A Live Dog is Better than a Dead Lion

 Exactly seven years ago yesterday, my mother died.

Today I thought about how many sacrifices she made for me, as only a mother can.

When I was 31 she said to me ' if life is hard just come back home '

I had tried and tried but nothing was corking, and when I did come back home, I continued to work for a dying maagazine that was paying me KES 4000 four times a year. I was applying for jobs but getting no openings.

My mother would buy a small milk- the 20bob one. for me to have some tea in the morning, the rest I would figure it out.

I knew we were both struggling but mehn, nothing was working at all, for  about two years. I was metally frayed, because whenever I walked around and saw people in business I thought, I wish I could start a business. if I passed by a big building, I would think- wow- people actually work here and get paid. I remember one time my mother flipping the covers off my bed and telling me to ' Get up and find work!' 'Naivas is hiring and you are still sleeping.'

How could I even explain to her that I had no confidence left. I didn't even think I could get hired as a super market cashier. I was afraid that the world had chewed and spat me out.

why didnt I finish my degree? Was my constant bug forming an error in my mind. I had forgotten the struggles of several years before when I had been thrown hither and thither in a foreign country when I tried to renew an expiring Visa and was told that an expired visa meant  a five year imprisonment. Life was already rough on the outside, time in incarceration? I would have died. I had already seen what happened to Nigerian Nationals who had missed their visa renewals, or been caught on tourist visas instead of student visas.

 Until a friend asked me to do some interviews and writing for the NGO she was working at. I was earning KES 10,000. So I decided to move out because I was embarassed to be at living in my mother's house at that age, and embarassed that I couldn't even give enough money to cover the bills. How do I explain it?

In my mind, I was like, ah, let me go suffer in private. My earnings got to 13k. My rent was 4k

I was on a beans and veg diet for many many days, but you know what, it was under control. 

I felt like at least I could organise my life, no matter how shredded it looked like.

But all in all, I feel grateful for the role a living parent plays.

Growing Into Adulthood Bills

 Yesterday, it hit me that actually, growing older is a gift. It's the end of the month and as usual the bills are coming in left right and centre and I was getting myself ready to  have the usual argument with my landlord- No I am not going to pay that kind of money for water- what do you think I am manufacutring?Cocacola?-

And I realised that, I no longer feel the panic I often felt when I had to deal with an unreasonable house owner (Those who got some money from their retirment from package and decided to concort a few bedsitters behind their bungalow to collect rent and supervise tenants the same way they supervised their Grad 5s and Grade 6s for the past 31 years)

Until recently, I would get a spike of anger whenever I received a passive aggrresive text from such a house owner but with experience and age now I can give aura for aura and move one swiftly.

My money doesn't jiggle, it folds?

This morning, I understood that money helps you to move in silence

I don't have that kind of money yet, but I have recognized how people with lot of it move a long noiselessly

But life has been a little easier since I was able to pay my way. I am less confrontational, less angry. I can let it be, I can let things slide.

So I hope I will have enough patience to nurture the wells and springs of income I have at the moment. And I hope to have enough wisdom to take up any possibilities that arise along the way.

Because I really am a nocturnal animal that prefers to do it's activities unobserved.

Living life as a Choice not as a Chore

 I was praying today and I mentioned something that made me pause.

It wasn't very profound at first but the more I thought about it I realised, ooooo,this is what I mean.

All my life, I have approached life as something to do to get out of the way. A minor inconvenience, a thorn in the bum,an inescapable fate 

And though I have filled it with beautiful things, it has always felt as though this life was not meant for me. 

That others deserve it more than I do.

I remember having a discussion with my friend and she said, she has never even imaged her life beyond death. She felt that she had received enough in this life and others should get the next life, not her because she neither desired nor deserved it.

The complete opposite to my feelings

 I always thought I was given the short end of the stick and no matter what I do it will never work out so why prolong it? 

Very few things in my life have felt meangful, I have been waiting and longing for the next life with a heartbreaking urgency.

But today, on my way back home I felt very very light. I had spent the morning cleaning and scrubbing my grandmother's house. I was smiling , and the thought came to me that, actually I don't feel stressed. 

In the Alchemist, the boy is asked to shine some glasses at the tea house 'it will cleanse your soul.' he is told.

I guess cleaning has that effect on a human body. It sets it free. So I prayed that I may open myself to life.

Not out of duty, not out of lack of otherwise, but because life is a beautiful thing. It doesn't have to be perfect.

We could just, take a Bus, By Cecilia Gathoni

 The book opens with the story of Fabian, a family man living in an Opulent Suburban area of Nairobi City. A warm opening about a peaceful family life that blows over when he decideds to get into politics. After his disappearance, we meet the other four characters, some are going through a  midlife crisis, while others  have finally understood their purpose in life and tryng to restart.

At first one wonders what a politician, a housewife, a Chinese immigrant, a ten year old boy and a 25 year old Muslim woman have in common, but the story swiftly spins together their lives until the reader see that- ahhh, I see where this is going-

One attraction in the story is the places they get to visit. Even though they pass through the main tourist attractions like the Victoria Falls and the Skeleton Coast in Namibia, they discover other less popular sites, learn the history of migration and attend workshops in different Universities.

