To my one-in-a-million woman!

Here I am, alone in my classroom, thinking about what to say on this day as we commemorate International women’s day.

Women’s day…

When I think about womanhood, I think of no other person than my mother.

What a woman!

I am reminded of my childhood and my actions towards her then.

I am reminded of the strength of this one woman, to raise a child like myself, right to this very moment.

I remember how I could write her notes, very early in my childhood, about how I felt she didn’t love

me and how better I was, not to have a mother, than to have one who loved me not.

I remember the hurt in her eyes whenever she looked at me because of a hurtful word I had uttered.

I remember the many times I hit her out of anger, in my childhood.

I am just wondering how she felt hearing everything I said to her.

I can’t even imagine how I could have been so evil in my dealings with her.

I remember how problematic my birth was for her, so much so, that even the doctors had to give me a name after they took me out of mother’s womb.

I hated my mother.

Why? I don’t know… I guess I didn’t feel her love for me that much.
I felt that she didn't know me.
I felt that she didn't understand my many intricacies.

But for Grace… I could have been far worse now.

I remember the time I had to speak to a Priest and even stay over at the Missionhouse because I was struggling with hatred towards my mother.

I can vividly recall how the Priest took me through counselling and the Book of Proverbs to explain what I ought to do and why I ought to do them.

I remember praying and asking for a change of heart.

After my encounter with the Priest, I remember how that hatred drowned in a sea of love, flooding my heart… a sea that takes more and more territory, as the days go by, by God’s Grace.

What I can’t seem to fathom is, her strength.

Her ability to watch her own flesh and blood break her heart over and over again and her ability to still take me in.

Mummy has her flaws…and I have a billion more…

There are still those things I wish could be easy for the both of us to do.

Yet, on such a day as special as this, I can only curtsey one woman who stands tall above all women, Araba Yalley…my mum.

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