kids and played anywhere and everywhere. The left heel was sore and got worse by the day. My big brother got hold of me and decided to look what was in there that was making me keep the heel off the floor. He got a huge needle and decided to dig in and remove it. It was fine until he reached a certain stage, and it hurt, so he got my cousins to hold me down and reached the point where the pus was and it came out. He could not see anything in there and did not find anything. As the pressure had been released, the pain was reduced drastically. I really thought that it would get better, but after a few days, it got sore again, and the original situation was back. I was taken to the doctor, and he was told what had been done up to that point. He decided to cut it open and clean it. He injected a needle into what felt like directly in the sore spot, and I kicked him with the other foot. I'm not sure what he said, but he was not happy as the needle had bent and was still in my foot. I think he slapped my bottom and asked me to stay still as the needle would break if I moved. He continued and did what he had to do, put dressing on the wound and sent me home. Not long had passed, and the leg was back to the sore state. My brother caught me, and like before, I was pinned down onto the table. The difference now was that there was a visible hole in my heel about a centimetre deep, and it looked like a matchstick had been removed from it. He started agitating the heel with his thumbs in a motion trying to squeeze out something. I was in agony, but he just continued on, and suddenly there was this spray from inside the hole. I don't know what it was, but after he washed it out and bandaged it, the heel got better. Our guess was that I had got a piece of glass into my foot, and that is why it was not visible. I also had jaundice at one time, but these were just two of the many times I was out of action and still clearly remember them.

The Luckan family had bought a butcher shop as my uncle Robert was a butcher. It was quite a good business, and I would go on the delivery run on Saturdays. We had so many customers that we would have to make two delivery runs. I remember this one house that had a huge order to be delivered, and one had to walk past one of the other houses to get to the one where we had the delivery for. This first house had a dog and would always make us run every time we passed there. Then one day I was walking with a lot of parcels in my hands, and my chin was on the top, holding it down. I saw this dog running at full speed towards me, and I could not run anywhere, so I just stood there in anticipation. I saw him disappear from my vision as the parcels were obstructing. When I stopped and stood, I worked out more or less where the dog would be and just at the right moment, although I could not see, let out a boot with all my might, and I got him. I heard this loud yelping and saw him run away just as fast as he had come. The butcher business got sold when my uncle was involved in an accident and passed away.

In grade eight we were transferred, and I went on to high school, and that was a huge leap. When I was there, I took part in gymnastics, athletics and soccer. I also played music. I was really well-known. I had also taken up martial arts training, and I was really very physically active and fit. My cousin who was working at that time had a girlfriend, and her sister Precilla was in school with me. She would bring letters that would be concealed in a book and give them to me to give to my cousin, and I would do likewise. One day, when she gave me the book, she said, 'The letter is for you.' I thought that her sister had written to thank me for what I was doing for her. When I opened the letter, it was from Precilla to me. I didn't know what to say. I called her and said I was sorry but I had a girlfriend already and, she was okay with that. I did have a girl that I liked, and she saw us talking a few times. At the end of the year on the last day of school, I got out of bed with a heavy flu, and I was feeling miserable. If it had been any other day, I would not have gone to school, but we would finish at about eleven o'clock, so I went. All I wanted to do was come back home and sleep. A friend of mine came to me with a movie ticket and said it was for me. I said I was sick and he should give it to someone else. He then said that it was not from him. It was from Kogi, a girl in his class, and he was asked to give it to me. I said to tell her I was very sorry but I was not well and needed to go home and sleep. She was disappointed, but I was sick, and that was that. She was in athletics of the school too, and we would go on competitions together, and she was okay with me.

I was the top student in the school in maths, and the teacher really liked me. I would be a few lessons ahead of the class, and I was never asked any questions even if I had my hands up. He would only come to me when everyone in the class failed, and I would have the right answer. I took advantage of this situation as I used to do my homework during the maths period. In grade ten, another teacher replaced him and had no clue what he was doing. I was busy as usual, doing my homework, and he had done a calculation on the board. The answer was wrong as we could check at the back of the book. I started paying attention, and he said that the answer in the book was wrong, which I knew was not possible. As he worked out the next question, I noticed his calculation was incorrect. I wanted to be sure before I said anything, so I started to do the calculation and found where he had gone wrong. The principal was sitting at the back of the room and taking down notes or something — I'm not sure — but he was only there to see this new teacher at work. He again came to the end, and the answer was wrong. Someone in the class said that it was different to what was in the book, and he said the book was wrong. I put up my hand, and he asked me what I wanted. I said, 'Your calculation is wrong,' and he immediately told me to put my hand down and sit quietly. At this comment, the principal stepped in and said, 'Let him do the calculation and see why he says it's wrong.' I went up to the board and started, and as I came to where he was wrong, I circled his work and said, 'Instead of that, you should have done this' and carried on with it until I reached the answer. My answer was the same as what was in the book, and he was not happy. I would sit in the second last row from the back; and one day, after the principal was gone, he walked up to me, folding his sleeves after an argument in class. I really thought that there was going to be a physical fight, and I had had enough of him. I was now prepared to take him on, and as he approached me, I got up and kicked the chair out of the way. He sensed something was going to happen, and he just handed me the chalk and said, 'You go and do the next question on the board.' During our break, all my classmates said that they were expecting us to get into a fight. At the end of that year, I left and went into technical college as I couldn't deal with an ignorant stupid teacher. How he got to be a teacher is a mystery.

