For Chelsea, a case of horrible déjà vu
TEN months ago, Chelsea Dinsmore suffered the same fate as Letshego Zulu, Gugu Zulu’s wife.
She, too, witnessed her husband — a public figure with a charitable heart — die on Mount Kilimanjaro.
Scott Dinsmore was an entrepreneur and motivational speaker from San Francisco who founded the Live Your Legend movement and sold his belongings to travel the world with his wife.
He was due to do volunteer work at a school and orphanage in Tanzania after the climb, but as he neared the summit with Chelsea in September last year he was killed by falling rocks.
“To this day, I would rather have been there than not,” Chelsea said. “While I saw things no wife should ever have to see, I am thankful that I got to be with Scott and hold him in my arms. I am thankful that the last voice he heard was mine telling him I loved him.”
Like Gugu and Letshego, Scott and Chelsea documented the trip, leaving behind a string of photographs with the mountain as the backdrop.
“There was a time when it was too painful to look at the images, but I am now able to cherish the moments we had together. The stories that Letshego and Gugu have transcend any sort of physical body,” she said.
The Sunday Times interview request prompted Chelsea to write a letter she hopes will reach Letshego when the time is right.
In it, she says: “My fellow warrior woman . . . I can tell you from personal experience, while there are difficult times ahead, the hardest thing you will ever have to do has already been done.
“When I look back at the past 10 months, everything pales in comparison to those initial moments on the mountain and the journey to get down it. I hope in your weakest times you can lean on
I saw what no wife should have to see, but I’m thankful I got to hold him in my arms
that reminder — you have already done the impossible.”
She urged Letshego to “continue to be a wife to the man you love instead of a widow to the situation you experienced — for you were his chosen partner, and are therefore the person best suited to honour his life in the way that only you know how”.
Chelsea, who has continued running the Live Your Legend movement, urged South Africans to “allow the loss of Gugu to create more love in this world”.
She said: “To honour Gugu’s life and death is to become a better version of ourselves through this experience.”