Coffee Date (Without throwing cups)

When the children did arrive home, I didn’t know what hit me! They were so traumatized, that I didn’t know what to do. They collapsed on the floor crying. I would sit with one, trying to comfort them, and another one would be sitting round a corner crying.

I phoned my parents to come help, because I didn’t have enough arms to hold them, and enough ears to listen. In desperation, we also phoned the counselor to enlist her help. It took 3 hours to calm them down.

The counselor wanted to institute proceedings to stop the Prof from seeing the children unsupervised. I asked her for a space of time, to just let everything settle down, before taking any drastic steps. As it was, the Prof didn’t see them again for about a month – because the next time they had to go with him, they decided that they didn’t want to go.

In the mean time, I contacted the Prof and asked him to meet me for coffee.

I wonder if he thought I would throw cups of coffee at him? I sure was mad enough. I met him at Mugg and Bean. As he walked in, a tremendous calm came over me, and the Lord moved my heart to speak to him with kindness.

This I did, to the best of my ability. I am not sure that he heard much of what I had to say. I told him that I had always been the buffer between him and the children. Now that I was no longer there to protect them, I suggested he went to seek some professional help, to help him cope with this situation (of his own making – but I kept that thought to myself).

He was very quiet during this conversation. I told him that the counselor wanted to make the weekends with him supervised visitation, and that he would have to prove he could look after them responsibly. In my heart, looking back today, I think he sat through that speech as he would a punishment. He probably thought I was being “I know best for the children” – who can say?

Then, a surprising thing happened – or rather – it surprised me. I had long struggled with the concept of forgiveness in my heart. I heard Werner’s oft repeated words in my ears –"Yvonne, you need to forgive them". I had mulled it over and knew, in order to move on, I would need to forgive both the Prof and Cream Puff, but never until now had I felt I could say with honesty in my heart that I had done so.

Now, under these adverse circumstances I knew I could. I told the Prof – I have forgiven you… you and Cream Puff, for the things you have done. He sat with a stoney face, and didn't utter a word.

It has never looked like he wanted my forgiveness, or even that it made the slightest bit of difference to him. But to me, it made the world of difference. I was suddenly free. I also only realize in retrospect, that my relationship with Werner, only began AFTER I had offered my forgiveness speech. Only then did things move forward in my life.

And the children? They have had extensive counseling for this and similar incidents. I haven’t asked them in a long time how they feel about it – feels like scratching off old scabs. But the folks who know the children, all say the same thing: they are happy, well balanced children.
I think we can be proud to have made it through such rocky times, as well as the fact that we maintained the children's weekends with their father.

If I sometimes write with a hint of anger about the Prof , please remember that I am still in conflict with him till this day, and the forgiveness thing – seems to be an ongoing affair – forgive the pun.

The darkest hour is before dawn

O believe me - I have a MUCH better title for this post. But hey - can one post a title like: A S.... night? Mmmm I thought not. So - this title will have to do.

The Prof began taking the children with to the farm. He continued the pattern which Cream Puff had started – that of going to the farm on weekends. I was deeply troubled. Cream Puff’s mother was terminally ill, and bed ridden. They would stay in her mother’s house on those weekends, and my stress was surrounding the introduction of another person into the children’s lives, who had but a matter of months to live.

Strangely, that need never have been my concern. What should have been my concern, never even occurred to me, and did more damage that Cream Puff’s mother’s illness and subsequent death.

The thing which I should have been concerned about – was the Prof’s emotional well being and state of mind!

In those early days, there occurred such a traumatic night at the farm, that the Prof almost lost the right to see the children unsupervised. I don’t think he even realizes today, how close he came, and that the fact he still sees the children today, is thanks to a lot of fancy talking which I did to save him that right.

As best I can remember, here is the rendition of that night.
The Prof and Cream Puff had been drinking wine with their evening meal. This is a pattern reported on a lot by the children. There were several things which happened - which upset the Prof that night.

The first, was a conversation which Marinda had with him about changing Eric's nappy. She was trying to make the point that it is one thing to change your own child's diapers, but quite another if that child is not yours. The conversation upset the Prof somehow.
Then, she accidentally knocked over the Prof's wine glass and it broke. He has an absolute fit if anyone breaks a glass - this time was no exception.

All this caused Marinda to walk away and go read her book.

A bit later, the children discovered that the toilet had blocked up. They didn't use the other bathroom - because it was the bathroom used by Cream Puff's parents.

