People’s stories fascinate me. They have told me new truths about my world. They have inspired me and taught me about love and loyalty.

Although I’m not able to attend my upcoming high school reunion in South Africa it did get me thinking. How are my fellow Krugersdorp High School students? What happened to the class of 1968? Are they parents and grandparents? How do they make a living and are they happy with their lives? I’ve fantasized sharing our blessing and our heartaches.

I’m particularly curious now that I’ve reached my mid-life years. I don’t know about the men but for me going through menopause has been a roller coaster ride. With my hormones undergoing changes it’s like being back in the teenage years. Molehills look like mountains and I have little patience. It’s become harder to deny my voice and to tolerate dead-end relationships. On the positive side I’m told the mid-life years are a time to complete tasks we started in our adolescence.

One of the greatest blessings during my teenage years was my five-year attendance at Krugersdorp High School’s coed boarding school. The family atmosphere helped me stand up in my loneliness and created an urgency to connect with the rest of the world. I made many friends (some of them life-long) and dated Dave, my first real boyfriend for five years. His gentle spirit provided an oasis for the pain in my life.

I sometimes think about what it would be like had I stayed in South Africa and married Dave. Barbara, my best friend, dated Roy, Dave’s older brother. Those were good years. The love Dave and Roy had for us ran deep. They would probably have made good husbands. Dave’s honesty, respect and love scared me. I’d never been treated so well. It did not feel right. So what did I do? I returned to America and married Jeff Collins—an American not unlike my mother who criticized and controlled me. We divorced five years later. He left me for another woman. Now I have come full circle. Bud Queen is my husband and heart’s companion. His loving kindness has helped me to heal. It took me 25 years to accept that I deserved such a man.

My greatest heartbreak has been my mother’s absence in my life. I had to adapt to the lives of others during my first seven years—my mother, my grandmother, my maternal aunt, an orphanage, my grandmother again then to my newly married mother and stepfather. I lived with my mother and stepfather for only six out of the 21 years I lived in South Africa and my mother has chosen to be on speaking terms with me for less than 12 of the 32 years I’ve lived in America. The meeting with my birth-father in America at the age of 21 was also a heartbreak. I suspect I was not the quiet adoring little girl he hoped for and he was not the mentor I envisioned.

My greatest blessings as an adult includes a move to Macon, Georgia, the receiving of a BA and MS degree in Psychology and becoming a children’s therapist for 20 years at a Mental Health Center. I’ve also been blessed with 20-years of outdoor adventures that include hitchhiking on sailboats, many canoe-camps on rivers and backpacks in the mountains. The writing and publishing of a book about my outdoor adventures and the transformational power of nature has also been a wonderful experience.

People’s stories fascinate me. They have told me new truths about my world. They have inspired me and taught me about love and loyalty. Some stories were treasure maps that helped me to navigate my life and enabled me to better understand myself and plot my future.
I also know the telling of my story forced me to come face-to-face with the truth. Truths I have not allowed myself to see before. Digesting the sorrow dissolved and integrated my pain and let me move on. It opened my heart and let me bleed. Now, I remember what I saw and felt before I was silenced. I’ve caught a glimpse of my fleeting life. The heartache has been a gift. I have learned not to be tossed away. The heartbreaks have engendered compassion for others and no longer monopolize my mind. Out of my broken state has come a tenderness for all living things. I can look outside myself with a sense of generosity and feel a vast acceptance of everything. It is as if I’ve touched something holy. It is like I’m waking up and then a waking up some more.

Sadly, I won’t be able to attend my high school class reunion. There will be no sharing on South African soil. But I have an idea. Since I have shared my blessings and heartaches with you. Perhaps if I’m lucky you might even be moved to share yours with a loved one or with me.
Think about it. It’s important—I believe we transmit the presence of everybody we’ve ever known.