My New Surrounds Inspired Me To Change My Life

Beverley Mawson, 68, sold her family home in Roodepoort to start a new life alongside Sabie River, where she runs a rehabilitation centre for large animals

- Virginia Boshoff

I was heading for 65 when it struck me that I wanted a lifestyle change. I’d always been someone who kept busy, and I simply couldn’t see myself slipping into retirement.

We’d lived on Joburg’s West Rand for 22 years. I managed a dental practice nearby, but my husband Jeffrey, a hydraulics engineer, left home at 4am every day to commute to Edenvale, sometimes working till 8pm, or staying on for 48-hour shifts. He has a typical

Type A personality and loves his job, but struggles to unwind – it seems to be a common city attitude. Everywhere you go, people are rushed, traffic is backed up as far as the eye can see and supermarkets are crowded. No one stops to say hello, and regardless of the years we’d lived in our area, I just never felt a sense of community.

By mid-2013, my stepdaughters had grown up and moved out. Tracy is a busy mom in the UK and, in Joburg, Nikki is a journalist and Pauline had just qualified as a psychologist at the time. Our once vibrant home felt empty. It was madness to think we’d be retiring here, in the rat race, all on our own.

Jeff and I have a mobile home that we’d been taking on holiday to Sabie for years. We love the area’s serenity – the canopies of trees, the still river with lush banks, occasional glimpses of greywing partridges waddling along the pebbled ground. On one of our getaways there, as we sat watching the sunset over the river, wine glasses in hand, I turned to Jeff and said, “Wouldn’t you like to live here?” His answer? Yes, without hesitation.

By January 2014, we’d sold our home, packed up our belongings and waved goodbye to our old life. On the day we moved into our new Sabie house, there was a crowd of smiling neighbours at the front door. I had finally found that sense of community I was yearning for!