About a year ago, while I was still busy illegal alienating and expatriating myself abroad, my mom sent me an e-mail in which she casually mentioned that she had taken up a new hobby.

I was immediately wary, because when my sisters and I were little, some of my mom’s hobbies had included activities that some might have viewed as being a bit odd for a seemingly sweet and innocent young mother of four young girls.

Like target shooting.

Scarier still was the poor buggers targets they shot at, and the fact that my mom won the trophy for best shot in the entire district several years in a row! If the people in the small town where we grew up had been any more clued up about musicals and theatrical references, my mom, with her red hair, surely would have been nicknamed Annie Oakley.

Needless to say, I was almost too afraid to ask what on earth she had decided was stimulating enough to take up in order to liven up her retirement age.

“Painting.” She replied.

“Painting what?” I asked, still suspicious. “Houses? Skyscrapers?” And then, a terrifying and therefore very likely thought occurred to me: “Bridges and overpasses? Oh, no, Mom! Please tell me that you have NOT decided to become a graffiti artist!”

She laughed. “No, you silly girl! Painting, as in art!”

“OH!” My relief must’ve been evident. And since my mom had until then never even drawn a picture in her life, I added, in what I thought was a suitably encouraging tone but probably ended up sounding more like an adult does whenever looking at a toddler’s art works: “That’s very nice, Mom. Send me some of your pictures!”

“Mom’s painting.” My sister e-mailed me a few months later.

“Yes, I’ve heard. That’s so cute.” I replied, half distracted.

And then I promptly forgot about my mom’s artistic endeavours.

Until my return to South Africa on Christmas Day last year.

Jet-lagged and traumatised, I arrived at my sister’s house.

And saw this:

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