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Brinjal Murphy Café
is the new
Red Verandah
for Stories and Poetry and Yarns
The red verandah was the length of the house. Lovingly polished to a brilliant shiny red. Treacherous when wet from summer storms but beautiful for children to slide on before it got mopped and dried to prevent people from slipping and falling but mostly because a gleaming red verandah was a source of pride and joy.
It had a three foot high brick wall around the perimeter which served as a seat or a foot rest if you were sitting on one of the wicker chairs. The square shaped buckets of twisted wicker were deep and cushioned with sun faded floral fabric, dust smelling and stuffed as hard as stone. They were haphazardly scattered around the red verandah amongst the large barrels of elephant leaves and ferns and inbetween the glass topped wicker tables laden with smaller pot plants leaving not an inch of space to place a tea tray or even a coffee mug or china tea cup and saucer.
This verandah faced the street and it faced west and in summer it was best to enjoy the verandah's mid morning and evening coolness and in winter the late afternoon brought warmth and comfort from a low flung sun. It was a place where laughter tingled and roared, and made bellies shake, hands clap and knees get slapped. A place to tell stories. Stories of good times and bad. Funny stories and ridiculous stories but whatever the story that could be shared while sitting on a hard cushioned wicker chair, it would be a story of people and places and happenings and every one would be detailed and colorful. They created a distinctive picture because the seeing was with the mind and not with the eyes.
Today we have TV and the Internet filling our eyes with pictures and paintings and scenes and often we don't sit out on the porch, patio, stoep or verandah to listen to stories and yarns and no longer exercise the "seeing" in our minds instead of our eyes. Brinjal Murphy Café is that red verandah. Come read the yarns. Some will take you back and some will make you "think forward" but whatever they do I hope they make you hear without listening, see without looking, taste without tasting, feel without touching and smell without sniffing. Yes, I hope you experience the sharpening of your senses when you hang out at Brinjal Murphy Café.