Agaat - Marlene van Niekerk [96]
6 September 1960
I was reading back tonight everything that I’ve written so far in these booklets it’s quite a little pile by now & wouldn’t make much sense to an outsider who doesn’t know the circumstances. It comforts me to write up everything about home & hearth whatever Jak says. His latest is that I must sell it to Femina but he first wants to insert punctuation everywhere otherwise they’ll think his wife with her Brahms & her French can’t write properly & it’s also much too long-winded according to him I must remember he says the housewife market wants things out of the oven in a jiffy & they want joy & sorrow with capital letters & enough commas so that in-between they can have a cry & a cup of tea. Can’t understand why it irritates him so. It’s not as if I’m trying to write a history book for high schools, is it?
On the other hand when I page through the booklets like this then I wonder what’s become of me. Of my interests & my talents. Always in a hurry or sleepy or tired when I write. Just trying to keep up with myself on this farm every day. Husband child & servant over & over & that’s where it gets stuck. What on earth would Dr Blumer have made of such subjects? Perhaps I should try to write in English. Perhaps domesticities will sound better to me in a world language. Can just imagine what Friedman the little whipper-snapper of a professor in the English Department in those days would have said. Always filled the margins of my essays in his myopic little hand. You have come seriously unstuck here, Milla, what has become of your style, your wit, your vocabulary? According to the experts even psychology has to read like a thriller. Pace, remember, pace, texture & wry moments, only wry moments will satisfy my appetite. Of wry moments he would have had enough here if only he’d put on his glasses. More at any rate than in his great hero Charles Lamb. On Saying Grace. Where are the days. So vain the idea I had of myself then.
Odd how much one forgets even though it’s only about pots & pans. Had to add or correct things everywhere. Then I had a sudden inspiration to write the dedication that had been in my heart all the time but the time was not yet ripe for it but now it seems as if all my trouble with A. has after all been rewarded. So sweet-tempered nowadays. Three attempts before I was satisfied. Difficult to sound heartfelt on paper but that’s how I feel. Must still copy it neatly into the front of the first book.
10 September 1960
Can place my trust 100% in A. She has a remarkable way with Jakkie that much is definite. The first weeks she sat up by his cradle hour after hour & even now still every day. Is patient helpful quick to learn knows her place. Has undergone a major change of attitude it seems. Honestly didn’t think I was going to stick it out with hr. Before Aug. still thought I’d be forced to find some other refuge for her because I could see nothing but hardship ahead. But what on earth would I have done without hr now? She picks him up when he wakes up & changes him when he’s wet & cleans him when he’s dirty & bathes him & dresses him as if it’s the child of her own blood day & night immediately she’s on the spot when he cries & she sleeps with hr window open to hear him at night. Says she’s awake even before he can as much as squawk & then she comes in at the back door & soothes him & sings