They told the Prof, who said he would look at it later. Time passed, and eventually they needed to use the bathroom so they again asked the Prof to help them. He completely lost it. "Now I have to stick my hand in the sh.t for YOU, and you can't even understand that I change Eric's nappy", he shouted at them.

The kids didn’t know what hit them as he ranted and raved at them for a while. Eventually, after the blocked toilet had been sorted out, and they were ready to bath, the Prof came back to apologize. Then, scarier than the first incident, he broke down in tears, telling them he missed them so much. He sat on the floor crying and they watched helplessly - not knowing what to do. He should have been comforting THEM, did they now need to comfort him? What was happening to the person who was meant to look after them and keep them safe? How were they meant to react? They clung together and kept quiet. That night, the girls crawled into one sleeping bag together, and promised each other to stick together.

They were too scared to go to sleep, too scared to say anything, and were just praying the time away until they could get home.

Caught out - AGAIN

The Divorce Care arrangement worked well. I would drop the kids at the Prof’s house and Werner would visit his kids at the Prof’s house on a Monday afternoon. We ended up leaving there at the same time, driving just a kilometer up the road, to attend the meetings.

Now the Prof is by no means a stupid man. It didn’t take him long to realize - hey I think I see a pattern here. The Prof asked the children where I was going, but they only knew I went to divorce care, and nothing further.

The arrangement with the Prof, was that he would take the children home at about 8 - because Divorce Care ended too late in the evening for me to pick them up again.
But gradually, the children began telling me that he would leave later than 8 o'clock, and instead of driving them home, he would first drive around. It was evident that he was trying to find me.

It didn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that Divorce Care was held at a church premises near his property, so he simply started going around to the churches – making the mistake of keeping the children in the car with him, who duly reported back to me. He managed to find my car eventually, and of course, Werner’s car in the bargain.

There came a night, after I had left Divorce Care already, and the Prof had dropped the children at my house, when he snuck back to Divorce Care, to try following Werner. (Why was he even bothered!)

But, Werner is a very sharp cookie. He spotted the Prof’s car on his way out, and gave chase. The Prof drove furiously round the block, back to his own house. Werner just drove straight to the Prof's house - knowing the Prof would head home. Werner pulled in to his driveway behind him. Wagging a finger at the Prof, he turned and left, after making it quite clear that the Prof must stop pulling such stunts - he would be caught out every time.

A choice reputation

Werner at some point, did some investigation of his own, into the Prof’s going’s on, and discovered that the Prof had quite a reputation.

I must say, when hearing this – many months later, I really wracked my brain trying to figure out who else might have been previous potential “Cream Puffs”.

I eventually came up with 2 names. One was a lady who had worked with The Prof many years before, and one was another person at the university. Werner later confirmed that this was also someone the Prof had had a “friendship” with. We don’t know details, don’t have proof, and thank goodness it no longer matters. What did help – was the thought that this was a “pattern” with the Prof. It helped me even more to realize, the problem had not been with me, but within himself.

Werner warned Cream Puff about the Prof’s reputation, but she paid him no mind. She accused him of telling stories in order to make the Prof look bad. All the information Werner gave her was vehemently denied.

A while after Cream Puff had moved out, (remember she moved into the Prof’s house), Werner wanted to make arrangements to see his children. Since he was in the process of packing up his house and selling, he did not want to expose the children to the trauma of being back in the empty house.

He called a meeting with Cream Puff and the Prof – to arrange visitation times. This was the meeting of the famous coffee throwing incident – the one the Prof still touts as his proof of Werner’s violent nature.

Werner became upset during this meeting because the Prof and Cream Puff were talking nonsense, and not to the point arrangements about the visits. He can’t remember the in’s and out’s but I can well imagine how such a conversation would have gone astray under the difficult circumstances.

It was at this point that Werner threw the cup of coffee at The Prof, missing him (what a shame), and hitting the wall.


Werner didn’t “know” that Cream Puff had moved into the Prof’s house, but he had a good suspicion who the house belonged to. She had told him she was renting the property. Lies and more lies.

Werner went to visit the children at the Prof’s house, even confronting Cream Puff once when she was there. She was supposedly alone with the children, but Werner just had the sense that the Prof was in the vicinity.

"Tell him to come out," he told her, "and he may as well own up to the fact that this house belongs to him - while he is at it."
Out walked the Prof from behind a wall. Werner's 6th sense about the situation proved to be correct once more.

