In all my life, I have never been away from home for Christmas. I mean home as a philosophical concept, rather than as an actual physical location. For example, in 1995, we celebrated Christmas in two tents in a caravan park on the Christmas Pass, above Mutare, Zimbabwe. Although we weren’t even in South Africa, it was still home because Linda and I were together, along with our three children.
Christmas 2014 was different. Brigid was in Sri Lanka, so we didn’t expect to see her. Kathleen, Gerrit, and Shannon were heading southward and westward in order to spend Christmas with Gerrit’s family in Cape Town. I, contrarily, was going northward and eastward to spend New Year with Patrick and Lèzelle. We arranged to meet in the Cedarberg, about 300km north of Cape Town. This gave us four days together before we set off in our respective directions on Christmas Eve.
After our farewells on Christmas eve, I did some spectacular off-road riding and then a pretty ride on good tarmac, stopping for the night in Calvinia. There, I was invited by the proprietor of The Calvinian B & B to park Linny III in the adjoining restaurant so that she would be safe overnight. This did cause a bit of a stir amongst the diners. I had a splendid Christmas Eve / Oukersaand / Weihnachtsabend / Vigilia di Natale dinner, accompanied by a fine Merlot.
The following day, I spent a very strange Christmas on the road, travelling from Calvinia to Britstown. The Karoo is not the most populous part of the world at the best of times, but there’s always someone around; not on this day. I felt as though I was the only person on the planet. It was blisteringly hot, reaching 41ºC fairly early in the day, and staying there until sunset. As I rode, sweating from every pore—and a few that I didn’t even know I had—I was singing “In the Bleak Midwinter”, not because it made any sense meteorologically, but because it fitted my mood admirably. Thanks to mobile phones, I was able to talk to my family, but it didn’t feel the same as being together.
I had a solitary Christmas dinner in a restaurant in Britstown and went to bed quite early.
Never in my life have I felt so lonely.