What if Jen and I had been given this story to read when we were just 16?

We've tried to imagine what it would have been like if someone had given us this story to read and said to us: "I've replaced the names of the two young sweethearts in the story with 'Jen and Ian', please read it and tell me what you think." Jen and I both agree that after reading it (at that age) we would have shuddered - then written it off as a rather sinister fairy-tale (admittedly with a happy ending) but certainly not even a remotely realistic story about us or our future! However, most times, with age comes understanding, and now, at 50, it makes some sense to us. Jennifer's mother saw to it that if Jennifer (or her sister) ever dared to "blaze their own trails" in life, she would see to it that they would do so without any support from her, their birth family or their relatives; but worse yet, that she would relentlessly work to ensure that they would feel "cut-off" and would be abandoned, rejected and shunned by all of their family (Mom, Dad, sister, aunts, uncles, cousins) -  left alone, "twisting in the wind". Her objective being to "break them" of any independent streaks and to have them return to sit at mother's feet, "worshipping" her totally obediently as she, the queen, sits there on her throne ... contented self appointed goddess of all her devotees. Loving, hey? Remarkably she has managed to marshal her forces so well that, in the end, Jennifer was abandoned by all of her family members. The mother's tactics were brilliant really - she simply persisted in telling them that if they did not help apply pressure to Jennifer, by isolating her, then they were to blame for her family splitting up - so they had better shape up and practice "Tough love" along with her or risk the same bad outcome for their families. On the few occasions when relatives sent a message something like: "We saw your daughter and she is looking well and is very happy", she would get this message to them: "And if you would not have made her feel so welcome, this whole problem would already have been solved and I would have got to see her too!" This evil tactic wouldn't work on anybody with a high pain-threshold and strong sense of justice, but it works remarkably well on weak-minded people with no strong sense of justice and a low pain-threshold!

Could we depend on the support of relatives for our family's independence, happiness ... for our very survival?

Well, it took her 35 years, but in the end she has had a 100% success rate in isolating Jennifer from any members of her old family - and the way in which she accomplished this was ingenious and very effective. She simply ensured (never skipped a beat) that whenever we got to visit with relatives, they would deliver all sorts of unwanted (never ever nice or good or remotely conciliatory) messages from the mother - directly to Jennifer. In so doing, she  saw to it that even though we had walked away from her direct abuse, we were still getting it via her "couriers" anyway - and there is only so much of all of that you can take before you feel like chewing your own arm off just to break free! So in the end, we stopped trying and simply said "enough already", then wished them all well  ... and disappeared out of their lives too. So while the mother smugly (and prematurely) celebrates what she regards as "her big victory" ... she now has to face this painfully obvious reality, in her own mind, and it goes something like this: "All of the efforts, 35 years of Jealousy, of determined hatred, plotting and scheming, has finally paid off! Jenny is now totally isolated from her old family ... but wait ... oh-oh, Jenny did not crack under all that pressure?" "Obviously Jenny must have some support system beyond my reach that I am not able to control ... and now her and her entire family have disappeared ... and she is gone, beyond my reach. I am no longer able to control any part of her life ... and now her and her entire family have left Canada (and me) far, far behind them. Ooops - maybe in my zeal, I went a little too far - since I have cut off ALL avenues of communications with Jenny through anyone that I can manipulate to keep me informed and to deliver any messages from me. So what do I do now? I've run out of options and at 78 I'm fast running out of time. Jenny is no longer contactable through any 3rd. parties friendly to me." That is a valid concern and question - and I would dearly like to know (ahead of time) what she is planning to do about it ... but I'm happy that God does know and that we will be warned and protected, as we have been, should it ever pose a problem for us. The reality is that at 77, going on 78, her 36 years of effort has yet to break Jennifer and "bring her to heel", leaving this old matriarch now as an effectively "contained" but still malevolent force - unless we give her an opportunity to launch a come-back bid, which we do not intend to ever do. In the end, between all of them, nobody in Jen's old family was brave enough to stand up to her mother. Some tried, for a while, but she was relentless in making their lives miserable, and so, one by one, they cracked. We did try appealing to any sense of decency or justice within them, over the years, but even while they were unable to deny the facts and were firsthand witnesses to the blatantly unfair and aggressive bullying tactics employed by this mother (after all, they never even once were manipulated into delivering ANY nice messages to Jen from the mother - only ever horrid ones, so naturally one would think they should have figured it all out?) they opted instead for "peace" with the bully ... and on her terms, which were, of course, "Join with me in applying as much pressure to Jenny as possible, then she will crack, and I will have my daughter back!"  "If you do not, then my family's break-up is your fault and will be on your consciences." A rather sneaky tactic - and an illogical lie! But it's quite a convincing argument for weak minded folks, though anyone with even half a back-bone intact and any sense of justice or decency at all, may well ask: "Excuse me, have you ever tried sending a sincere message to Jenny that you're sorry, that you miss her and want desperately to try and fix things between you and her?" The answer (to date) is, of course, "No." Well, if I were them, I'd worry much more about God's judgment of their (basically cowardly) actions, and fear God's Justice - rather than give in to Jen's mother's intimidation. Jen's sister's life is a sad warning to us all, of what's really at stake. At age 47 she basically lives a "zombie-like" existence, far from her young son and anybody else who once loved her and could have helped her. Jen saw this all unfolding - saw her mother's hands busily engineering it behind the scenes! We tried to help her, but one day she crossed over the "event horizon" into the vortex of that "Black-hole" - with her mother at it's core, and she was effectively out of our reach. And what of Jen's closest relatives? Sadly, in the end, their low pain-threshold quickly exceeded, their controllable minds easily outwitted by this evil genius, with no sense of indignation  or justice visible in any of them, they never did anything to help Jen's sister and, when it came down to it, were willing to betray Jennifer and our family into the hands of the worst enemy we have ever had (even after knowing what that had done to Jen's sister's life) just so that they could take the easy (self-serving) way out, and finally have some measure of peace. Well, I have bad news for them - Just like with Jen's relatives, they've effectively "made a deal with the devil" hoping for some measure of peace or whatever, but as is the case in all such deals ... absolutely no good will come of it!

