to feel or not to feel...

Yesterday at service came a man with his son. The boy looked like he was around eight years old, but i couldn't tell exactly. His arms were clutched around his heart, his face was mostly expressionless. I thought he must be the saddest little boy I'd seen in a long time. His hands could not stretch, there was something wrong in his elbow joint. So he walked all of those years in his life with his hands clutched around his heart. Being that his father was hardly able to make ends meet, it was likely that the boy couldn't go to school, couldn't play, or do any of the things boys his ages should be doing. My heart broke.For the first time in a while I wanted to ask God why such things happen to poor innocent people.

But we see them everyday. The beggar on the street walking on all fours, the man in the wheelchair selling sweets. We see them, but we do not see. We have become so numb to other people's pain. We walk along looking straight ahead, consoling ourselves with shallow words, "I can't help them all", "They should find something to do". That way we can make their problems all about us, and sleep easy at night. True, there have been those who have preyed on the humanity of others with false disabilities, walking around with crutches in the daylight, or until chaos ensue. Crutches long forgotten, "ghafla bin vuu, wananunua pujo nambari mguu niponye" as my Swahili teacher would say. And one too many I'm afraid.

Still, I'd like to go back to that time when parents didn't exploit their children and send them begging, if it ever existed. I'd like to be able to help a beggar on the street because they actually need it, not see the same guy walking at night and spending my former money on alcohol. And though I may be mostly sarcastic and no-nonsense faced, deep down my heart isn't as strong. No matter how much I try to close my eyes and pretend they are not there, I can't shut them out, and I can't do much about it at the moment. And I feel...

I do not deserve the life I now live. I remember when I was talking about the good lady who stole from us I said I saw myself in her, and I had no idea why. So i sat and thought about the life I now live, the schools I've been in, probably ranking as some of the best schools in the country. But what if I, being me, was born to some woman in the village out of wedlock. I could be smart, but how much chance would I have, going to the local village school where the best student would never manage half the mark in the national exam, if I would be lucky enough to just finish primary school, that is. I'd probably not go to school a week every month when "the visitors" came. Or I'd be married off early to cut on costs. The only difference between me and her was where I was born, because Lydia was probably smarter than many people I'd ever met.

I can never understand His ways, His purposes, I don't know why things turn out as they do, why a loving God would allow so much pain to go unchecked. It's easy for me to say "Suffering exists to cause us to turn our eyes on Him", but when I don't have food, and no money, and no education or means, sitting at my doorstep helplessly watching my children cry because they are hungry, will I say the same thing? God help me, I don't want to ever be that person who can look at pain and never see, I don't want to grow cold and dead inside. It may break my heart over and over, but I'd rather that, it'll drive me to do something, and then, even if it's just for one person, I could perhaps make the world a little better a place to live in. God help me.

you don't know the cost of the oil in my alabaster box

Have you ever met those people who are so sure they know everything there is to know about everything? Now there are those who do, those are fun to listen to, like listening to  a geek going on excitedly about something or other i probably will never get Then there are those who are just plain annoying, propagating ignorance with such a sense of righteousness in their own eyes.
I'm one of those people refer to as plus-size, thank God for development and activists, before i was just "fat'. At some point this was something i definitely minded, but in recent years after it was concluded that it was not going to go away, I daresay it's now a thing I don't completely dislike about me. Every so often though there comes a few crude Kenyans who test this resolve. Yes, you know who I mean, those who not only call me 'fat', that's a good word, the Swahili word they use is far much worse, 'mzito' translated 'heavy'. The picture drawn in my head when I hear that word is a 90kg sack of maize slumped against a wall. I'm talking about those people who insist on asking you really rude questions that are none of their business, like "Huwa unaenda gym?" (Do you go to the gym?) Those who assume that you automatically eat a whole lot, "Uko sure utashiba?" and when you don't they assume you are on some kind of a diet, "ama unajaribu ku-slim?" (Are you full, or are you trying to be slim?) It's worse when you skip the meal altogether!
I like to think we're in a new season where everyone is allowed to be who they are. But that aside, in any case, what should give you the right to make someone feel bad just because you got thin genes. My mum says as long as they still make clothes that fit well then there is no problem. You don't know where people have come from,  you do not know what they have overcome to be able to stand up straight. i like Cece's version of Mary's story, you don't know the cost of the oil in my alabaster box. Before you try to point fingers and claim I am wasting it, take time and find out its cost.

heroes 101

"Heroes didn't leap tall buildings or stop bullets with an outstretched hand; they didn't wear boots and capes. They bled, and they bruised, and their superpowers were as simple as listening, or loving. Heroes were ordinary people who knew that even if their own lives were impossibly knotted, they could untangle someone else's. And maybe that one act could lead someone to rescue you right back."
— Jodi Picoult (Second Glance)

