The highly anticipated auction date for the house in Gonubie was yesterday. My conversations with the auctioning house have been sobering lately because I can sense that there isn’t much interest there and they are definitely struggling to show a presence in Gonubie, when they do not even have an office in East London. Compared to the hype they stared with I was preparing myself for disillusionment, but I did not anticipate its monumental proportions. They called me yesterday afternoon to tell me that they had a single bidder for R 400,000. This is even less than what was actually paid for the house. I was sorely disappointed and lamented the money I threw away at this auction ( R 10,000 for the auctioneers + R 1000 for cleaning the pool) in addition to refilling the pool with water, and god knows what this will mean to my final municipal bill.
My dreams of breaking free from this existence at Jackie’s have been shattered, and I was caught at an extremely low point when I spoke with Ron today. I could sense that he wasn’t doing well either, perhaps because the expenses are much more than he bargained for. He said that perhaps he should have understood the triangle of conflict in our life together and how we interchanged the roles of villain, victim and benefactor. He even said that perhaps we should have tried counseling. My personal situation is so bleak that I cannot sympathize with him a bit. By and large he was the one who led us to this particular turn of events. I can hardly remember myself being the villain in this relationship, and he rarely -if ever- played the benefactor. The imbalance was starkly revealed with the birth of our son and his almost hostile attitude towards him, which really frightened me.
When my ex firmly stated that he wanted OUT, he could not understand that my first impulse as a nursing mother would be to protect and defend my young one. The response is not unique to us humans, and is widely observed in the animal kingdom. Females display uncharacteristically hostile and aggressive behaviour when there is a threat to their young, it doesn’t matter whether the threat is real or perceived. His threatening behavior provoked my anger, hostility and aggression and I retaliated very strongly and decisively, by filing for divorce and going through with it this time. I saw with my instinct that a man who can shut out his wife and his newborn son simply doesn’t love her anymore, and perhaps doesn’t even love his son enough. Yes, I did hurt at the time, and I still do. But I know one thing for sure, I have no regrets. Even though I still care for the man, my trust for him is completely gone, and that is why there is no future for us together anymore. All I want now is a place of my own, I have had it with living under the dictate of other people.
Something that I fed Robert during the past two has caused an awful rash in his nappy area. He is red and sore and can’t even stand the touch of warm water. I tried to think back about the food I gave him in the last 48 hours. First I suspected the olive oil, which he has ingested for the very first time. The other foods he has taken before without any problems. After his dismal weigh-in on Wednesday, I have been running after him, trying to convince him into eating different types of high calorie foods. I lined up a variety of foods so when he refused one I moved on to the next. At any given lunchtime we had toast, yogurt, eggs, avocado and cheese, in addition of course to the ever present formula bottle.
Time and again I find myself craving things. I go out to buy myself food, then I go to the wool shop and buy yarn, and of course my biggest addiction buying books. Our largest bookstore chain in South Africa has two annual sales, the winter sale and the summer sale, and I have been very dedicated in attending them from my days in Johannesburg to this day. I know I missed a few when I was overwhelmed with work at the garage, but I usually make it a point to be there as soon as my closest branch opens on sale day. This year I was there one full day too early, I showed up with Robert on Tuesday, and found an almost deserted mall. The staff at the bookstore were still setting up the tables of the sale books, which weren’t open to public viewing yet, so I had to try again the very next day.
I picked up Robert just after eleven then I walked with him to where my friend’s place. I met W a few weeks ago at the park and we related to each other quickly because we are both single moms. Her story is slightly different, because she was not married to the father of her baby, but we still ended up in similar situations. In her case, the father sends money regularly but does not want to be involved in any other way. Sometimes I wish this was the case for us as well. Ron’s contribution to our finances is pathetic and in return for it I have to put up with his strange behaviour and venomous comments, and I do not consider it a fair bargain at all. Another thing that W and I have in common is that we both share accommodation with friends. W’s place is more chic and upmarket than this old home, but the problems are still the same. We both need to protect our babies from the dangers in the house – in her case there are open steps and banister- and at the same time we need to protect the house (or its contents) from the menace of little hands and feet. When the moms showed up we had a full complement of little boys, ranging in age from 4 months to just over a year. W’s son had just turned one on the 14th of July (Bastille Day – which incidentally is also my dad’s birth date). The older kids spent some time playing and generally making a mess while the little ones watched angelically from their cots or cushions, there was curry for lunch and then cake and muffins for tea, and we all enjoyed ourselves. Robert tried many new toys, and naturally they held his interest much longer than the toys at home. A rattle with a long handle was a hit with his as usual. I was very surprised though when he suddenly found interest in a ring stacker. He has a similar toy at home, and I have been trying to show him how to fit the rings correctly around the base, but he was had never shown real interest in the process until today. W’s son had loads of interesting toys, but Robert spent most of his time playing with the ring stacker. All good times come to an end though, and my queue to leave was Robert’s voice increasing in volume, announcing that he had enough and was really tired, so I had to leave in a hurry. The problem was fixed immediately once we started moving and Robert went to sleep in the stroller as soon as we cleared the block. I often wonder how I would deal with a similar situation on a long-haul flight, I get panicky just thinking about it.
The Loskop Diaries 