To Dance Again

“Debbie was a dancer. Her most energetic and spectacular leaps were on the beach, long blond hair flying and sand trailing and turning into a million sparks of reflected sunlight around her perfect young body.
Away from home for the first time in her eighteen years, at Stellenbosch University, where she was a first year student and having the time of her life.
It was the July vacation, she was coming home, and once more her laughter would ring out....... but then the music stopped.

This is my story of the untimely death of my 18 year old daughter and the subsequent communication I have had with her.......a very unusual but significant “happening” in my life. I feel that this little book could be of comfort to those heart-broken parents out there.”

Ronèl Wood

Preface

“Have you been half asleep and have you heard voices?
I’ve heard them calling my name!
Is this the sweet sound that calls the unseen mist
The voice might be one and the same…
I’ve heard it too many times to ignore it
It’s something that I’m supposed to be.
Someday we’ll find it, the Rainbow Connection
The Lovers, the Dreamers, and Me!”

These words from a song by Williams/Archer struck me as not only beautiful when I first heard them sung by that gifted Irish singer, Mary O’Hara, but also, like most poetry, made me realise how much profound truth is veiled in the artistic and poetical material that exists around us.
Of course, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” and the comforting thing about poems, music and the visual arts is that the originators leave us free to find our own interpretation, and see our own innermost thoughts reflected in the mirror that they hold up to us.
You may understand the “Rainbow Connection” in this song as something quite different to what I do, but to me it is clear as daylight that it symbolises a bridge between two worlds – one material, the other non-material. To me it is a promise from God that there is a means of connecting to the next life, after the floods of earthly emotions and experiences, to the present existence. And what is more, I have heard voices! And so have many people throughout the ages. These voices have indeed been heard too many times to be ignored. Only the blinds and blinkers of prejudice can block out the radiance and splendour of the “Pot of Gold” at the end of the rainbow.

Enjoy my story......