After two years in college, I had started a new job as a trainee draftsman. I left that place of employment after just one year. As I was physically very active in sports and martial arts at the time, I found it very boring to be sitting behind a desk all day and would often struggle to stay awake. I needed to be doing something physical and strenuous and decided to go into the building industry. I was in my second year of apprenticeship and loved it as this is what I wanted. It was 1972, and I was in technical college again. That was nothing too much — just a little bit different from secondary school. We had maths, science, drawing, English, Afrikaans and woodwork theory and practice as subjects. There were no history, geography or biology classes, which I thought was really good. Travel mode to and from college was by bus five days a week. Fridays would be an early day as we would finish at noon. We would have to attend college for 13 weeks of every year to do theory, and we would get paid for it. It was just a normal day, and I had gone to college and come back. I got off the bus at my stop at about 3pm and headed home. The walk home from the bus stop was just over five minutes and very tiring as we lived at the apex of a very hilly suburb called Sea Cow Lake. It was so named because a sea cow (dugong) had swum up the river and decided to make the lake its residence. I don't know if that was really true, but we all knew it as that.

As I headed home, I noticed up the road about a 100 metres ahead of me two girls standing, one slightly bigger than the other. It was nothing out of the ordinary, just two young girls standing on the roadside. They were in their casual clothes, and the bigger of the two was wearing a yellow top with a blue skirt. As I got closer, I could see that they were not someone that I knew and therefore had to be visitors or someone new that had just moved into the district. I was born in the house that I lived in at that time, and I knew everyone in the district. We would come and go into any house as everybody was one big family. And these two girls were definitely strangers. I walked on and came close enough to see that they were trying to hide or shield a box that was on the ground from my view. That made me a bit curious and inquisitive. It was enough at the time to make me try to see what they were so eagerly trying to hide. I saw that it was a cardboard box with groceries in it, and it looked a bit heavy as it was quite full. They had been waiting for me to walk past, and then both of them would carry it home as I learnt later.

I gave my bag to the bigger girl without saying a word. I picked up the box and began walking up the road. It was fairly heavy, and I realised why they were waiting for me to pass and not see them carrying the groceries. They would have looked really funny carrying that weight as they would have had to walk almost sideways. I had no idea who they were or where they lived or even where they had come from. I got to the first house, and I turned around as they were walking behind me and asked where they lived. They said at number 210, which was the third set of stairs on the left. I, being in front, came up to the stairs first and began walking up, and they yelled out no. I offered to take the box up to their house, but they refused to let me. The walk to the house from the bottom of the stairs was about 100 metres up a set of stairs that was at an angle of about 45 degrees. I insisted that it would be difficult for them and that it was okay. I didn't mind. They totally refused and didn't want to hear about me going anywhere near their house. I got just a glimpse of the bigger girl when I gave her the bag and looked at her again when I was offering to take it up to their house. She was blushing and very shy while I was talking to her, and she encouraged the little girl to reply. Although I was talking to them, my eyes were wanting to remain on the bigger girl. Being as shy as I was, I did not constantly look at her; but on noticing that she was also shy and not looking directly at me, I began looking at her while I spoke. She looked at me only a few times — just quick short glances during our conversation — and stood with her hands on the little girl's shoulders, putting herself in between us. What I saw was that she was really very beautiful, and this weird and funny feeling ran through my body. I knew that she was someone special, and I wanted to know her better. My emotions had been touched, and I wanted her to stay there and just talk to me. I wanted to be there longer, and I didn't want this meeting to end so quickly. It was sort of very serene and comforting and innocent all bundled together. I left the box on the stairs, very saddened by the fact that she was leaving, and felt very disappointed. I took my bag from the bigger girl, and they both said, 'Thank you, sir' as they headed home. I felt curiosity agitate me, and a lot of questions were racing through my mind. I was sort of happy that I had just met a very beautiful girl and felt like dancing home. But at the same time, I was sad that I did not know anything about her. Who was she? Where did she come from? Did she have any brothers and sisters, mum, dad? Will I see her again, and would she want to see me again? But the biggest question was, did she have a boyfriend? I was hoping and praying that the answer to the last question would be no. All these questions were racing through my mind, and I felt in a state of disruption. I was, at this moment, a totally different person to the one that had gotten off the bus a few minutes ago. I wanted to get to know her, and all that I could think of was this girl — who was she? She walked up the stairs, and I went home and didn't see her again for quite a while. It felt like I would never see her again, and with every day that passed, I was more tempted to go up towards where she lived and see if I could see her. Every day was magnified a hundred times, and I was at a point where I needed to see her. She had touched me emotionally, and that affected me. I wanted to see her more with each day that passed, and I would go down to the shop daily and wait anxiously for her. There was a chance that she may need to come to the shop to buy something they needed, and I would get to see her then. But she never came, and I would return home as the night fell. My heart felt heavy, and my life darkened with the night sky. This was now an everyday event: anticipation on arrival at the shop and disappointment at the end when I had to leave and go home as the night fell.