Lent Day 39: Hard days night

This morning we woke up in Umfolozi to the stillness of creation. Few moments are more peaceful than a dawn where humanity is sparce. Sitting on our little verandah in the freshness of the day I was almost duped into forgetting how bad our night had been and it made me realise how inverted survival is in the wild. 

Last night Gray developed a UTI and I spent the whole night panicking about whether we needed to rush him to the hospital, at some point Eva climbed into our bed with us and wriggled for what felt like an eternity, there were mozzies and at 10pm the generators got switched off denying us our much needed fan and so we had to basically sleep in what felt like a hot armpit because opportunistic animals could climb in through even an asscrack of a window opening. And then of course, with all this anxious damage control happening around me when everyone did eventually settle down and sleep I was left wide eyed and reliving every unfortunate thing I've done and said since I was 3. So basically your average kak night.

And as I sat in the loveliness of another new day, half delirious with lack of sleep, I thought about the animal kingdom.

I'm pretty sure that part of the circle of life jamboree every morning is a group high five for the prey who survived the night. Nothing must be scarier than being an impala in a game reserve at night. If I was an impala I would probably develop a nervous twitch every time the sun started setting. It's a war out there, and you are the cannon fodder, so to speak. 

Nights in the wild don't favour the vulnerable. Every sunrise deserves a pat on the back, or rump. For most animals the day is actually when you get to let your guard down, literally. The lions are all asleep, the hyenas are in their dens and the leopards are hopefully eating your cousin in a tree somewhere. And also you can see a helleva lot more when the lights are switched on. Day time in creation is the restorative time for those lower down on the food chain. 

As I pondered my bad night I thought about all the humans on the lower part of the food chain - the vulnerable ones. The ones in grief, the sick ones, the anxious ones, the insomniacs, the ones nursing new born babies, the ones with sick children, the ones who see the night as one long ordeal that has to be survived and I suddenly realised how close we are to our animal origins. 

The night can be a terrifying place where lions stalk and hyenas laugh in the darkness. Where every snapped twig is a terror and the lack of light makes the hours seem like forever.  

I don't have a pithy end to this thought other than the realization that maybe some mornings we should all go to work and sing 'the circle of life' together and high five our impala friends who survived another night of being human. Because it's a war out there and when it's survival of the fittest being an impala requires the strength of the herd.