Kīrīmi scurried towards the gate feeling guilty about dozing off in the lounge. He didn’t want to appear like a lazy bone relying on strangers to feed him, or like those vultures who wait for lions to hunt only to circle and hover around the carcass until the lions loose their appetite and abandon the kill.
Upon reaching the gate he spoke to the gateman whom he came to learn that his name was Njoro. Njoro was tall enough to hover over him and with a condescending tone said, ‘its bout time you got useful around here, this is not a refugee camp.’ Kīrīmi sighed and took a deep breath, he’d learnt that this technique really worked when someone was trying to rile you up and a sudden outburst would only take things further south. He exhaled and followed Njoro who motioned him towards the workshop. He explained to him the nitty gritties of operating the lawn mower and soon the engine was purring and shaking Kīrīmi’s hands like a leaf on a windy fall evening. After adjusting to the shake and the angular velocity, he was able to control the machine well and admire how it’s fine blades now played with the green dewy grass. He found himself whistling to, ‘take a message to Mary, but don’t tell her where I am.’ He was glad he didn’t have a Mary at the moment because he too wouldn’t want her to know where he was. The purr of the engine and the smell of the freshly cut grass had him absorbed in the moment he almost closed his eyes and waltzed the day away. He was a son of the soil and the smell took him back in time to when he’d take a book and camp under a fig tree next to the Likii river. He’d read chapters and chapters of Jeffrey Archer’s and Robert Ludlum’s thrillers only being brought to reality by an occasional fig hitting his head. He’d munch on the fig and thank nature for existing for the betterment of others. He’d somehow feel inspired like sir Isaac Newton when that apple hit him and voila the first law of motion was documented.
Without further drifting of his mind, he’d go back to reading and would only stop when the pangs of hunger took preeminence. He’d then pull his fishing hook from its usual place look for a good fishing spot and once he’d caught plenty a fish he’d then light a fire and roast them. Only after his tummy was full and he was belching would he take a swim in the cool waters and head back home. The sudden stop of the engine brought him back to reality and he realised that the fuel must be over. He scurried to the workshop to look at the various containers and see if there was any fuel…
To be continued.
#StillTheChronicler.
Drifting