Then where else could we go to find help, support, protection and guidance?     

The queen (and her relatives) miscalculated, for God saw to it that Jen was adopted into a new family ... God's family! Jen was  placed in the care of a loving Prince, Jesus ... God's Son, given a strong sense of justice (the "Holy Spirit") as well as many supporting "dwarves" to help her resist ending up like her sister. The relentless attacks that Jennifer, our love, lives and our family came under, could easily have destroyed her and us (that is what they were designed to do) but instead our family ended up finding a very really priceless Treasure along the way, and a way to all unite as part of a new supportive, loving Family. Having a common relentless enemy bent on your destruction sure hones one's survival skills rather fast! You either adapt - or you die. If you adapt, then having such a common relentless enemy actually serves to unify a couple and a family remarkably effectively! Refuse to adapt - then love and family dies. The key for us (I suspect for anyone) is to ask for supernatural help ... for Heaven's help to survive. Ironically, the more dangerous enemy of our love and family, by far, would have been the secular world's aptly mislabeled: "carefree good times!"   

Living life on the edge - it's dangerous, it's rewarding, it's exciting ... BUT it's NEVER boring!

"Fairy-tales can come true ... it can happen to you!" Well, as you have read, we really did get to live "a fairy-tale" (and for more than just those few romantic summers at the end of our high school years). In the process of living out this particular story, we discovered that generally fairy-tales do have some pretty nasty chapters in them too - often featuring some mean old witches and the like! You know it seems rather rare to find an enduring love story nowadays - and there were times when we thought that ours would not endure, but it did. We appreciate that absolutely no story is perfect most of the time, and certainly never all of the time, and ours too follows that pattern, but fortunately for us fairy-tales most often do have happy endings  ... at least it now seems that this one does, though you will have to read all of the chapters to see if you agree. How many people have you heard saying: "Wouldn't it be nice to have a fairy-tale wedding, or a fairy-tale romance or a fairy-tale life?" Well, perhaps it's just simply a case of naivety ... but clearly they do not fully understand what they are really hoping for! You see, one really has to choose one's words very wisely in this regard, as fairy-tales are not simple, uneventful, harmless, always happy little stories! In fact, most often they are quite action packed and fraught with danger ... but then again they certainly are not boring, and most do end happily! Well, ours has ... and for that we give all the Glory to God and to Jesus.

  "Flights of Fantasy"  ...
a tribute to the romantic history of  " The Wilderness National Park "

Quite appropriately, and much to our delight, quite some years after Jennifer and I met and fell in love in this most exquisitely romantic place ("the Wilderness")  Siesta (the campground) was purchased by the government, renamed to "Ebb and Flow" and it and the whole surrounding area, including several unique lakes, rivers, jungles, mountains and it's awesome coastline, were declared  as a protected National park. "The WILDERNESS NATIONAL Park" stands as a fitting monument to all those many sweethearts who fell in love or romanced each other there (at one time or another) or went there for their weddings and/or honeymoons, as no doubt, many still do! Click here to see what it was like to canoe up that enchanted river, winding it's way  to the ocean from deep within the mountains and tropical jungles, filled with colorful birds and flowers - and the beautiful white lily indigenous to this loving natural sanctuary. 

