Peopled

Last week at work, I had a day full of bizarrely serendipitous introductions.

I was working the counter in the morning when a tired looking, perhaps fifty or so woman arrived, and asked about our wine tasting. She heaved herself onto a bar stool, opened the wine list, and announced,

"My daughter in law is in the car with three grandkids all under five."

"Oh," I said. Surprised, but polite.

"All under five. I am so damn sick of poo and pee and snot." She paused to look at a tell-tale, chunky stain on her shoulder, "Spit up too. Ugh. I came in saying I might buy one or two bottles of wine. How much can I taste in under 10 minutes before they get suspicious?"

"I'll start you off with bubbly!" My sympathies and humour thus aroused, I went double speed to ensure this woman's glass was not once empty for the entire 25 minutes she ended up staying.

"I mean, of course I love them, you know I love them... But they're sticky, and sometimes smell..." She trailed off and enthusiastically downed some red.

I assured her that it was the divine right of Grandparents to swan in and spoil and scold as they please without worrying about the more practical aspects of small child parenting. After all, she'd done her time already. Now to enjoy the fun bits without the diapers. We continued to chat over most of the classic tasting, and one or two of the ultra premiums.

Her name, I learned, was Debra from Chicago. She was asking me about what I was doing up in Cape Town, and eventually what I wanting to do with my life entirely. She was a medical volunteer, and I ended up telling her about my volunteering with the 55+ centre and about how'd I'd eventually like to volunteer as a hospice worker.

Well, Debra from Chicago was now convinced God had made arrangements for her to meet me today, because that was what she had spent much of her life doing, and she stayed the nearly full half hour (poor daughter-in-law...) telling me about her experiences and training in everything from medical work to alternative medicine to acupuncture. I kept her topped up all the while.

No, I am not planning to investigate alternative medicine or acupuncture. I enjoyed the conversation so immensely not only because I was talking to a Bad Ass Grandma who rented a car so her daughter-in-law wouldn't know she went... somewhere ("I can't tell you, dear. You're too young. We'll just say it's a place grannies shouldn't go."), but because she was evidently so sincere in her belief that she was meant to have come across me. It was a semi-spiritual encounter with a complete stranger that left me feeling quite touched. Like a vague nod in my direction from the Universe.

Later the same afternoon, a new worker from Gorgeous, the Bubbly Bar in our estate restaurant Catharina's, came to do a flagship tasting to familiarize herself with the wines. Because it was so slow, I ended up have a glass of wine and a chat with her about her background and we swapped email and facebook so I can arrange my bubbly tasting at Gorgeous for one of her shifts, and she directed me to a friend of hers who runs a wine room in Obs, where I live. Another afternoon-perking affirmation!

Encounter the third was, perhaps, the most both eerie and gratifying.

A family came in at around 4:30, a set of parents and a quite small girl. The small girl, in an eloquent and serious manner, asked me if I knew how imaginative she was. By this point, I had watched her for some time sliding off the bar stools in a quietly dramatic fashion, and I asked her to demonstrate how imaginative she was.
"Oh!" A look of inspiration crossed her face, "I think my fingers are people." And she acted out a brief and sophisticated dialogue between her two index fingers. On a hunch, I asked if she was a reader.

"Yes!" She thrilled, "I was on 12 page readers, then 24 page, and now I can read ever so many pages!"

She was 'just turned six', and the charming UK accent only endeared me to her well-spoken manner further.

I asked what she liked to read, and she rattled off some generic school-reader story books, and I discovered her favourites were the ones with 'proper stories'.

On a further hunch, I asked if she liked to make stories up.

"Yes!" She nearly fell off the bar stool (By this point, her parents were well into their wine tasting, having established that I did not mind their tiny offspring's company in the least, and would give them a wave if she "made herself a nuisance". ) She proceeded to tell me all about her collection of toys, and their assorted characters and names. It was shades of my own childhood, and I told her about the massive stuffed toy collection of my youth, and how each citizen of my wee bedspread town had distinct personal histories, likes, dislikes, and accents.

Mia, (her name was Mia), asked me what I like to read. I rattled off a few of my favourites, but before I was about to begin on my children's books, she asked;

"But what did you like to read when you were me?" I'm aware she meant when I was six, but the phrasing melted me a little. My mission accepted, I grabbed a sheet of paper, and began writing down every single children's book I could think of, spanning Dr. Seuss to Roald Dahl to all the Narnia books. Enid Blyton, Redwall, The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents, The Secret Garden, my personal favourite, M.M Kaye's The Ordinary Princess... I dredged up every favourite story my brain could remember, and ended up, as we were chatting, doing up a list of nearly 30 some easy, some weighty children's stories. At this point, well over an hour had passed, and when the time came for her parents to leave, with her Mother's permission I added my address to the reading list and I now have a 6 year old Pen Pal and long distance reading buddy from London. My life took a seriously cool turn.

I enjoyed the last encounter so much because it quite seriously felt as though I met myself when I was six. When I was a wee thing, my eldest sister referred to me casually as "precocious to the point of disturbing". Once, at the age of four, I was instructed (with alternating coaxing and threats to behave or else) to greet my Mother's close friend and colleague politely... She came through the door to find a tiny, severe child saying  "Mrs. Petrone, I presume?" in a drawling, semi-British accent.

I think of myself as a child, a ball of mental energy and whimsy, and think of who I am now. Those traits that people are so often quick to dismiss as childish have been the formative aspects of my character and here I am- Still reading, writing, engaging, and doing my own thing. Whatever that happens to be this week.

I had a difficult time at school as a child, for no other reason than lack of focus, interest, and motivation. I sometimes wonder if I would be any different if I had been, say, medicated in order to improve my school performance, or put into classes or activities to make me less withdrawn from fellow students. I probably would be, and I'm glad I wasn't. For all I loathed school, I really love who I am, and what my strengths are. Even my weaknesses suit me just fine.

 Mia was one of the one in a hundred children who women meet and suddenly think 'Huh. I could probably have 10 of you, provided I have a guarantee that they'd be you'.
The reason I've always wanted to have children is because I have a life and a family and experiences and a future that is happy, relatively stable (as much as anything can be) and I could die tomorrow and it will all have been worth it. Why would I not want to give that to someone else, and watch another person discover who they are, and what they can become? As far as I'm concerned, the extent of my job is to see them foisted on the world with good manners and good character. They can take it from there.
My mother once remarked that by the time you have four of them, you pretty much realize they all arrive with their own ingrained personalities, even when they only weigh 5 pounds. You may not have a guaranteed Mia,  but you can give whatever comes access to what  made her.

Cheers,

~A Whimsical, Imaginative Full-Grown Adult (And Proud of It)