Four little wheels

It has been six months since it started serving our family as a tool of rapid acceleration toward bodily injury but it received its own share of abuse last night!


About 16 teenagers from a group called Son Surf descended on our half pipe. Son Surf is a Christian group for surfers, and is very active in our area. Skating and surfing go together as they require similar in strengths in balance, core muscle strength, and careless abandon!

These kids set that ramp on fire! Well not literally! I had no idea that the stunts I saw could be pulled off on my ramp; airs, reverses, and long grinds off the top. The skating madness encouraged me to keep my poor skating skills well hidden; and instead I compensated by sticking a big flash on my camera and documenting the mayhem! There were of course some spills. One mad kid after being dared to get some air into a bush without his shirt, thought nothing of doing it twice! A number of other kids dropped in for their first time, making my own mental inability to do just that look pretty stupid!

What a wonderful group of youngsters. Excitable, energetic, and full of madness! They were also polite and friendly, and certainly seemed to be the kind of kids that I would like my children to have as friends growing up.

Luke got into the thick of things, dropping in and pulling off some tremendous top turns. He almost seemed to grow as the crowd cheered and applauded him. A tremendous boost to his self worth that no money could ever buy!

Chalk up another win for the half pipe!

Early Days with new Baby

My two girls got home on Friday, one very sore and the other very hungry. Both went straight to bed. Life in my household returned to a semblance of normality with me firmly in the driving seat of moms taxi. I now understand why Donna has to stop off so often for coffee as it is just not a whole heap of fun!

Isabella was very well behaved in the hospital fuelling a new belief that she may be the same at home. My imaginary world even saw me sleeping peacefully through the night!

Night one involved lots of baby attention and very little sleep for any of us. Isabella was understandably a little out of sorts in her new environment. Morning dawned bright and sunny, quite unlike our dispositions. Reality was a little hard to swallow just then! Night two progressed far better with night three only involving two wake up calls.

I still cannot get over the fact that my family has grown by one member. We are no longer four but five. Very scary! The boys seem to have made peace with the idea of a baby sister and we have started to see this new helpfulness flowing from them. Long may that last!

In my imaginary world night four will involve just one feed at two in the morning. At least I will have all day to dream, before that dream is shattered and I create a new one tomorrow! In all of these dreams, I know that I am inordinately blessed!!

Sometimes words are unnecessary!

To my dear little girl

To my dear darling Isabella,


Yesterday morning you exploded into being in the form of a tiny pink baby. So small, wrinkled, and helpless! I was humbled by the notion that God chose your mom and I to be your parents. To love you, care for you, and possibly even sacrifice our lives for you. I so look forward to getting to know you better, to guiding you as you grow, to hugging you when you are sad, and to helping you explore all that you are.

I could not help but think of the life that lies before the feet you don’t even know that you have. A life wide open with possibilities just waiting to be explored. The choices you will make will either lead you to fulfilment, a mundane existence, or a life of destruction. I hope that I have the strength and wisdom to prepare you for those choices. I pray for the humility and courage to share my life with you and show you a better way to live.

Through all of the arguments we will have, through the failure you will see in me, and through those times when life just does not seem fair, know that through it all, I have loved you from the start. I will always try and give you the best of me, but in those times when it isn’t so, I hope you will forgive me, smile on me, and reach out to me again.

There is a long road ahead of us. I hope that it is filled with much excitement, laughter, and joy. It is only fair to warn you that it will also be filled with disappointments, tears, and loss. Yes, there will be bad times but they will be much easier to bear if we face them together as a family.

Your life, like mine, will be full of its own twists and turns. At times life will flow and at others become incredibly complex. Regardless, I will be there for you whenever you need me!

Remember always that you are special because you are you. That in your uniqueness you have something valuable to offer the world, the gift of you! Cherish life, learn something new each day, challenge those around you, brighten the world with your smile, and love fiercely!

All my love, dad.

Baby Girl

It has been an emotional day for the family. The boys are shattered. The old girl is tired and sore and pumped full of drugs. And the young girl is working hard at adapting to life in the world!

The good news is that Isabella was born this morning to two very happy parents.

I am afraid that this terrible phone pic will have to suffice for now. more news to follow shortly...

Thank You

Tuesday is a big day in our lives. God willing it will be the day that our third child and first daughter is born. A big day indeed! I honestly have no idea what to do with a daughter; I have a lot to learn! No doubt, I will be emotionally blogging about it shortly!