I have little doubt that for any two sweethearts canoeing up that enchanted river - once they pass the last signs of human settlement and are thus transported into that jungle's solitude, with the high walls of the mountain-sides forming a natural amphitheatre all around them, that if they look just a little bellow the river's mirrored surface ... that there, blended in with the reflections of the mountains, flowers, trees, with accompanying music provided by the many colorful birds, they will not only see themselves, but the shimmering, dancing images of so many countless couples - sweethearts floating in canoes, all so happy and all in love! Perhaps they may even see us there? For as these two sweethearts lie there in each others arms, gently floating slowly forward deeper into the jungle, their craft causing small ripples to spread outwards from it's bow on the mirrored surface ... that with just a tiny bit of romantic imagination, these reflections of multitudes of very precious and poignantly beautiful loving moments held trapped within this river's memory (in the layers just beneath it's mirrored surface) will be located and released by the laser-like shafts of sunlight peeking through and focused by the small gaps between the jungles leaves. Now with countless many love-stories rising - projected above the water's surface, surrounding them with countless loving images there in nature's perfect amphitheatre, that enraptured pair too may entrust their own love story's beginnings to this faithful amber archive - to be safely saved away, recorded there forever in that stream ... But copies of these loving stories are continuously carried away with the currents as this river gently meanders through the jungle's trees, surrounded by colorful flowers and birds and white lilies, on it's way out of the mountains - to the river's mouth, to the soft white sandy shores of that refreshing turquoise Indian ocean, and released there into those turbulent waters, where Mermaids still swim, romping in it's relentless romantic waves. Fascinated ... excited by the snippets of romance she sees arriving in it's waters, as it enters the ocean, before the waves erase all traces of what she has just seen, she poses alluringly on the carved rocks at the very edge of those foaming white waves, awaiting rescue by her soul-mate, wanting to feel the freedom of walking away with him on an adult woman's legs - no longer bound to her ocean-home, that nursery she grew up in ... wanting too to be rowed up that loving stream, there to experience some of that romance she saw just the briefest glimpses of - though she instinctively knows that her new adult women's legs (and the new freedom that they bring) also have the power to cause her excruciating pain. Even so, our "little-Mermaid" drinks the sea-witch's potion. So it was (just as in the original fairy-tale) that I met a 15yr old "little Mermaid", coming out of the  ocean. But unlike in the original fairy-tale, she was able to get me to fall in love with her ... and I married her, thus thwarting the sea-witch's wicked curse. So instead of dying and turning into white sea foam, as the sea-witch would very much like (and her birth-name suggests is inevitable) my "little Mermaid", Jennifer, was able to break that curse, keep her legs, gain her soul, enjoy her freedom, win her true love and ended up living happily ever after. Strange coincidence? Maybe not when you consider that the fairy-tale of "The little Mermaid" also happens to be the absolute all-time favorite of Jen's birth-mother ... maybe not?

[ For those that can't remember the story, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Mermaid ]

Footnotes:

(1) Too young to fall in love! Some people remark that 15 or 16 is a little young to be 'falling in love'! To them I respond by saying that (for them) this may well be true - and that when they are old enough (say 77,78 or so) to fall in love - I'll be sure and let them know that "It's OK now". You see, I left home at age 8. By 16 I had already spent 1/2 of my life on my own. By age 23 I had already graduated from high-school, fought in 2 wars, graduated from University, was married,  moved and was living on another continent in another hemisphere. By then this independent streak of mine had stretched to almost 2/3 rd's of my life. Compare that with the fact that many people still haven't left home at age 23 (which is, in a way, quite enviable). So I think it's just simply a case of entirely different circumstances. Time has made for us, out of this issue, a rather a moot point really. To illustrate this point ... I've met some people (as I'm sure have you) also now in their 40's and 50's, who still have not figured out the difference between love, which satisfies and satiates - filling a yearning deep inside of us; and casual sex, which is driven by our appetites and which, like any meal we devour, needs constantly to be repeated . Ironically,  "true love" leads to "great sex" anyhow, while "casual sex" often is driven just by "hunger" and never fills the need we all have (but often deny) to be "soul-mates" for life. Those that understand this difference realize why "true love" is something to be cherished more than any earthly treasure - and I (as no doubt you do too) do know that there are many even older folks that never figure this much out ... how truly sad!  But you know, I have met some teenagers and young folks who instinctively know the difference, who do appreciate it and then go on to live happy fulfilling lives, simply ignoring society's pressures to over-indulge all of our appetites and thus become not just physically obese - but "sexually obese" too ... while remaining "starved for love". Jennifer and I grew up far apart in Southern Africa and only got to be together for 3 weeks each summer (Christmas time). As such, and because of our ages when we first fell in love, we agreed to date others for 49 weeks of each year. Thus we often refer to our summer romance as "the affair", but technically though, it wasn't.