Is there a class that teaches the art of heroism? I wish there was some kind of a manual. If she starts crying hold her and let her cry. When it gets to this point let go, it's no use, she won't listen. It probably would be one long long manual, there are as many ways of dealing with conflict as there are people. But I seem to think Jodi captured the entire syllabus right here. I tell my folks they are my hero one at a time, usually depending on who has what I want at the time :) I tell my brother he's my hero, as well as a select few of my friends see criteria above :) Of course the parents caught on soon enough and the brother never believed it, sadly.
I'll admit, I'm a little liberal with my use of the word. A hero for me is not some political figure with a great philosophy he lives by. It is not Mahatma or Mandela or Condoleeza Rice why would I pick her? They are great, but not to me. I've got this friend of mine who's been there since primary school. In this country those are usually hard to find, because probably by the time you're through with high school you may have lived in five different towns. And Facebook only just happened. Keeping in touch was next to impossible. But many years later, here we are. For me, there's a hero, and at my wedding, God allowing it, when i ask her to stand beside me it will be with pride, and honour.
My parents are my heroes. They tell me how far they have come, and I look with wonder. Last year I had a job over my long vacation, when I got paid, I thought whoa, what a sum!! Two days later I couldn't see where it all went, and not that I squandered it. Just for never having slept hungry a day in my life, never having missed school and never having been abandoned, they deserve to be lauded. my brother too, in his own way. I don't know why, but even though he's a bit introverted and not at all like me, he's a man I admire. He always does the right thing, and he stands by what he believes in this is sometimes not something i appreciate, i try though.! ;) My friends are my heroes, special attention to the pre-technology ones. Sticking by someone takes guts, even just a friend. Listening, loving, praying, travelling long journeys, sacrificing time,bringing humour to humourless situations. I could not ask for better friends that these.
I thank my God upon every remembrance of them, those men and women who, in ways big and small, have made me what I am. My heroes.

gold in the morning sun

Don Williams wrote the song 'I'm just a country boy' about a simple country boy who loved the prettiest girl in town, but never did have the courage to ask her to marry him because he didn't have the money to take care of such a girl. It's chorus went like:

'Cause I'm just a country boy,
Money have I none,
But I've got silver in the stars,
Gold in the morning sun,
Gold in the morning sun.

It's the last week of my holiday. I'm glad, because I spent it with people I love.I've seen most of those I had not seen for so long, it was simply delightful. I realised something out of all this, my wealth is in my friends. Kahlil Gibran said once that each friend represents a world in a person, a world not possibly born before this meeting, and only by this chance meeting could this world be born. And he also said that what one loves most in a friend may be clearer in their absence. The time-out I have had from most of my friends has wrought more clarity in its wake than destruction. A few of those whom I had previously given up on came back, perhaps to reawaken in me the old girl who would move heaven and earth for friend. I've got confidence, it's gonna be a good year. And if it gets tough, I've got behind me a host of people who would bear me up despite myself. And that, my friends, that is something worth treasuring. Don Williams' song has got a twist to it. This young man decided he wasn't gonna be married, now that though he loved her he couldn't take care of her. But who knows? Maybe she could have said yes if only he had asked. He didn't take a chance. I won't be like the country boy. Life has a way of giving you what you least expect. It may not always be a good thing, true, but it also isn't the worst thing ever, methinks.

happy new year

Someone asked me something interesting towards the end of last year. We were talking about stuff in general and I was just saying how much I was looking forward to next year now this year so I could maybe start over. He asked me, "What if Jan sucks, then Feb and March suck, are you going to sit around and wait for the next year?" I didn't have an answer. Everyday we get a chance to start over again and take back the wrong decisions we make day after day, but the thing about a new year, much like a birthday, is that it gives us a perfect opportunity to actually start over with the calendar backing us up. One could start over in December, but January just seems better, I suppose. And January is here. 
A lot of things will happen this year. I become a senior in September, I go for internship - the first time the reality of life as a biochemist will dawn, i turn twenty two among other things. More than anything else though, I want a lot to change inside me. There was a time last year a friend and I were talking about quiet time, and how confrontation with God is hardly a peaceful experience. Those moments reveal to a person things about themselves they never even knew existed, base and wicked attributes. Which is why most of us fear those moments of silence when He speaks. I know I do. I've seen stuff in me I didn't know was there, and it scares me a lot.
I've never had resolutions, i used to think those are just a few more things I'll have to look back on and regret come end year audits. This year I have a few resolutions. I want to bet on people, bet on life, bet on opportunities. I've lived in cynicism and skepticism because no one you don't expect a thing from can disappoint right? The greatest One I want to trust is Him. I just realised that I trust no one. And that's a sad way to live. I'm gonna be like Anne Frank, I'm gonna give someone a chance. I'm gonna believe that people are really good at heart, like me, they just make some really stupid choices sometimes, and then taking them back seems impossible so they just keep going. Sooner or later I'm gonna have to take a chance on someone or something, why not now?