Their journey culminates at the The Diaspora Salon in Marrakech.

Gravity

Many times I  have felt myself pulled in different directions, emotionally and mentally.

And of course, that's when I get an overwhelming desire for flight.

Recently though, I started to work on my internal gravity.

I started to tell myself  ' hold still, give yourself time, ' 

and like one  would  command  a dog in training that has  a tendency to  get  agitated,

I commanded myself to:

 

STAY!

Ciss, STAY!

Whenever I have  to  the urge to move, move  or be active, be present, be useful, be helpful,  be there.

I tell myself ' si utulie msee.'

It's not easy,  for a number of  reasons.

 I could say culturally, a woman is expected to be on the move  and  not  stop to even  have a meal, because  when you are  serving  everyone, touching this,  and  that and finally  having  your meal  in tupperware  beside  the sink as  you wait  or the  sufuria  ya  ugali to soak so you can finish cleaning up before  you go  to sleep at midnight, means  that you are a complete  woman. Not lazy. And  your in-laws will love  and admire you and  praise  you but  still criticise the  quality of your chapati.

So that  is how I was raised, to be on the move even  when all work is  complete and it would make more sense to take a nap and get up later, BUT we keep  moving.

Or it  could be conditioning. When I was younger  and unable to finish my education because of lack of fees, I panicked  and  imagined  I had  to work four times as hard as anyone  that held  a Masters, a Phd or simply  managed to  find  work immediately  after  completing their Diploma in Project Management. Some people  had it smooth, some had connections, and some just settled into life earlier.

After years of hustling just  be able  to afford milk and potatoes, it has become  part of me to do this and  that to keep afloat.

Even  when I don't  need to.

It's as though my sense of self is attached to how exhausted I feel at the end of the day, how depleted I am at the end of the week AND how many times I can keep telling the people around me that ' oh my gosh I am so tired. '

You know that common phrase about not pouring into an empty cup?

Sometimes I feel like I am running on an empty cup.

 The good thing is, I can now recognize when I am running on empty, and I take time to recharge.

I have also understood, through a lot of experiments, that actually, when we learn to quiet the internal storms, then the outer storms don't shake us when they arrive.

Though I now have to find a balance between, moving away from constant  movement and interaction while also avoiding the loneliness epidemic

GEN X, Which HighSchool did you go to?

 When I was in Primary school, I would hear my uncl a and aunties talking about the hi highschools they had been to, and the once they admired.

Mary Leakey,  Kangūbiri, South Tetu girls Limuru Girls, Loreto Limuru, Kagumo boys, Njiiris, Tūmūtūmū, Alliance Girls (which was kinda out of reach ) but there was always BG to aim for.

You knew after that you would go to Nairobi University, or KU if you wanted to to be a teacher in future.

Life after highschool  didn't matter so much to me because I knew O was gonna get into Kenya School of Journalism, the cut line was a C, and I was so sure of it I knew I didn't have to study Chemistry too much.

At that  time Maseno University offered a single course in Mass Communication.

But I wasn't gonna be allowed to go to Western Kenya, not with my history of Malaria.

Anyway, that's a lot of water under the bridge and the purpose of the post wasn't. Even about Universities.

It was just a realization I had yesterday.

I have sat through a familiar discussion too often, where one person wants to talk about the superiority of the school the attended.

So I went to BG and I have friends that went to Mang'u, Nyeri High, Loreto girls and when we reminisce about highschool, it's about teachers we had nicknamed or the punishments we scored.

Never have we sat to compare school facilities. And apart from the schools like Loreto that had a swimming pool, everything else was standard.

But then I find myself in this group of acquaintances and  the girl finds a way to ask : where did you do you chemistry lessons? And someone from the group will answer, In classroom, unless we had practicals then we'd have them in the lab.

In the lab? You only had a lab?

Yes we had a lab, 

Only one? Us we had a lab for each lesson, Chemistry lab, Biology Lab, Physics Lab

Oh watu wa group of schools

She smiles contentedly 

Na wewe Cecilia?

Oh, we had labs

And I leave it at that because I don't get it, and I don't want to get involved.

But after hearing this over three times, I can only exit the room before I say something nasty.

I found myself in that so called  group of schools and couldn't believe how dusty it is., even the said labs are broken down with missing taps.

How can I participate in the discussion now with the knowledge I have, when I imagine the pristrine condition of the Music Rooms, the Computer Labs, The huge  Library, the Agriculture Labs , the chemistry lab 1 and 2, physics lab 1 and 2 enormous Homescience fitted with kitchen equipment on one room, and Sewing machines in the next room, enough to sit 60 girls at the same time?

And I finally understood why  the school placement  was a problem last year. When they said a student can be placed in any school within any county, I now get it why Central had a problem. Government Schools in Kiambu, Nyandarua, Othaya and Nyeri have long been standardized, and it wasn't 100% government funding. It was community efforts. Every few years a school will have a fundraisers.

And parents of the  fourth year class  would be allocated a certain amount to to leave a legacy for the  generations behind.

In my years at BG, there were two projects, a fundraiser where President Moi was the Guest of honour to build and stock  a modern  Library and in our fourth year, our parents paid a set amount each for a new school bus. 

I guess, she hasn't met someone from Central.