My father’s, girlfriend’s X-husband

Werner didn’t ask me to marry him on that first night we heard the news of his divorce. He took me out for dinner, 2 days after his birthday, and asked me quite unexpectedly while we were sitting in our favourite pub restaurant.

So, will you marry me? I sort of didn’t get it- same way as I was with the flowers. I thought he was talking about – when he one day asked me to marry him. So he had to repeat the question.
When I finally GOT it – I bubbled out – YES, Yes, yes… just in case he changed his mind before I said YES.

So, our "joking" wedding date, became a set one.

A few days after this, Arno told his class – as some of his “news” – that his mom was getting remarried.
Oh? Who is she marrying – they all wanted to know.
Thinking for a moment, he came up with this smart answer: My father’s, girlfriend’s X-husband.

Hello… they could not put those pieces together. Arno must be fibbing. So… teacher was waiting me in that afternoon as I very drove in to pick him up.

Is it true – you are marrying his father’s, girlfriend’s X husband?
Mmmm – wonder how much practice that one took the teacher to say.
And here I started to learn the fun in telling people who it was I was marrying. There is a jaw dropping moment of disbelieve, you see the wheels turning in the heads and finally the idea of: how did you manage THAT!

The Question

If ever I was concerned that the children would not accept Werner – I was worrying for nothing. Werner had said to me – that day we jokingly set up the wedding date – to leave them be- they would “come on board” in their own time.


By December 2007 (a mere 1 year from when the nonsense began), the kids were asking Werner quite openly: So… are you going to ask our mom to marry you?

How that change of heart came about – I don’t know. As I’ve said before – he grew on all of us!

But – in Dec 2007, Werner’s divorce had not come through yet. So his standard answer was – "no I can’t do that – I am still a married man."


Eventually, it was to be through Marielle that we were to hear that Werner’s divorce had gone through. There had been several times back and forth with the lawyers, settlements etc. A very stressful time. We didn’t want the Prof and Cream Puff to know any details of our relationship – in case they used it as leverage against us. As it was – they remained blissfully unaware.

So – one evening, at the end of March 2008, Marielle phoned us from her dad’s house with the famous words- "I believe Werner is divorced now."

Well, that was good news for us!

Now, the question the children asked, changed and became more demanding:
So Werner – WHEN are you going to ask our mom to marry you?

Counter Offers

The Prof and Cream Puff went looking for, and found – new jobs for themselves. To this day – we think that things got too uncomfortable for them at the university.

So, in the same month – they both left.

I think it was a relief to Werner. Suddenly, the university was his own domain again.

Together with this move, the Prof informed me that he could no longer take the children to school in the mornings. He had threatened me before – told me that if I didn’t do as he pleased – he would no longer take the children to school. This ploy at control did not work and I had coldly informed him to stop threatening me.

However, I do believe this was not intended as a threat - and was merely the result of his circumstances. I was pretty much at a loss. I asked him for suggestions to resolve the problem and here is what he came up with: He would take the children one day, I would take them one day, Cream Puff would take them one day and my folks could take them the other 2 days.

Now clearly, this was a cumbersome and non practical arrangement.

I decided to speak to the school for a possible solution. The first person I ran in to at the school – was the receptionist who works there. When I asked her if there were any lift clubs operating at the school , she tilted her head to one side and considered me for a long time.
"Now why would you need that ?" – she eventually asked me.

I explained my situation.
"Well…. I can help you "– she said.

What a heaven sent answer. She lives approx 1 km from my house, her daughter goes to Marinda’s public Afrikaans school, and she herself works at the private English school where the younger 2 were at the time. Where on earth could I find a better match?!

So, we made the arrangements. My morning problems were resolved, as well as releasing me from the Prof’s control – as it were.

I also arranged to pay Mrs G (the new lift lady) for the service – so that we had a business arrangement as opposed to a “favour”. She and I were both thrilled with this arrangement.

In fact, she has been doing this for the last 2 years, with such reliability and cheerfulness – I could not have wished for better. If I could draw cartoons – I would draw a small car with kids squashing out of every opening, bags flying in the air – and a giggle cloud following the car. Those are the impressions I have of Mrs G and her car, with all the kids.

But... it didn't take long for the Prof to work out that he was missing the children. He began asking if he could take them to school again. I felt sorry for him, but instead of just saying yes, I put it to the kids. They refused on the spot, to change this new arrangement. Mrs G is always on time and cheerful. they felt that with dad, he arrives at different times, and causes them undue stress. They unanimously decided they didn't need that in their lives.

I simply told the Prof we couldn't change the arrangement.

The nagging began, and continues until today. It gets worse at the beginning of each year and then tails off as we go along. I have steadfastly refused to change the arrangement – also not wanting to be back in the Prof’s control. I smartly told him one day – that Mrs G also needed the extra income she gets from driving the children to school. My mistake!

At the beginning of this year, the Prof went to my house early one morning- and found Mrs G picking up the children. He walked over and introduced himself (totally unnecessary – Mrs G is the secretary at the school – she knows all the parents!).

“I believe you’re just in it for the money”, he said.
Wow - did he think offending her would persuade her to his offer?
“I will offer you double, NOT to take the children to school”.

WELL….this is the lowest of the low points he could go, in my opinion. Worse than the dustbin digging!

And Mrs G? Well, she smiled at him politely, and told him to speak to me – since her arrangement is directly with me.

