The Travel Diva

In another life

One or two of my editors have picked up on the fact that I'm pretty dangerous. Others cringe when they hear of the latest disasters I've unleashed on the world. My son reckons I'm not a freelance writer, more of a mercenary. It's somewhat troubling when I consider my previous life, when I was an elegant designer doll -- a picture of executive perfection in Gucci, Prada, Tiffany, Balmain; colour co-ordinated from head to toe with matching bag, shoes and gun holster. I walked like a run-way model and was refinement personified.

Then it all changed.

At some point in my life I decided that I no longer wanted to spend 2 hours a day pampering and preening myself - enough of the expensive hair, acrylic nails and YSL cosmetics. I donated it all to charity, invested in 4 or 5 pairs of jeans and comfortable shoes (okay, trainers) and unknowingly proceeded to transform myself from a self-obsessed individual to one that obsesses about the world around me (and wears the same pair of jeans for two weeks).

I was probably the most organised person on the planet. Now I'm surrounding by strategic piles of paper and chaos; every other week I'd be at the hair-dressers, now I go see my husband's barber maybe twice a year. The old me's car used to look like it had just been driven off the showroom floor. I don't know when last my car has been washed now - 2005 or 2006?

My husband reckons that perhaps I've begun to see what really matters; personally I just don't give a shit about glamour any more. And you know what, I look (and feel) a hundred times better for it.

But what I cannot figure out is where my common sense has gone. Please bear in mind that I've found my way across the Atlantic Ocean by navigating the stars and sailed single handed from Cape Town to half up the African continent … why then, after 4 years, do I still need to use SatNav to find my way around my own town. Why am I the one that get's caught out with a flat tire wearing a crusty old a dressing gown? Why am I the one that brings down the whole shelf of canned food in the store? And please God tell me why am I the one that finds the only toilet that's door needs to be held shut with my foot?

I would love just once to rise from a dinner table without looking as if an extremely localised seismic event just occurred on my lap; get into a car and close the door without leaving half my coat outside, wear light-coloured trousers without discovering at the end of the day that I have at various times sat in chewing gum, ice cream, cough syrup and motor oil.

posted by Cindy-Lou Dale @ Friday, August 03, 2007