The Yank Invasion Continues...

The onslaught of Yankee Doodle cultural infiltration continues to creep into our South African way of life.

In the beginning, thanks to the Equity ban of the 70's and 80's, music, movies and TV were left wide open for American occupation.  Slowly, our Christmases changed from easy, summer family affairs into competitive table decor, Bing Crosby crooners and nibbles for the hardworking reindeer.

And yes, I fell into it.  With glee.  American culture made Christmas beautiful, colourful, fragrant and iconic.  Retailers everywhere celebrated, the Christian roots withered away but oh, my, did our table groan while our house glowed and glittered in every nook and cranny.

Then Halloween arrived, replacing Guy Fawkes and Bonfire night.  Backed by genius American marketing we painted and pasted yucky wounds and monster faces, peeled grapes (for the eyeball trick) and sent the offspring on their way to load up with unwanted and unnecessary sugar.  And saw nothing wrong with that, either.

Fortunately, Thanksgiving is passing us by (TWO turkey dinners in four weeks would blast both budget and waistline) but social media still gives it a good tonk and insidiously Thanksgiving is a familiar date on our calendars too.

Yet bizarrely, Black Friday has landed and slipped tentacles into November's last Friday.  Why?  This is a day exclusively linked to Thanksgiving Thursday.  Which we don't observe.  So why a day devoted solely to shopping and money spending a stone's throw away from Christmas should plant itself firmly in South Africa is a mystery.  

Or maybe not.  Checkers, a discount food grocery chain proudly brags that they brought Black Friday to SA in 2014.  And trumpeted that Black Friday 2016 would be the biggest and best yet, with markdowns of up to 50%.  How they must be regretting that after photographs of the horror queues at their store in Port Elizabeth flooded social media on Friday.  Online shopping websites across the country crashed and optimistic shoppers got to the virtual checkout only to have their baskets melt down. 

A sign of desperation in these fraught economic times, or that crazed bargain hunting gene gone wild?  Perhaps a bit of both.    

Meanwhile, the Social Media Social Conscience Keyboard Warriors (SMSCKW) have added their two cents worth by flooding the airwaves with urban legend and rumour in an effort to ruffle and stir up a collective guilt wave.  Black Friday was the day way back in the 1800's when Southern plantation owners would discount their slaves on the sales block.

Bollocks.  But when did a little research ever come between a keyboard warrior and an inflammatory post?  http://www.history.com/news/whats-the-real-history-of-black-friday

Black Friday began in the 1950's in Philadelphia when local cops were all out on duty struggling to cope with hordes of people and vehicle traffic in town for some pre-Army/Navy football game shopping.  By the mid 1980's, retail marketers saw the gap to rocket sales stratospheric-ally and embraced a huge, discount shopping day.  They'll tell you it changes retail balance sheets from the red into the black, which is a spin stretched quite far.  A few days into the final month of the year, these poor businesses finally get to turn a profit?  

Anyhow, back to the beginning.  Why, oh why, is this intrinsically American phenomenon, linked to a holiday South Africans don't celebrate, putting down roots in our culture?  Are we so eager to fit in under the shadow of that huge nation we grasp excessive commercialism rather than explore, and exploit, the many cultural possibilities on our own doorstep?

Personally, I prefer my Black mixed with White!

This CAN'T Be My Life!

You know how it goes - you've just finished school and escaped the prison of parents and home to enter uni and res.  Life is bloody fantastic and stretches ahead to infinity while you can do anything, know everything and by the time you've had your say and fixed the cock-ups of your parent's generation, the world will be a better place.

First job - magic.  No exams or assignments to hand in.  No one to set curfews or control the purse strings.  Your salary is your own, your hours (outside of the office) are yours to squander as you wish.  Life is marvellous.

Marriage and the early stirrings of Grown Up begin to rustle.  First property ownership, gardens to manage, dinner parties to organise.  Not bad, though you say it yourself.

Oh, your circle of mates begin to sprout offspring.  Fancy that.  Well, why not?

Good grief, the kids are in Matric and that dreaded Matric Dance (which seems to create more hysteria and hype than the actual school leaving / university entering exams do!) is causing household chaos.  At least we're all in this together and wine, a mother's best friend, is lavishly shared.

Can't believe it - every weekend seems to bring yet another 21st party as the 'crowd' your sprogs belong to hit this milestone like bird-shot.

Emptied the postbox and found an ornately scribed, heavily embossed invitation to the first of my varsity friend's child's wedding.  Can't believe my mate is mother of the bride - how middle aged!

What'sApp delivers a photograph - a black and white scan of some kind of blob. Oh, the first grandchild hits our circle.  Huge gushes of emotion pours from us all as we coo and ahh over every single development until the main event.  Then we are completely toast - those precious fingernails and eyelashes sweep us into a wet huddle.

The retirement village calls - your father, the tall, imposing figure of strength and security has been admitted to hospital.  The empty hours left by fledged children are now filled with responsibility to someone who is a husk of what you remember.  Good thing he CAN'T remember what he was.  Or what he said three minutes ago.  There is such sadness to watch our roots, our memories, our foundation of who we are desiccate before our eyes. 

First parent shuffles off the mortal coil, delivering a swift thick ear.  Shaken up by the realisation that someone who, for better or worse, has been around for your entire life has gone and you no longer have parents, you have a parent. And quickly, that parent becomes a late-life child, requiring attention and help which you've never been asked for before.  Commiserating with friends as like ten pins, their own parents begin to fall or to fade away into a twilight zone of ill health, both mental and physical.

Sometimes, it feels as though I'm acting in a movie of someone else's real-life story.  This can't be mine.  Firstly, I was going to live forever.  Secondly, I'd like to, please.  Or reincarnate as a fly - I'm passionately invested in my sons' lives, I want to be there, discreetly on the wall, watching them to infinity and beyond. How is it possible for time to sweep past, not only at warp speed, but so invisibly I've been completely unaware of it's passing for decades.  S'true.

Most annoyingly, since early childhood my parents and grandparents have trotted out the trite sayings - enjoy it while it lasts, time flies, live in the moment blah blah fishcakes.  So not only was I oblivious to my passing life, but my mother was right after all!