Scar Tissue, Legacies and Sleep Crawling

This is for my mummy when I was a little girl, this is for my girlfriend whose struggle so mirror those of another woman 30 odd years ago in another Africa, Kenya, another town. This is for me on those nights I completely and absolutely hate my husband and the Saturday mornings when it’s all I can do to reign in my anger and not throw a stone or two at hubby dearest. This is for the deep hurt that women have carried because their men are just men.

I woke up extremely late and extremely tired. I had no energy to be apologetic or make the calls I needed to make to realign my day. Baby baby AKA Ovals is very active in his sleep in ways that are less than safe. He wants to crawl so bad that he actually crawls in his sleep! He crawls off the moses basket that’s his sleep space next to my side of the bed. Twice I dared to sleep and found the guy a second away from a face first drop to the floor. So yeah I haven’t slept at night in a while. We need to move him to a cot I know… but but but… many buts. I digress though. So I looked at this smiling sleeping lump of cuteness and I wondered how many hearts he will break. How many he will break intentionally, how many he will break that he never knew he had, how many he will break out of his manly foolishness… that he will break hearts among other things like glasses and doors is a given. He will as surely break a woman as he will break a glass. This is because breaking is what men do. Breaking their women, breaking their womens spirits, break the work of their womens hands… just breaking. But must men break?

I look at this little lump of lovely mooshness that is my baby boy and I realize that as his mother I have a responsibility to him and to his father to do my best and try limit the number of animate things he might break. I need to have the wisdom to know when to speak and when to feign ignorance to give this my boy boy the space he needs to grow and the knowledge that his parents have his back. I need to remind his daddy how important he is as a role model to his boys. In today’s world, men get lost in the rat race because that’s how the bills get paid, that’s how the kids go to school, that’s how he makes his name in the world. Many men forget that their legacy rests with these young ones that wait for him to come home and listen to their escapades for the day.

There are many broken children who are now becoming parents. Broken as their homes broke as they were growing up, broken as morals and values in the home were swept under the carpet to ensure they get premium education. We have broken children in designer suits driving shiny big cars living in big houses in the leafy burbs… who are now parents. They hide in the clubs ‘networking’. They hide their children in playschool with the nanny at 10 months and spend time in the spa ‘centering’. Behind these plausible lifestyle stories are kids, broken… trying not to break their progeny like they were broken.

This picture reminds me of my Rioter when he was a baby... my guns were on fire

My mother, my friend, me. We were broken for the scar tissue to toughen us up to be the parents we need to be to unbreak the world that was broken in our childhood. We hold the memory of brokenness to create a legacy of strength. Take heart when you want to kill him. Remember you are the healer and not the breaker. Make the choice that will be best for you and your legacy and if its worth it… his legacy too. Never forget however that you, woman, broken as you are, you are the only one who can heal your world.

When my Rioter (Little Man) and Ovals (baby baby) grow up to read this. I want them to know that their choices are the difference between leaving a legacy and leaving broken fragments of a dream.