Which Ever Comes First
I went home for Christmas on Sunday and had a typical Kikuyu holiday. My sister in ATL (the one with the twins) didn't come down with her family. People were sick so they didn't drive down. My cousin (the one who married my other cousin [but that's a whole 'nother story]) and her family were on their way up when drama erupted around suspected infidelity. They didn't make it. My oldest nephew (the one with the weed habit) was the focus of a lot of negativity. He'd decided he didn't want to go back to Job Corps, which left my sisters and mother in an uproar. It lead to an emotional exchange between my mother and myself (what else is new) that ended with my mom giving me a holiday peace offering. It's almost like Hallmark banks on these kinds of Christmases. Hallmark seems to have a card for everything and my mother seems to have a drawer full of "I'm sorry I over-reacted" cards for every occassion.
The best thing about going home to FL was seeing my father enjoy his brother. When we arrived at my cousin's new baby momma house, my uncle rode up on a bike and got off before the vehicle stopped. Although he's definitively over 60, he has the energy of a 30 year old which is in stark contrast to my Parkinson's aflicted father. Nothing was funnier than when we couldn't get the sliding glass door open in the family room. How many Kikuyu's does it take to open a glass door? The answer is...two and a half. It took my uncle, my aunt (my father's sister), and myself at least 10 minutes working together to get the damn thing open. It was also nice to see my father and his brother talking in Kikuyu (our tribal language).
During a dinner filled with chappati, goat meat, and stew, I noticed that my father had on new shoes that were identical to my uncle's. My sister and mother later told me that when my father was a boy in Kenya, he used to wear the shoes to school in the morning and then give them to his brother to wear in the afternoon when he got home. Those old men were too cute! I think my sisters and I will be like that when we're old women.
I also enjoyed walking to Publix (the happiest place on Earth) with my son. We talked about life, love, and his future along the way. I bought him some fruit and we had a snack in the deli as he shared his thoughts on his new life in IA with me. I was disheartened to hear that there's a girl at his school who's all of 14 and already has 2 babies. I reminded him that my job isn't to tell him what to think but to teach him how to think. I told him, "As your mother, I'm not supposed to tell you what your life should be like, but to teach you how to make decisions to shape your life in the way you want it to be." I think he'll remember that trip to the grocery store and hopefully think of it fondly.
When we arrived at my parents' home that evening, I was surprised to see my aunt Tsigi (pronounced "Sigi", and she's not really my aunt [she's Ethiopian] but was married to one of my father's school friends many years ago...but that's how Kikuyu families are) in the living room when I arrived. I greeted her warmly and chatted for a bit. She asked where I was living now. "Ohio?" "No, Iowa," I replied. It was easy for me to forgive her for not knowing where I now live since she forgot I existed after Katrina.
My mother thought I'd create a scene with my aunt knowing that I knew what my aunt had said to her after the storm, "I'm so glad I don't know anyone who's going through that!" "But [insert my name here] and Shorty live there!" my mother exclaimed to her life long friend. "Oh my God! I totally forgot! I'm so sorry!" my aunt exclaimed to my mother. There's a reason Katrina cleaned out my contacts list, and although my mother thought I'd take my aunt on a guilt trip, I'd written her off over a year ago (reasons I didn't bother to call her while I was in DC a few months ago [where she lives] on a business trip). That didn't stop my mother from running with the fear pumped from her amygdala and getting into a fight with me about dreams.
We were discussing my nephew's lack of desire to go back to Job Corps after the break, his recent drug use, and his burning desire to hold on to his girlfriend. He's said he wants to be a boxer, which I think is a silly and childish dream, but I understand his hopes. Knowing what it's like to be told that one should strive for something more solid (he's learning to become a welder at Job Corps, after which he could make a comfortable living) I reiterated what I'd said 20 years ago when my parents pushed for me to become an engineer. "Money isn't the most important thing." My mother (in her financially & health challenge state) replied, "Money is important! It's not good to feed into some dream that will never happen!" Without recounting the emotionally charged argument, I'll sum up each of our points here:
Mom: He's been head strong and disrespectful to her and my parents' household by ignoring their rules after they took him in once my sister put him out for using drugs in her house after graduation. He's demonstrated that he doesn't want to do any hard work and is seeking love and attention in all the wrong ways. He holds on to the dream of boxing and running an apartment complex so he doesn't have to do any hard work, but he's afraid that he'll lose his current girlfriend if he's gone for too long.
