Road by the fever tree
'Outsider artists', a term given to creatives that seem a little strange to us, also suffer from being labeled as 'having issues' well, who doesn't have issues? There are people who suffer incredible pain in life, more than most, and they are deep-felt individuals who can create imaginary worlds to live in to cope with what life throws at them and make life bearable.
An outsider artist, Nukain Mabusa, was the subject of an earlier blog post. My fascination with outsider artists is heightened because my dad was such an artist.
Back then, Willem Johannes Stephanus Bosch, my dad, a potter by trade in his youth, was a gay man who was forced to stay in the closet to survive the world he found himself in. When the suffering became too much, my dad moved to the country to a piece of land my middle brother Willie owned. My dad focused on developing my brother's smallholding. My dad’s partner lived in another city, so they continued their relationship differently.
To create a beautiful surface on the exterior walls of my dad’s mud cottage, yellow ochre oxide was mixed with boiler plaster, a paper cement, by my brother Willie. All the materials were provided by my brother, who passed away unexpectedly in 2018. He was referred to as the godfather of cement. What a loss, he was only 61 years old. A local carpenter built the furniture for my dad's cottage. A large vegetable garden flanked the side of the dwelling. The amazing part of the story is the 80 trees my dad, then in his sixties, planted on the rugged property. There was no easy way to dig into the soil where this took place, it was ‘rooi grond’ red soil. The soil has a deep rust colour because of its iron content, which makes it tough, like digging into rock. Yes this father of mine dug and dug and after a number of years a plantation of many Fever trees emerged. The Fever tree is found in Eastern and Southern Africa, it is medium sized and grows up to 25m tall. My favorite part of the tree is its green trunk. It’s spreading branches possess thorns 7cm long! A mixture of feathery leaves allow sunlight to filter through its open canopy. Fifteen years later my dad sadly died of cancer at the age of 75.
While I don't consider myself an outside artist, looking at the story of my father, I can't help but notice similarities in our behavior. You may know from a previous post that I have suffered a great deal of loss. In my youth, I lost a child in the middle trimester of my pregnancy, my dad died when I was in my early forties and my eldest brother Cornelius was murdered a few years later. My mother battled dementia for ten years and died at the ripe old age of 93, then there was the unexpected and sudden passing of my middle brother during my mum's illness. After so much that has happened to me, I don't mind being the only one left. The burden has lifted. It is not the purpose of this post to tell you about my loss, but I believe it affects my behavior.
When I was in my mid fifties, my husband and I purchased an unusually steep piece of land on the Mornington Peninsula. The land is exceptionally steep and was available for sale at an affordable price. After we sold our mud brick home in Eltham Victoria where we lived for 12 years, starry eyed, we bought it after selling our house. My husband and I were owner builders. With gardening in my blood, I took on the garden by myself. My dad taught me what I know. My husband gave me a structure, building retaining walls, but the weeding and planting were done on my own over a period of five years. I am grateful to say that I’ve survived it without serious injury. A weed, called bridal creeper, originally from my birth land, South Africa, took several years to eradicate. Its rhizome underground habit is difficult to get rid of, and our block was infested with it as is most of the area where we live in Blairgowrie.
I have planted a small forest of Moonah trees, indigenous to the area, amongst several other native and indigenous species.
Below:
Pic.1- my dad with his pet goat Stanley and my brother’s Labrador Ginger.
Pic.2- my dad’s mud cottage
Pic.3- dad in his veggie garden
Pic.4- Fever tree close up - that gorgeous green!
Pic.5- Road by the Fever tree
