My Friend Rosemarie has a theory.

And the way we are all feeling at the moment, as a nation, low, depressed, uncertain, chaotic, apathetic, stateless, leaderless, desperate, we can only theorize as to what is going to happen to us all.

And Rosemarie's theory is that if one can get through the next thee months in Zimbabwe, one will be able to make it through the next six or twelve months, (or for however long it takes till the Tide Turns.)

The reason for this theory of hers is that August, September and October in Zimbabwe have always been, since time immemorial, hot, dry, brown, ghastly, horrid and nasty. Even in the good times, August, September, and October were the unsavoury months, remember we used to call October the Suicide Month ?

The jacarandas are stark and ugly, the ground is brown, bare and covered in supercool packets and plastic bags.There is nothing nice about September apart from the promise of the purple jacaranda blossoms, which seem to come earlier every year.

The smells ARE superb though, the scent of the jasmine, the Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, and the cestrum are all magnificent.

AND ONE MUST LOOK AT THE GOOD THINGS.....to get one through the next few months until the rains. (which are going to be good this year they tell me !!!))

I rode through my usual field next to the hockey stadium with my dogs yesterday and tried to be as positive as Rosemarie had inspired me to be !!

The plastic bags stuck on the dry grass stalks, were not plastic bags, suddenly, I began to visualise them as daffodils.....the myriads of super cool packets thrown down at the side of the road became snowdrops.....(No laughing now, just try it yourself, they actually looked quite pretty )!!

At her request I drove down Leopold Takawira. ( I drive down Leopold Takawira every day and somehow this year I had not noticed the magnificent petria bushes just before the fountain in the park. I had also not noticed the Yesterday Today and Tomorrow bushes which are budding feverishly. )

Being the weekend, I promised Rosemarie I would look out for the weddings in the park. Until this year, I must stress that I had always noticed the petria, the Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, and the weddings, but somehow so far, they all passed me by in my introspective gloom...

The weddings were great I must confess. The Centenary Park near the fountain has traditionally been the meeting place for wedding photographs and there they all were. Brides galore, beautiful brides in all their pure white finery, complete with vast retinues of six or seven bridesmaids, flower girls, page boys and groomsmen in all the colours of the rainbow. Violets, emeralds, azures, crimsons and turquoise, even purple to match the petrias !!

The whole colonial bangshoot !!

Well worth a comtemplatory stop, albeit a compulsory stop, because the balloon festooned combis will not let you pass at any rate !!

My Friend Rosemarie also gently reminded me that life in Zimbabwe, although we are stretched to our very elastic limit, is still fortunately a lot less confining than that on the European Continent.

Life is still good, life is not as restricted, not so hide bound by rules and regulations, by trade unions and conventions, by laws and legalities.....

(I love laws, we all love laws, but we have become like the Wild West in Zimbabwe these days, lawless, rooting, tootin cowboys it would appear !!)

I faithfully trust in my friend and her prophecies, all will come right in the not too distant future, let us just get through the next couple of dry barren months, keep a close eye on the petria, stop and smell the jasmine, listen to the Heugelins Robin, and don't take any notice of the dark threatening clouds until the real clouds appear, the rains fall and wash away all the grime.