When I saw her later that same day, she laughingly shook her finger at me:
"You’d better be nice to me", she crooned – "I’m getting counter offers".

Magoebaskloof

Magoebaskloof... I have a strange love-affair and connection with this place. My heart seems always to yearn to go back. I think it comes from childhood memories of holidays spent there with my parents and grandparents...and the ethereal mist which surrounds that area, so many days of the year. It holds a fascination I cannot explain. I love the woodland walks, the mountains, the streams, the sounds of chain saws which echo eerily through the trees. To me, it is a fairy-tale land, literally coming out of a desert like landscape of nothingness.


It forms part of the the northern tip of the Drakensburg range, and lies not far from Tzaneen. The area is named after Chief Magoeba - who was killed by an unnamed Swazi mercenary. In order to persuade the white men (who were also hunting him), that the chief was indeed dead, they cut off his head - to prove the grime victory.


The area is rich in history and colourful characters, and has a beauty which will steal your breath away.



One of the first things I did when the Prof left, was to book a holiday for myself and the children. I wanted us to have something to look forward to, and to show the children we could still have a life of fun, without their dad. Where did we go? Of course - MAgoebaskloof.


I had booked that holiday for October 2007. I had invited my parents along as well, and since I had Garmin to point me in the right direction, I felt very confident that this was a very excellent idea.

I asked Werner to look after the house for me, and he very readily agreed.


A strange dilemma presented itself with this proposal. The children – very concerned about their space – asked Werner horrified – WHERE will you sleep – you can’t sleep in our beds? Laughing he told them he would sleep in my bed. Well, they could see the logic in that, but they swallowed hard on that piece of info.



While on holiday there, Werner was fixing up my house. He fixed things that had been broken for years – things I thought were unfixable.


Huh – turns out – he is a good fixer of things ... and people. He had done a lot of FIXING me, fixing kids, as well as fixing our old house – which had been neglected for so long. Guess you could say the kids and I had been suffering that neglect on a human level too. We all flourished under Werner's humour and way of looking at life.

The Flowers

My works colleagues had become aware that there was"something going on" in my life. Their kindly concern lead to a lot of teasing, especially when Werner arrived one day - out of the blue - to have some coffee with me.

There was a day where things just worked out so... that if I didn't know better - I would have thought that Werner and work colleagues had all concocted it together. However - much of it happened by chance.

Werner did something he has never done in his life before (and seems determined never to do again!)... he sent flowers!!!!! (O to be fair - he puts roses on my bedside table often - and since roses have a special meaning from our wedding ceremony - they are more precious than any flowers he could have sent!)

These flowers arrived just as I had stepped out of the office. Not slow on their feet, the colleagues jumped at this tremendous occasion - hi-jacked the card on the flowers, blew up some balloons and strung up the card and balloons from the ceiling.

Coming back in to the office and seeing their faces, I knew something was up - and thought- oh oh...more teasing. THEN I spotted the balloons and card, and started to turn red in the face. Very flabbergasted by all this attention - I didn't even notice the flowers standing on my desk. I just thought the friends where teasing me about Werner. It took a full 5 minutes before I noticed the flowers and began to realise this was more than a "work prank".

The coincidence of it all was the timing. The fact that I had stepped out, just as the flowers where delivered, and then coupled with the quick thinking of the work friends - they had me mighty confused as to what was happening and who had sent what!!!!

I had to endure a LOT of teasing after those flowers. They STILL bring up the fact that I did not notice the flowers first.
Looking back at the photo, I am struck again by the thoughtfulness of the composition: daffodils!!! - my favourites and granddad's favourites too!

A place of his own

At last, the townhouse which Werner’s friend had bought for him, became available. I jumped in to help him move all his stuff. It was scattered all over the show. Some furniture was stored at the university house, some at the flatlet, some at his folks.


We painted the new place, hung curtains, unpacked boxes and discovered a treasure of stuff which he had bought – some new, some came from his old life.

At that stage, the children were in the middle of exams. They elected to stay home with me – as opposed to going to the Prof, for those weekends. They battled ( and still battle) to study on the farm.

The Prof was very upset that they didn’t want to spend the weekend with him. He began phoning them – to “check up” that they were studying. Through the phoning, he became aware that Werner was in the process of moving, and that I was helping, thus leaving the children at home – alone.

The Prof took it on himself to drive himself over – claiming he missed them and wanted to see them.

The children opened the gate for him, he marched in and sat down on the veranda. They knew not to let him into the house – which was now our own, new safe place. They phoned me in such a panic – Mom – Dad is sitting on the veranda– what must we do?

They didn’t want to go outside – somehow being suspicious of his motives for being there. I told them to stay put in the house.

Then they phoned again – he wants coffee mom! The cheek!!!!

Werner and I were on our way home when the first phone calls started coming through. It was going to take me a good 20 min before we would get there. I phoned the alarm company and asked them to go to my house to remove the unwanted intruder from my property.

Chubb and I arrived at the same time. The Prof was sitting with a huge attitude on the veranda– for all the world like he owned the place. I think it was here that I learnt, that the Prof could put on the "garment of intimidation” - like you would put on a cloak. He was clearly out to pick a fight but I don’t think he had bargained on Chubb being part of the fray.

They were more than willing to help me remove him. However, in light of the backup I had in terms of Werner, and Chubb- the Prof decided of his own free will to leave.

That incident deeply distressed the children. Their safe space had been invaded. For a long time after that, they chose to come with us whenever we left the house – for fear of being intimidated by the Prof.