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Introduction
Here be a tale spanning some 21 years. I suppose, it's also an adventure.... An adventure of a lifetime and an adventure of life itself....
To tell the tale, I’ve broken it into snapshots… Moments that had special meaning to me & my son I. I have no issue with the telling, It's long since been public on both national TV and in the odd glossy magazine..... Although a long time ago..... I hope you don’t get to bored .
Two plastic shopping bags
“That’s it then”? I asked as he slammed the Landy’s door shut. It was an old series Landy, and the door needed to be slammed!
The corners of his mouth lifted slightly then he busied himself with the seat belt. Back then, that’s about as good as communication ever got.
It had taken around a year.
We had played by their rules, lost some battles, but finally won the war.
The Lad was leaving the home.
And what a war it was. You see we were the very first in the country…
Not just any placement, a very unique one indeed..
A legitimate placement through the welfare, of a white teenager with a single man.
Not a special needs placement, or a trans-racial placement… This was very different. Here was a white boy with a white unmarried man. Blond he was, blue eyes, the top of his head came to just under my chin. For those Calvinistic / prejudiced people such as we in South Africa are, an absolute socialistic nightmare.
The war had raged on every level imaginable, from the Welfare Minister’s impressive boardroom table at the seat of government the Union Buildings in Pretoria, all the way down to the caregiver’s tatty couch at the home. The dust had settled. We had won.
Poor Chris. He had his hands full as well, keeping all the other kids at bay, they all wanted in on the deal. Eventually to turn and conspire at every turn and twist to make his life as unbearable as possible, their new found hatred driven by pure jealously. Such is the life in a home....
Alone, shunned, his world such as it was, lay in tatters. His only hope lay with me.
But even that wasn't real minefield..
Summoned to the home, only a few days left to go… Sat round the table… The social worker, a police captain, and myself.
You see the tyke had been fingered for stealing washing off the line at the police (Yip, the police) flats nearby! I flipping ask you.. He was headed straight for reform school…
Closing argument: - “Captain, if you do this, he will be lost forever. Give him to me, and I promise it’s in the past” – Thank God, I won….
Anyhow, that was all behind. Truth be told, they were probably just glad to see the back of us, I had made their life a living hell.
A mere 14, twice before he had been placed out in a “family”. Only to have his hopes smashed into pieces. The reasons why? Not material. Just underscores the desperation for a life unfettered from the home-boy label that his peers had, for the past 7 years, taunted him with.
We hardly spoke. On the way we did the usual Wimpy, Then home.
A pair of broken sneakers, a small tog bag and two plastic shopping bags was all that needed to be carried in.
I remember busying myself with something in the kitchen and left the lad to settle in.
The first couple of weeks went by.
Nothing splendid, just the daily grind. Up in the morning, bath / shower, off to school then on to work, for him 2 buses home, for me, home, cook, then dishes, homework, goodnight’s said.
Weekends where spent cleaning house & garden, doing the itsy-bitsy shopping where I started slipping in the odd T here, a Jean there, undies, socks and so on. No particular reason in the mall, I felt his hand in mine.. I gave a gentle squeeze to let him know “It’s fine”….
The first of many changes.
“Uncle Warren, If I start calling you dad, you think it will upset my dad”?
“Come, sit down”
“ You have a father, he’s the one who made you, and I think that all he wants is that you are happy. Lots and lots of boys have two dads and that’s ok”.
A long pause….. Then “Dad”? “Yes” “Can I sleep here tonight”?
“Of course”… I said “Climb in son”…. It was the first of many such nights… about three months in fact.
The first of many yelling’s
Chores not done and I yelled at him. He just stood there. I stormed off.. A while later, Can’t find the bugger.. Glanced in his room, not there… Called, no answer…
Went back to his room and noticed that his duvet and pillows where missing.. That’s odd… Look again, notice duvet sticking out from under the bed… There he was hiding under the bed.
F%^$! That tore me apart. I set him down and we talked… Appears his uncle was in the habit of drinking and when he got drunk, he began shouting then hitting, so he used to hide away to escape the fists..
Poor Chris, I never imagined, all he was thinking about: -
Here it comes round again, Even worse, this family was falling apart… Again
The talk went on long into the night. Face expressionless, and in a subdued monotone I learned of many things.
Sleeping in shop door entrances with his mother and sister. Washing cars in the nearby car park to make money to buy food
Being sent to here there and everywhere to be looked after. About the first uncle who used to smash him up when he got drunk, and the next uncle who made him strip naked outside and hosed him down with the garden hose-pipe because he used to wet his bed…
What it was like to leave his mother behind when he was taken up into welfare.
The battery alarm that the home used to attach to his genitals because of bed-wetting, the shame, the mocking he had to endure from the other kids, at the home and at the school where most of them went.
The first placement where he was forced to wear the foster parent’s recently deceased son’s clothing to cut his hair the same way, and made to sleep in the same bed with the very same bedding..
The second placement where he was falsely accused of stealing, got S&^%ty presents meanwhile their own son got really fancy stuff, turns out it was the biological son was doing the stealing to support a dope habit
Not one tear did he shed.. Life had long since taken that away…
Roll on a week or two
Music to my ears! Heard him whistling in the shower this morning… Sounded just like an asphyxiated kettle…. But he was whistling.
The chapter closes.
Where on earth is the tyke? Hunted all over. Finally, in the store-room sitting on the floor, the very same two plastic shopping bags of broken toys & other junk spread out between his geeky 14 year-old legs… He looked up straight into my eyes, smiled and said “Don’t want these anymore”…
That was his way of putting it all behind, finally secure in the knowledge his life was finally coming round.
Me? I shed my tears…
He no longer hold’s my hand….
Got the “I’m sleeping in my room today”
At his Father’s unmarked grave… “I want to put up a headstone someday”…
Ups and downs
It’s been good, very good as these things go; sure, there have been some rough patches.
Moved out lock-stock-and-barrel, moved back in, moved out (again) then moved back. Along the way, got high and crashed his car, I bought him another.
Pretty much, he’s always had a job, contributed what he can and about eight years ago met Jacky some nine years his junior the mother of his children to be.
The circle of life complete
The most significant note in my Diary: -
Ayden born @ 13:50 today (25-08-2009) and weighed in at 3Kg. (almost 5 years to the date as I pen this tale…
Standing in the maternity hospital I watched the circle of life become complete, as Ayden, wrapped in swaddling cloth, all pink and wrinkly, was handed to Chris by the nurse.
I think, of all the moments in my life, watching Chris, all of 6ft 4, in tears, trying figure out how to wrap his dinner-plates-for-hands around that tiny new-born child all wrapped in swaddling blankets, his first-born son, was definitely the most beautiful thing I have ever experienced.
Then it was my turn to hold the little bundle... Me? I cried…
Our promise
These kids will never know the S&^% he and I have had in our lives.. (Never mind about my baggage, and there be plenty there too... This is about Chris)
Bought them a house, I’m going to stay in the cottage... Now he looks after me, I don’t do the chores, the cooking, the washing any more
Epilogue
At 57, my chapter’s slowly closing, and although I have my gripes, that’s ok. A whole new one’s opening up....
FRANS PRETORIUS: That's still a wonderful story, even when reading it the second time around!!!!, first time was on caravanparks.com a few years ago.
FREDA: I agree with Frans, Warren. You are a very special person. You gave Chris the love and security he needed and made such a big difference to his quality of life. If not for you one wonders where he would have been today. But you also scored big time, a family of your own, two beautiful grandchildren. It was meant to be and definitely in the plan that God had for you.
