Diable Tonnere

How I wished I could still do cartwheels !!

Cartwheels would have been the most appropriate expression of joy after all.

The sky was totally ominously black, the entire sky from horizon to horizon. The thunder did not crack and whip it usually does, instead it growled and bellyached as if the earth was in tremendous pain.

The air was heavy with the scent of fragrant fresh rain; the birds were whirling around deliriously knowing they would soon need to seek shelter.

The land was lacklustre, dry, parched, and achingly arid. Is Mother Nature playing havoc with us again very little rain last year, dry dams this year, shades of another 1993? God forbid.

Scanning the heavens is a dedicated pastime in Bulawayo where we are on the edge of a desert. So much depends on the rain, our wildlife, our crops, and our very existence. Rain is hugely important in this part of Africa. It plays with our psyche, it messes with our heads. Bulawayo now has severe water cuts twice weekly and the populace is in serious distress.

In 1993 thanks to the ZTV program me "Bulawayo Must Live" the world watched in incredulous amazement as we introduced "The Big Flush" and now we are doing so yet again, the dreaded tenyear cycle, nature's wheel turns with deadly precision.

Someone must be getting rain surely, the sky was so dark? All around us it seemed as though the sky was crashing and rolling in agony. The mythical god Thor was hurling his mighty weight around on someone surely?

All week the blistering heat had gripped the city in its malicious claws. All week the winds had blown horrendous heat in from the north, and now as cool as a cucumber, the south winds began their damning work.

All that promise, all that bluster and torrid tempting, the clouds were blown away in an instant, leaving us sagging in frustration.

My desire to do cartwheels left me instantly as Mother Nature teased us with her mischievous Diable Tonnere, into weary dry submission once again.