That brings Werner’s story up to date with mine, where we continue with divorce care.

Not THAT one! (present)

Life is a bit like a fast moving train, going so fast that I can't see the scenery outside. There is not much time to get my head around writing the story - so I thought to show you glimpses of the fast moving scenery instead.

Viewing the one window we see the following:
Marielle is having long days at school - apparently it takes TIME to germinate from Lorrie to FLORRIE. We went to see their "Groentjie" (GREEN) concert last night. Very cute. But by the time we got home, the tears were also flowing. Long days at school, with intimidation, practicing concerts, lack of food, lack of structure, all took their toll on this little person who loves structure and wants to know what is coming next. They have told her she may not have a fringe - heck - where do we go to with a fringe - it doesn't exactly grow out in a day.
The only piece of "helpless" advice I can give is - take it one day and one problem at a time.

Out of the other window we still see school scenery - but of a different nature. Eric started nursery school this week. IF I say YAH - you cannot imagine my relieve and joy contained within that little word. We were deeply concerned about his developmental stages, and he wasn't receiving enough stimulation at home with the housekeeper. Apparently the school teachers adore him, and he is having a ball.

Yesterday, Werner had to send copies of our Id's through to the school, in order to give permission to fetch Eric from school.
With that, my ID went along too, as there may be days that I need to pick him up from school. The school apparently took a good, long, hard look at my details and then phoned Werner, deeply concerned:
"You wife's ID number seems to have changed!"
"Oh?", said Werner, "well as far as I know her ID number has stayed the same". Then the penny dropped. They were comparing my ID number to that of Cream Puff's.
Realising this he asked them, "have you got the id's in front of you?"
"Yes".
"Well take a good look - she is my wife.....not that OTHER one!"

We had a good giggle when he repeated the story to us. These are the little antidotes which have dotted our lives and we take huge pleasure from them!

School "germination"

The Blogging community has a thing called : Wordless Wednesday!

The idea is that you post a photo and it tells all, and you don't write a word. Sounds to me like a very nice way of giving bloggers the day off!

So... I have been planning and timing and took some photos... with the idea that I can do Wordless Wednesday too, only to discover - I can't do Wordless Wednesday. Aside from it now being Thursday , I just cannot keep quiet like that.

So , here is my best attempt - lots of photos and fewer words!

Marielle won the blog spot today.


Here she is - 2nd day of high school. She is going through initiation - which they are calling - "germination" ... they are being "germinated" to worthy Florries. ("Florries" is the traditional name of the Florida High School pupils. ) With that in mind - the new initiates are now being called Lorries - they need to EARN the F.


Their "Lorrie" needed a number plate, head lights, and a board explaining what their Lorrie looks like. Here is "Lorrie Marielle" with her number plate!


"Lorrie Marielle" has leather seats, a scratched door and a flat tyre - according to her board.












They also needed to carry a stone around - representing their pet dog, have 8 pony tails and walk around bare foot.
SHAME.

"THE END"

Although Werner knew that Cream Puff was having the affair, and intending to leave, he didn't know what her plans were or when. So, the actual end came as a huge shock and surprise.

As she usually did, she packed up and left with the children to the farm one weekend at the end of March 2007. On Sunday, she phoned him to tell him she was no longer coming home. With no warning to the children (they were too young to understand - according to her), she returned and moved into the Prof's house.

Werner and the maid were left to pack up her stuff for her.

I fetch Werner's little girl from school (story for another day!). Late last year, she began talking about when she used to drive with in her dad's car. She was talking about his bakkie which he has subsequently sold, so I realised she was talking about her life "before" her parents divorced. I knew she remembered the previous house, because many a time she has told us - I miss my old house. So I asked her what she was missing about her life from before. This was on advice of the counselor who has said we must give recognition to the fact that the children have lost a way of life and have a right to mourn it.
So she spoke for a while about her toys and her room.

Suddenly she said: "you know, mommy took me shopping for shoes - that was before it was the End. Then we went to the farm and it was THE END and I never saw my house again".

I was shocked to the core. Not only does she remember that time, she even has a name for it - The End. And Cream Puff thought they were too young to realise?
My heart still breaks about this, even just writing it down is painful.

