Cheetah

If a person should look at his life, one could look at it as an unedited movie, some of it being out of focus and lost, some mundane clips and then vivid clips, complete with stored emotions, tastes, smells and sounds, stored in a special "untraceable" section of the brain. These include moments from death, new life, laughter, sadness, loudness and complete silence.

One such a moment, saved in that place, was the sighting of the cheetah and spending time in their general company. The place is an unassuming small reserve, in the Free State Province, called Soetdoring Nature Reserve, a favorite hangout for a few years. Soetdoring refer to the ,Acacia karroo, sweet thorn trees found along the river that flows through the reserve.

The reserve, being small, has 2 camps, where in one they have lions and the other cheetah. You drive in through a double gate system and then follow various gravel roads looking for the animals. I questioned if they actually had any cheetah, because after 3 visits they remained invisible non existing "entities" to my mind.

Driving in, talking about other things and not expecting much, looking for birdies, suddenly, "There!", and in an instant the vehicle's engine was dead, but still moving slowly forward under what momentum it still had. Dead silence. Then, as if nature turned up the volume, chattering of birds all around us, the soft earthy smell of a mixture of "herbs and soil", replaced by a puff of a dead carcass.

The cheetah was sitting proudly upright, seemingly ignoring the intrusion, although it must have known about us long before we actually arrived at the spot.

[caption id="attachment_184" align="aligncenter" width="474"] Proudly over carcass.[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_185" align="aligncenter" width="474"] Looking around.[/caption]

We watched in silence as he looked up and down, never in our direction, then a soft word, "beautiful", breaking through the chattering. Suddenly it got up and walked towards a hill, taking one of the gravel road tracks. We followed, and as the diesel sprung into life again, it seemed to make less noise as well, not nearly drowning out all the outside "music" as before.

[caption id="attachment_186" align="aligncenter" width="474"] Walking up the road.[/caption]

Slowly, determined and graceful, the cheetah walked up the road with his human observers in toe at a fair distance.

[caption id="attachment_187" align="aligncenter" width="474"] At the top of the hill.[/caption]

As we arrived at the top of the hill he veered off to the right and fairly shortly after that, as if a mirrored ghost, another one appeared from seemingly nowhere. They briefly touched, our cheetah turned around and the two came back towards us.

[caption id="attachment_188" align="aligncenter" width="474"] Meeting[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_189" align="aligncenter" width="474"] Walking back towards us.[/caption]

Then they found a nice spot fairly close, and lay down in what again seemed like a mirrored movement. Again the now in vehicle silence was broken with "stunning" and nature took over again. This time we were the ones being watched and in that moment I realized how they blended in and it was no wonder we never saw them before.

[caption id="attachment_190" align="aligncenter" width="474"] Resting in the shade.[/caption]

After a while and with a "sigh" natures music was broken again as I fired up the diesel and taking a last look at the two, drove off. This event has and will forever stay with me as a special moment, a vivid high-definition clip, but better than any technology version, as it combines with smell, sounds and other emotions. It also makes me wonder if we really think enough about how important nature in all its forms are for our own mental condition.

Driving away with a feeling of accomplishment, excitement and wonder, I realized that for the shortest of moments I was totally at peace, it was like taking deep oxygenated mental breath.