Me: After hearing my sister call him stupid at the Christmas Eve dinner, an old protective switch was turned on in me. Although I think my nephew going back to Job Corps and becoming a welder would be the best thing for him as he pursues his dream of becoming a boxer and landlord, I will NOT sit by and watch another generation endure being verbally and emotionally abused. I watched my sisters and mother go through it while I was growing up, and I don't want it to go on for another generation. Part of my purpose in life (taking care of this planet and the people who live on it) is to stop the cycle of abuse that's perpetuated itself through my geneology. That includes my nephews and niece. My whole point was that he needs positive reinforcement, not tearing down because he's thinking negative things. Negative begets negative.
I also will not feed into the idea that making money describes success. I believe that one should pursue his/her passion in life. "Do what you love to do and the money will come. And if it doesn't, at least you love what you do," is my motto. My parents (likely because they both came from poverty) disagree and have preached about getting "a good education so one could get a good job" for as long as I can remember. To me, it's a recipe for slavery. You'll always end up working for someone else. You'll be comfortable, you may even be rich, but you'll never be wealthy (nor healthy). They never taught us anything about courage.
To me, courage is about doing things afraid. It's about having a dream and pursuing it, even if you fail 1001 times in the process. It's about knowing what you're meant for and going after it. It's about finding your niche in life, which usually doesn't come through an already beaten path. Success doesn't come from the destination, it's about the journey. And it's not about money...it's about love. You can't have health, wealth, or wisdom without love. And you can't have love without courage. You have to be willing to potentially be hurt, willing to potentially fail, willing to take a chance. And that takes courage.
I rearranged Shorty & my plans for love. I wanted my father to have the memory of his youngest daughter and my son meeting his brother when he lies on his death bed. Gruesome as it may sound, I did it with courage in the face of my mother and her amygdala, even though I knew my family account wasn't fully recharged after Thanksgiving.
Parenthetically, I moved away from my overwhelmingly negative nuclear family after high school because I knew I needed to live my life on my own and in a more healthy way. I've gone home over the years to check on the children, hopefully inspiring them to a more healthy way of thinking than what I thought they might be getting at home (based on experience). I've spaced my visits (usually a minimum of 4 months apart) such that I could recharge my spiritual bank account between trips back to the family. Sometimes they'd fill me up, oft times, they'd drain me. This year, I'd been home 4 times (and let's not count the time home around Katrina last year), so I was pretty darn close to tapped out when this trip came up.
For me, visiting my family is a careful balance between "enjoy & annoy", and if I haven't had enough time to fill up my spiritual account with positive before I go, I usually end up with my guage on annoy. Barring a death in the family, I have no plans to go home before May, or when another Kenyan relative comes to visit...which ever comes first.
The best thing about going home to FL was seeing my father enjoy his brother. When we arrived at my cousin's new baby momma house, my uncle rode up on a bike and got off before the vehicle stopped. Although he's definitively over 60, he has the energy of a 30 year old which is in stark contrast to my Parkinson's aflicted father. Nothing was funnier than when we couldn't get the sliding glass door open in the family room. How many Kikuyu's does it take to open a glass door? The answer is...two and a half. It took my uncle, my aunt (my father's sister), and myself at least 10 minutes working together to get the damn thing open. It was also nice to see my father and his brother talking in Kikuyu (our tribal language).
During a dinner filled with chappati, goat meat, and stew, I noticed that my father had on new shoes that were identical to my uncle's. My sister and mother later told me that when my father was a boy in Kenya, he used to wear the shoes to school in the morning and then give them to his brother to wear in the afternoon when he got home. Those old men were too cute! I think my sisters and I will be like that when we're old women.
I also enjoyed walking to Publix (the happiest place on Earth) with my son. We talked about life, love, and his future along the way. I bought him some fruit and we had a snack in the deli as he shared his thoughts on his new life in IA with me. I was disheartened to hear that there's a girl at his school who's all of 14 and already has 2 babies. I reminded him that my job isn't to tell him what to think but to teach him how to think. I told him, "As your mother, I'm not supposed to tell you what your life should be like, but to teach you how to make decisions to shape your life in the way you want it to be." I think he'll remember that trip to the grocery store and hopefully think of it fondly.
When we arrived at my parents' home that evening, I was surprised to see my aunt Tsigi (pronounced "Sigi", and she's not really my aunt [she's Ethiopian] but was married to one of my father's school friends many years ago...but that's how Kikuyu families are) in the living room when I arrived. I greeted her warmly and chatted for a bit. She asked where I was living now. "Ohio?" "No, Iowa," I replied. It was easy for me to forgive her for not knowing where I now live since she forgot I existed after Katrina.