(2) Taken on location: All the photos are actual scenes taken on location. Some are daytime scenes (such as this one of Fairy-Knowe) when they should have been night-time ones, and visa versa. Included are actual period photos, of Jen and I, on our first date together, going canoeing together, on the beach as teen sweethearts or us on our favorite old gray wooden bench - our "make out spot" etc.  The picture of us leaving by boat (pictured above) to go dancing at Fairy-Knowe (pictured here), was taken just before sunset, on our way to our first dance together. Later, when we returned to Siesta  (at midnight) the African moon shone brightly - but we do not have any photos of that ...  just very fond memories. I often think: "How fortunate we are that so many photos were taken of us by so many of our family and friends" ... but really it was obvious to them that they were witnessing something unusual and quite precious, "True Love", and  now 36 yrs later, time has proven them right. You know, it's almost as if the entire group of regular campers, pretty much the same families each year, many cheering us on, supporting us, wishing  "Heaven's richest blessings on us and for our young love" ... there in that most romantic place. Well ... It worked! Where I did not have lovely enough pictures (i.e. of the river and surrounding rain-forest that we used to go canoeing up into, or the riverbank and palms upon which and under which Jennifer and I first kissed) I journeyed back to Africa and re-shot these scenes on a special trip back to Africa. So while these are not all period photos, not much has changed ... just time and us. I also have managed to find a few lovely aerial pictures on the Internet, since "The Wilderness" is a favorite spot for hang-gliding and Para-sailing. I have now been back to visit our "special place" twice in the last 27 years - sadly both times without Jennifer ... once because there was a intense civil war going on during the run-up to their first free elections, and once because I went back to  thank my parents for making it to their 50th. wedding anniversary - to take them on a trip down their own "memory lane". Still, I made good use of both of these occasions to take the photos with which to illustrated this story. The poem "Summer love" was a surprise gift for Jen and, as you may well imagine, it was well received. It sure was tough to visit all those memorable places, going back in time, and to relive so many deeply precious moments in my mind ... walking, sitting, standing, canoeing in all those places, remembering so many years later - and doing so all alone! It's the most sobering thing I have ever done. Everything looked just the same ... but Jennifer was nowhere in sight. Yikes! Yes, it's  very nostalgic, but I would have preferred that Jennifer was there enjoying it all with me. So far time and circumstances (and perhaps again "Serendipity") have conspired to keep these only as fond memories  - forever precious to both of us. You know ... perhaps it's just as well?

Mermaids still know this place to be very special ...

(3) A perfect incubator for great romances. Here's a classic photo of a contemporary  young couple, who met, fell in love and romanced there. They are now married, live very close to the Wilderness and, as often as they can, make the pilgrimage back to their "love's roots". I discovered that they also regularly enjoy canoeing up that most romantic river into the solitude of those same mountains and jungles. I met this loving young couple as I retraced my own steps to "that dear little store" - and there I found them sitting - right outside of "The Duka". Looking at them, I immediately knew exactly how he felt! Maybe you can see the same "smitten" look  in his eyes as is evident in photos of Jen and I? Notice the confident look in her eyes? I also immediately recognized her mesmerizing look as "the gaze of a Mermaid". It was plain to see that she had him under her spell! I told them just a little bit of our story. There was no need to tell them much ... for they too shared much of our experiences there. Then I took my leave, allowing them to savor their own love story - but not before I asked them (due to their proximity) to be "proxy care-takers" of all of the romantic surroundings .... and of "true love in the Wilderness" - for Jennifer and I and so many others who may never return. They instinctively knew that what I was asking them made perfect sense - that it was so very important for so many couples all over the world. I sometimes wonder ... just how many?

Jennifer & Ian, Summer vacation, the Wilderness ... Christmastime, in 1971.

You see, once you make eye contact with a Mermaid ... it's all over! For as long as I (or anyone else) can remember, in fact still to this very day there in that most wondrous and romantic place, at the southern tip of Africa, along that warm turquoise ocean, Mermaids still entrance their chosen mate - whisking him off on a loving, life-long adventure!

"SERENDIPITY" The phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not purposely sought after ... seemingly by chance. (Q) What was the most precious of all of our many serendipitous discoveries? (A) Discovering who the Author of our love story was, then seeking purposely to get to know more about this Loving, Kind Author!

What if  ...

Wouldn't it have been wonderful if Jennifer's parents had been loving Christian parents, had both raised and adored their daughter,  had accepted Jennifer's choice of husband (when the time came) and had cherished their awesome grandchildren? Well of course it would! That would have been our preferred script - but that has remained, for Jennifer , just an elusive happy ending to a nightmarish Fairy-tale".
But the reality was this: Jennifer was destined to be "Africa's Snow-White"  and all those of us who truly loved her ... just had to adapt our lives accordingly.