A number of you good readers of my blog have made me sit up and think a bit harder. I am saddened by all of the feedback about you not being able to submit comments. I have no idea what that is about, but will get busy with some research. Please don’t give up trying!



I am also thoroughly humbled by the type of feedback that I have received about this blog via mail and in person. I had no idea that it had such an impact on so many people. Thank you all for your readership and for your wonderful comments. They are all most appreciated and inspire me to think deeper, live better and write more furiously.



Have a wonderful day!

Old, Sick, & Forgotten

The wind was blowing feebly and the air was chilly due to the weather being sandwiched between two cold fronts. I parked the car at the Sir Lowry’s Pass train station. A lovely building which has been converted into a soup kitchen, and offers the services of a bakery, laundry, ablution block, and counselling room. 200 to 300 people pass through its doors every day, desperate and destitute. A sad reflection of life in this village!

Every day parcels are packed from donations of old Woolworths perishables, and then delivered on foot to the people too old or sick to make the walk to the station. My mission for the day was to join the volunteers as they handed out these parcels. I wanted to see the conditions under which these poor people live, and see if there is any way I can make a difference.

I hooked up with Cathy and Dolly, volunteers who themselves have nothing. Both of their husbands are out of work and money is non-existent. Their attitudes were humbling, instead of feeling sorry for themselves, they were out helping others. With great love and care they delivered the food parcels and chatted to the families in each house. There was much laughter and gaiety as they went about using the gifts of themselves to make a difference in the lives of people forgotten by society.

I met so many people and all gladly invited me, a complete stranger, into their homes for a chat. Some of their homes were lovely, carefully filled with ornaments and mementos. Others were nothing more than hovels. In some holes bigger than footballs peppered the walls and wet patches on the floor remained as testament to the recent violent rainy weather. One woman described how everything inside her house took off in the gale force winds.

God came up in every conversation. I was amazed at the depth of their faith, especially as they stood in broken bodies, in broken shelters, with futures as dim as mud. One man told me how he thanks God every day for his health. This is a man with glycaemia, can barely see, and cannot walk unaided. And he is thankful for his health. He is my new inspiration!

It was a touching morning. I felt that through my presence and conversation, I too had made a difference. But I could do so much more! A friend and I have come up with a plan to seek some funding. Then we aim to purchase materials and start doing home repairs for these people, hopefully training some unemployed youths in the process.

The benefits of a home visit will last a day or two. The benefits of simple repairs may last many years! Hopefully we can pull it off!

Going nowhere slowly

How about an update on my truck?

Almost nothing has happened and yet so much has gone into achieving it!

When last I wrote an update, the car was waiting to have itself rewired. After five weeks of more nothing happening, it was decided that not rewiring was not the best option at that point in time. Instead I was convinced to have it resprayed in satin matt black. A whole lot of convincing and an awesome quote for potentially something to happen finally swayed me.

A couple of weeks ago, Tweety as she was fondly known due to her bright yellow plumage, was disassembled. Then all possible holes patched, all pimping removed, blemished filled and smoothed, and every other surface prepared. Finally something actually happened, she was sprayed! Unfortunately the compressor broke down resulting in a blotchy paint job which actually meant that it would have been better had they done nothing too.

More days passed, and nothing kept on happening. Suddenly something happened. She received her final coat of paint. My old useless yellow tyres and mags were swapped out for an awesome set of not yellow mags. Tweety now looks utterly sexy in her black number finished off with some new rubber!

Still have to run her motor, fit the glass, finish the interior, and rewire her. I have given all of my new friends who like my wallet a deadline of 16 December to finish with her. I really want her all to myself!

The written word

Writing is a strange sport!

There are times when nothing comes to my mind. When I sit in my chair and stare at the screen until the words blur into unintelligible script. I type a few hesitant lines. I delete them all. I edit some text and realise that my edits are worse than the stuff that was there all along. Any distraction is enough to make me leave my spot. Anything has to be better than writing! The tank seems empty, there is nothing more to give!

I should know by now that on days like this, it is better to go surfing and try to write again later.

There are also times when words seem to flow out of my very being, down through my arms and out of my fingers. Which then blur as they touch type the thoughts and emotions that pour out of my soul. Word upon word, paragraph upon paragraph, page upon page, they stream past my eyes.