My mother thought I'd create a scene with my aunt knowing that I knew what my aunt had said to her after the storm, "I'm so glad I don't know anyone who's going through that!" "But [insert my name here] and Shorty live there!" my mother exclaimed to her life long friend. "Oh my God! I totally forgot! I'm so sorry!" my aunt exclaimed to my mother. There's a reason Katrina cleaned out my contacts list, and although my mother thought I'd take my aunt on a guilt trip, I'd written her off over a year ago (reasons I didn't bother to call her while I was in DC a few months ago [where she lives] on a business trip). That didn't stop my mother from running with the fear pumped from her amygdala and getting into a fight with me about dreams.
We were discussing my nephew's lack of desire to go back to Job Corps after the break, his recent drug use, and his burning desire to hold on to his girlfriend. He's said he wants to be a boxer, which I think is a silly and childish dream, but I understand his hopes. Knowing what it's like to be told that one should strive for something more solid (he's learning to become a welder at Job Corps, after which he could make a comfortable living) I reiterated what I'd said 20 years ago when my parents pushed for me to become an engineer. "Money isn't the most important thing." My mother (in her financially & health challenge state) replied, "Money is important! It's not good to feed into some dream that will never happen!" Without recounting the emotionally charged argument, I'll sum up each of our points here:
Mom: He's been head strong and disrespectful to her and my parents' household by ignoring their rules after they took him in once my sister put him out for using drugs in her house after graduation. He's demonstrated that he doesn't want to do any hard work and is seeking love and attention in all the wrong ways. He holds on to the dream of boxing and running an apartment complex so he doesn't have to do any hard work, but he's afraid that he'll lose his current girlfriend if he's gone for too long.
Me: After hearing my sister call him stupid at the Christmas Eve dinner, an old protective switch was turned on in me. Although I think my nephew going back to Job Corps and becoming a welder would be the best thing for him as he pursues his dream of becoming a boxer and landlord, I will NOT sit by and watch another generation endure being verbally and emotionally abused. I watched my sisters and mother go through it while I was growing up, and I don't want it to go on for another generation. Part of my purpose in life (taking care of this planet and the people who live on it) is to stop the cycle of abuse that's perpetuated itself through my geneology. That includes my nephews and niece. My whole point was that he needs positive reinforcement, not tearing down because he's thinking negative things. Negative begets negative.
I also will not feed into the idea that making money describes success. I believe that one should pursue his/her passion in life. "Do what you love to do and the money will come. And if it doesn't, at least you love what you do," is my motto. My parents (likely because they both came from poverty) disagree and have preached about getting "a good education so one could get a good job" for as long as I can remember. To me, it's a recipe for slavery. You'll always end up working for someone else. You'll be comfortable, you may even be rich, but you'll never be wealthy (nor healthy). They never taught us anything about courage.
To me, courage is about doing things afraid. It's about having a dream and pursuing it, even if you fail 1001 times in the process. It's about knowing what you're meant for and going after it. It's about finding your niche in life, which usually doesn't come through an already beaten path. Success doesn't come from the destination, it's about the journey. And it's not about money...it's about love. You can't have health, wealth, or wisdom without love. And you can't have love without courage. You have to be willing to potentially be hurt, willing to potentially fail, willing to take a chance. And that takes courage.
I rearranged Shorty & my plans for love. I wanted my father to have the memory of his youngest daughter and my son meeting his brother when he lies on his death bed. Gruesome as it may sound, I did it with courage in the face of my mother and her amygdala, even though I knew my family account wasn't fully recharged after Thanksgiving.
Parenthetically, I moved away from my overwhelmingly negative nuclear family after high school because I knew I needed to live my life on my own and in a more healthy way. I've gone home over the years to check on the children, hopefully inspiring them to a more healthy way of thinking than what I thought they might be getting at home (based on experience). I've spaced my visits (usually a minimum of 4 months apart) such that I could recharge my spiritual bank account between trips back to the family. Sometimes they'd fill me up, oft times, they'd drain me. This year, I'd been home 4 times (and let's not count the time home around Katrina last year), so I was pretty darn close to tapped out when this trip came up.
For me, visiting my family is a careful balance between "enjoy & annoy", and if I haven't had enough time to fill up my spiritual account with positive before I go, I usually end up with my guage on annoy. Barring a death in the family, I have no plans to go home before May, or when another Kenyan relative comes to visit...which ever comes first.
posted by N'j at 3:08 AM
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