Pulling Strings (Present)

Arno LOVES string. He is forever asking me to buy him string. Sometimes you find he has tied up all the teddy bears in his possession, and everything is a mangled mess, and other times, you discover he had string in his pocket when they were on the farm - and he was able to help out with tying something up. Last week, I ended up washing his shorts - and out of the pocket came kilometers of string - AFTER it had been washed.

I have even taken to buying extra rolls of string and sort of hiding them in my own drawers - with the words - This is MY string - it belongs to ME. When he runs out of string, he eventually winkles out those supplies too, and comes asking for it. I look sternly at him asking - What is that for NOW, but eventually give it to him, because it was bought for him anyway!

This week, I get called into his room to look at his latest invention. He has discovered that every night, when he has climbed the long ladder to the top of his bunk bed, and wants to go to sleep, that he arrives at the top, only to see his curtains are not drawn. Then he has to trek all 5 rungs back to the floor - in order to close his curtains. That is way not on - and way too much effort for the little sausage! So - he made a plan. He STRUNG his curtains up, so that he can "draw" them closed when he is lying in bed. "When I am grown up, mom - I will get remote control curtains - you get those you know." Yes, I do know - SIGH - men and remotes - poor wife one day.

So, I am treated to a demonstration of a variety of things his new string contraption can do. The strings are even labelled - so he knows their functions!

They can close the curtains, close the window itself , open curtains (sort of - one opens and the other closes), etc.

In between these demonstrations, I get a huge giggle, because some of the stuff does not work quite like he had intended it to. My programmer brain translates this : your system has some bugs, you will need to find the bug, redo the design, and then TEST the whole system again. Briefly I wonder if I should use this as a lesson about "testing" stuff in life - but decide that is way too programmer like to be cool.

"This deserves a blog spot Mom", says Marinda in admiration. I have to agree, he did earn himself a blog spot!

As I walk out his room that night, he calls me back to switch off his light.
"Haven't you got a string to pull, that will do that for you?" I ask slyly.
"Moooooooom" is my only answer, and I wonder how long it will be before he designs a hammer falling from the roof, to switch off his light.

Oeps

Heeelloooooooo!
Happy new year.
Back online, back in the working world, back to normality!

We had a lovely Christmas, and just took Werner's children back this weekend. Despite the hard work of having 5 kids around - it was sad to see them go. Eric had tick bite fever while he was with us, so we had a few troublesome nights with him, and we heard on Monday that Carissa has tick bite fever too. They all spent time on the farm before Christmas - with the Prof and Cream Puff - so - I guess that is the down side of country life.


The children had a wonderful time on the farm. There, they ride horses, swim, even row boats in a nearby dam. The Prof was well behaved, or perhaps they had more space to escape his grumpiness, than when they are at home with him. Despite the lovely life style of the farm, they were happy to come home again - and live a normal, somewhat more sedate lifestyle. It took a few days for them to settle back into our way of life here!



While the kids were with us, we painted T-shirts, decorated cookies, read stories, took photos... made food, made more food (that cycle just never ends!)

Well, that is a very short recap of what has kept us occupied. Shoo.



I think it is time to get back to the story line. I was last telling you where Werner was in the whole story. He had found out about the affair, had in fact also discovered who the other man was, Cream Puff was still living at home, but Werner knew it was over. He just didn’t know when she was leaving.

A funny incident occurred round about this time: before Cream Puff moved out. It was quite late at night, and Cream Puff was acting strangely. She had been sms-ing on her phone and just generally, Werner sensed that something was not right.

Not quite able to figure it out, he told her he was going to bed, but he actually went outside, to stand in the garden and smoke… and think, I guess.

Standing in the shadows, he noticed a car pulling up in front of his house… guess who! The Prof!

Werner walked out to the drive way – and casually asked the Prof – “Can I help you?”

The Prof got an awful shock!. He had come over, to give Cream Puff a humidifier (my humidifier!), because one of the children was sick and coughing.

The Prof practically threw the humidifier down, jumped in his car and rushed off… in the process bumping his car into a tree.

His car still has the bent back fender as proof, but he has changed the story a few times over. When the children asked him what had happened to his car, he told them he had driven in to a tree at the university. Funny enough, this same conversation recently came up between Marinda and her dad, as a discussion they were having on TRUST. She was saying she couldn’t TRUST him because he had lied to her, and she used this as one of the examples. He got very upset, and told her, he had bumped his car into a tree in our street.

Tsk tsk… when you lie – you need a better memory than that Prof – your stories aren’t straight!