Sometimes writing just happens. It flows without stopping until it suddenly does. In those times, writing is a pleasure, a joyous exhalation of my spirit! And the stuff I write at these times is nothing short of brilliant.

So good that the few good times are more than enough to inspire me to carry on through the many bad ones!

Stork Party Pictures

Keen for a run?


Donna in her element!


Even I was impressed with the cup cakes!!

Party in Pink

Saturday saw us up and shining at about 10h00 in the morning. Most unusual as both boys managed to get themselves breakfast and keep quiet since they awoke. Donna and I needed the extra time as we were both utterly exhausted; Donna because of being 10 days away from giving birth and myself with reasons unknown!

Then the doorbell rang, forcing me to put down my book just pages from its conclusion. At my front door, a lady presented me with a bunch of flowers. The attached note told my wife to enjoy her special morning and sorry that the sender could not make it. I asked my wife what was happening this morning. She said she had no idea. We left it at that!

Donna had invited some people over for a late afternoon braai, and so we spent time cleaning the house and getting ready. I made potato salad, just rescuing the potatoes seconds before they boiled to mash and we put the bread maker to work. The doorbell ringing again signalled that our never early visitors were early; who then proceeded to have an amazing argument about who had left the bag containing the meat at home. The clear winner seemed to be his wife; although he nonchalantly popped open a beer and then his wife took my wife to go back to their place to fetch it.

Then chaos erupted! Operation ‘Donna’s stork party’ was underway! With the unsuspecting mother to be again out of the way, and reinforcements in the form of neighbours and friends, it was time to turn my house into a pink sanctuary of fun for women. Just under 30 minutes later and all signs of braai preparation had been replaced by cupcakes, cheese platters, pink champagne, and enough pink presents to make my eyes water.

Soon 28 women crowded into my lounge and I found myself alone and rather disturbingly in my element! My wife arrived and was visibly surprised. Having gone with her friend to collect the missing ‘bag of meat’, she suspected that she was being taken to her stork party. Only to find the missing ‘bag of meat’ as promised at her friend’s house, which as you can imagine was a little disappointing. After much dilly dallying, including wasting a desperate couple of minutes by returning a DVD she had only just rented, friend and Donna arrived home to all of her friends whipped into a frenzy by yours truly. Or perhaps I was imagining things, too much pink champagne!

Somehow despite a number of people RSVP’ing to my wife about her surprise stork party, we still managed to keep it a surprise. She had a wonderful afternoon and our new daughter has been spoilt pink!

I cannot help but thinking back to when our second son matured into toddlerhood. At that time we gave away every bit of baby paraphernalia that we owned. Now, we have been given absolutely everything we need for this baby and more! Most of it better than the stuff we had for both our children! Makes me believe that there is something to the principle of giving to receive!

My family certainly has been blessed. Not because of stuff, but because of the incredible family and friends that surround, care for, and love us. I am not sure how we will ever thank you all!

Hacking Horribly in the Helderberg

Yesterday I played golf. Trust me, I am no golfer. When I retrieved my clubs from a cupboard in the garage I removed an SAA baggage tag dated 2006. That was apparently when I last used my clubs. I subsequently removed a couple of hotel brownies and a large chocolate biscuit from my golf shoes. From careful calculations of the amount of mould, my suspicions were confirmed that it had been a long time!

The golf day was a fundraiser, as they all are, for our church and a local charity concern that looks after disabled children. The big event was held at Erinvale Golf Course, a beautiful and challenging course on the side of the Helderberg.

Golf courses frighten me as it seems to be an outward expression of one’s obscene wealth. Unable to do compete, I parked at the far end of the parking lot so as not to cause a stir in the ‘cool’ car section. I then walked around the pro shop, eventually settling on a purchase of a second hand golf ball for R8. The assistant and I were both under no illusions that I did not fit in!

On the first tee, a friend and I met up with the rest of our four ball. Two Scottish chaps in their 70’s! Watching them tee off released plenty of pressure in us as it was clear that our golf was not about to win any competitions. Instead the plan was to have some fun. The sun was hot, the wind whipped my short pants around my legs and I drove a beautiful shot down the fairway. It was the last time I would play off that manicured grass, the longer stuff on the sides seemed so much nicer to my ball!

