Deep Reflection On Life

I just sat down to write down my 10-year plan as cluttered, scary, and unrealistic…I dare to. The irony is that I am in my mother’s house. Her memory can be polarising at the worst of times, a source of courage at the best of times. Dr Mara Mberira asked, “what happened to you”? I reflected deeply this past weekend on the course of my life and the many choices I had and was making  At middle age acutely aware of my high mileage,  I want to taste life more. I realised how I have been incapacitated by fear of aging, irrelevance, being poor in old age.

I went back to the memory of my parents. My mother was in many ways a product of her generation, submission is a posture she wore so gracefully. She let my dad take the shine. But, she was the brighter spouse. She did not only want her girls to succeed, she threw everything she had behind our education. But, she didn’t know how to embrace our audacious dreams.  Perhaps she had been numbed by a life that made her choose the norm and forfeit her dreams.

 I never asked her what she actually wanted to be if she were not a mother of 5, a committed wife of a Minister and teacher for the better part of her life. She equally showed immense courage “going back to fetch the things she had left behind”. She obtained her Masters degree @ 55 because she could.

As I put on paper how I feel and think that my life should unfold. I know what,  where and when I was injured. All of it is in the past. As long as I am alive, I can start all over again albeit, wiser. This is the permission I give myself. 

Yes, I am afraid, I carry scars for Africa, a sign that I have overcome.  

I love you
Always Thando