Woman reading at sunset on her bridge
Walking is made easier when the mind wanders and I do the usual of imagining the lives of people inside the houses. Remembering when I used to walk home from UG back in the late eighties when some of the houses near the Cummings Lodge/UG road still had kitchens with open windows and you could smell curry and dinner cooking. Architecture and cooking habits and the smells have changed there and here
Rum shop is open, it always seems open. Lady wearing a cap with her bags sitting down, I look to see if she drinking rum, but she is looking at her phone , kind of hold the phone far away as you do in the dim light when you have to put things away. I wonder if she knows she needs spectacles. I wonder if she is waiting on the rum to come.
Old house, no fence. Many old houses, family property, dispute, fortunes fading. Looked like it used to be one of what we called the little wooden cottages though not the same cottage like in the story books from England. The grass is overgrown. The bridge is just three planks over the drain. Woman is sitting near there, short pants, tank top,, book in hand, reading, and she has a pen. Probably reading or doing puzzles or something in the sunset and not watching at anybody.
Child passes eating from a packet of my favourite junk fake cheezie things. I want to say, chile, make sure you throw away the packet in the bin but then I thought no way. Child is crunching merrily, like I do. I had two packs of the thing earlier in the day and threw the pack in the bin.
Black car with dark tinted window pulls up and I wonder if guns will start shooting. Nothing so exciting. It is parked outside a church, church is kind of walled, up to the road, entrance is at the side. Sunday evening service. There is a man, woman and child coming out of another car. Could be family coming to pray or maybe not.
The street has about three churches, another one likes kind of closed up and the other older one is open only when there are sevices.. only the rum shop seems open 24 hours.
Some yards have beautiful flower trees. I imagine people planting and watering the plants in places where the houses are not so new. Woman with three children laughing. Two small children dressed in red, skin brown almost orange so they could be invisible almost in the light , look like twins. One of them is following me down the road and I wave and she waves back.
Boom box on the road, coolie man with tattoos and cap playing reggae , loud, but maybe not loud. Boom box in the middle of the drive way. Woman sitting down next to the boom box with the two children. A lot of people have children and babies next to boom boxes in yards, minibuses and elsewhere. Nobody knows what effect this is having on the children. The man plays with one of the children in the woman's lap. Black woman. Child does not look douglah though.
Some houses are nice new ones, closed in. Some people on bridges standing. Some people might be 'looking out'.. one of the afternoon things , sitting on steps, verandah, at windows, bridge and looking at who is walking through the street.
I wonder if anybody noticed me.
I loved reading it so quiet yet evocative just an ordinary walk and sights and sounds I too was a ug student at your time
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