We laughed and joked, and occasionally even played a decent shot. Two good shots in a row were rare and three unheard of! I discovered that if I put my back into my swing I could almost smack the casing off the ball; sending it straight as an arrow as far as I could see. Unfortunately these sweet shots cost me five balls in rapid succession as they went straight in a direction I had not intended; into a wine farm across a road, into the gardens of houses that probably did not know they lived on a golf estate, and into water hazards that were picnic spots and well off the beaten golf track! Lesson learned – tone down the power swing! My soft shots were still beautiful examples of golfing technique, except that the compass in my R8 golf ball seemed to be on the blink, hence my zigzag up to every green.

The last hole saw me provide a demonstration of my ‘Happy Gilmore’ swing. Tee the ball up high, stand well behind it, start the swing, step to the ball, and hit it hard, hockey style! Much to the delight of the Scotts, the ball took off landing just short of the green. Ironic that whilst trying to control my swing all day I had no direction and with the most uncontrolled swing, I got the direction perfect!

Prize giving saw our 4 ball take last place – 24th to be specific! The rest of the field seemed to have had as much fun as us but used their clubs far less in the process. It still makes little sense to me that you want to spend more on equipment so that you can use it less. Our four ball certainly got its money’s worth!

Lots of money was raised through an auction, at least R100,000 ($12,000). Everyone was only to keen to open their wallets and give generously which is exactly what was needed. My wallet was very shy and so I was glad to slink off to the far end of the parking lot and climb unnoticed into my car.

Suffice to say, golf is not my game and I am an uncomfortable man around people of serious wealth. I just do not relate!

Insight from an 11 year old

Last night was Judo night again and I was not looking forward to it. My body is still recovering from last weeks exercise festival. I am sure me bod requires a bit of rest, but I find resting more than a little difficult.

Thankfully I had a meeting at the same time as Judo and arrived at the end of the session. Sensei still got me involved in the last few exercises even though I was in my normal clothes. After the session, a boy of about 11 came up to me. He said, and I quote, ’It is really cool that you do Judo with your sons’. I said something completely inappropriate like I wish you would tell my sons the same thing.

He ignored that and went on to say, “my dad is too busy!”

Ouch!

I have certainly wondered over the last almost two years about whether I have done the right thing to embark on this path of finding a better way. If ever there was a sign post along the way saying keep on going, this kid was certainly it! I am not sure that my boys have the same level of appreciation as expressed by this child, but then again the value is in being there not in my boy’s knowledge that I am there.

This child, less than a third of my age, made me feel exhilarated and horribly sad. My boys get the benefit of a full time dad but what about all of those other boys just longing for time and attention in their lives. How do I make a difference in their lives? How do I make them feel special too? How do I get men to realise that the business of making money is but a single element of all that life has to offer? How do I get men to realise that depth is measured by love and not wallet size?

Funny that a comment made by a young kid can be so insightful and mean so much to me!

Love and Marriage

Today, I have been married for 12 years. I remember spending the morning of that big day in our swimming pool, scrubbing off algae with a hard brush. That is until I was rescued by my well meaning good men and whisked off to breakfast. A breakfast I was far too nervous to eat!

I am still amazed that despite the nerves, I still found myself saying ‘I do’ a couple of hours later. Today I congratulate my dumb luck in making a decision that in retrospect was brilliant, as it sparked forth the longest and greatest adventure of my life.

And yet marriage is not a popular institution. In a time when anything is possible at a price, and iron clad contracts just require pricier lawyers than the ones who put it together to take it apart, and where divorce is a commodity, I take much joy in my own marriage. On Friday we had drinks with our neighbours; two of whom have been married for 48 years. They don’t spend much time with the skateboarding crew but they are feisty and full of fun.

They are also people I look up to in terms of making a marriage work, as a lifelong commitment is no longer the norm! Today it seems that when the going gets tough, the tough get going out of the front door to the lawyers. Needless to say Donna and I made a couple of vows and we mean to keep them!

When I got married, I thought that I was deeply in love, but now I know that I really had no clue. As the years have gone by, I have found that our love for each other has grown and matured. It is different to when we first met and so much better. Our lives have become more and more one life, whereby both of us are halves of some different whole. A whole that is simpler and yet more complicated and thrilling than either of us on our own.

One day when we hold each other’s thin bony hands and squint through our bifocals at each other’s lined faces and reminisce about the incredible adventures of our lives, we will know that it was as good as it was, because we did it together!

I would not have it any other way. I love you honey!