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When he had done, everybody believed fairy tales could come true.

Only after midnight, when the guests were starting to take their leave, you withdrew into your own space, but you did not cry, you pondered and planned and mustered your wits. Jak came to look for you. He was tipsy, full of talk, and amorousness itself after the commotion of the marriage feast.

He came and stood behind you in front of the mirror where you were sitting in your petticoat, caressed your neck.

Sweetheart sweetheart sweetheart, he sang to you, will you love me ever.

You hummed along for the occasion.

I could never marry a beautiful woman, he said, it would cost me too many a sleepless night.

You smiled. My dear husband, you said, what more could a boer woman ever wish for than a husband who leaps out of bed in the morning fresh and rested for his day’s duties.

how long do wild peas lie before they mould? how long does a sheep suffer a sick tongue before it turns blue? how long in my symphyses did the midges multiply? in what creases or folds of the collar and the crotch the invisible mite of the mange? how many years the incubation of terror? in what subterranean seams does history precipitate? a catchment of rain does not elect itself the mountains choose and a mouth for the stream is gifted by the sea how was I then reservoired so wrongly such a still mephitic pool?

Wednesday 12 May 1960

Everything is starting to seem more real now that I’m making the lists. Two processes (three!) they keep each other on track but there are many things to think of at the same time. As long as I think of the things and not of the reasons. Heaven help me sometimes it feels too much.

Kriel & Co. list 1

Baby (a little girl or a little boy?!)

Nappies & pins

Blankets (holding and covering,

woolsey) (5)

Vests (long-sleeved it will be win-

ter) (7) Ma says you can never

have enough of them.

Crawlers (button-front)

Nappy covers (waterproof)

Cradle (perhaps after all get my

old white cot from Ma? Or is it

still down in the cellar here?)

Push-chair (Dunlop adjustable)

Pillows & covers

2 baths (thick plastic)

Towels (4 large & 4 small)

Baby shampoo & soap

Bath oil

Baby powder

Cotton wool

Earbuds

Small scissors

2 x 4 bottles + rings + teats

Bottle-brushes 2 (Saw a little

frame with coloured balls that

rattle & twirly things full of

angels & birds to hang over the cradle)

Kriel & Co. list 2

7 Long-sleeved uniform dresses

(black—could probably make

them myself but don’t have time

now)

7 Aprons (high bib backstraps

crossed cf. Royal Hotel)

7 White caps with elastic bands

(try Good Hope Café if Kriel &

Co don’t have the coloured girls

wear them there ask Georgie’s

wife)

Hairpins (2 x 24 large)

Bloomers (strong black woolsey

school section)

Scholl shoes (rubber soles)

White socks (dozen)

Flannel nightgowns (2)

Nylon nightgowns (2)

4 bras 32 A (will just have to

grow into them I see the titties

are pushing fast)

Towels & washcloths

(curtains?) I can make up from

the odds drawer of the linen

cupboard. Bedding & pillows

enough. Off-cuts!—phone

Needle’s Eye—will have to run

up a Sunday dress or two for

her quickly needlework she can

enough already she’ll just have

to jump in herself & muck on I

won’t have time can really not

buy everything new

Dr White’s 4 dozen (Facts-of-life

talk! When will the right time

be?)

Elastic with loops

Mum (rub-on kind)

Lacto Calamine Lotion

Lifebuoy soap x 6

Johnson’s baby powder (will

have to teach her how to keep

lace-up shoes fresh!)

Pepsodent x 6

Black polish (& brush & buffing

cloths)

Three small black irons & iron-

ing board (she mustn’t use those

in the house in the mornings

must emerge fresh as a daisy

from the outside rm finished &

ready for the day)

Vim

Scoop & brush

Omo

Washboard

Starch (write down recipe for

her: cold water and ordinary)

Reckitt’s Blue

2 Tin buckets

Sunlight soap (X4)

Zinc bath

No water as yet in outside rm

electricity one point?

(Two-plate stove?)

Tin kettle

Big pot for