Dear Kids (A reflection from a greying Mama’s Heart)

Dear Kids

Whilst no parent has all the answers and whilst this mama is constantly, still learning, know this for sure:

1. You are never alone
2. Travel is the best teacher
3. “No” is a good word. Use it often. It’s particularly lovely when there’s a dead silence and you offer no explanations
4. “Please” and “thank you” never goes out of fashion
5. Water heals. Oceans. Tears. 2 litres a day
6. You have a built-built in “people” radar. Please listen to its beep beep beep when something feels offish
7. Sleep is medicine
8. Play, play, play. Never stop playing
9. Less sugar, less screen time, more grass, more laughs
10. God is inside you and no one one has a special hotline that you need to go through
11. Betrayal is painful. Nothing can prepare you for that kick in the groin
12. Go out and explore. You can always come home to cry
13. Try and remember who you were before the world started pinning its labels on you
14. Your body is beautiful. Exactly as is. Explore it. Admire it. Treat it right and it will reward you so much
15. No one knows it all
16. Blood makes you related. Loyalty makes you family
17. Believe in magic. Those who don’t, never find it
18. Your word is your honour. Do what you say you will. Always
19. A grateful heart is a magnet for miracles
20. Give freely. Of what you have. Of your time. And quietly please
21. No one likes a show-off
22. Learn to listen. To God’s voice in the early morning. To yourself. Certainly to people who you trust
23. Shortcuts never work
24. People will forget what you say but they will never forget how you made them FEEL. Be kind
25. Books, music, thunderstorms and tea are good for lonesome days when you need your mama
26. Abundance and prosperity are your birth right
27. Look beyond the labels of race and religion, gender and social standing. How people treat people from whom they need nothing is where you should focus your scoring and grading
28. Jealousy is when you count other people’s blessings instead of your own
29. Love does not need to hurt
30. Speak your truth. Even when your voice shakes
31. What sets your soul on fire? Go there
32. Learning is constant
33. Messing up is okay. Intentionally hurting someone never is
34. You teach people how to treat you
35. You may have one “true love” or many or even none. Remember that you are whole anyway
36. You have a story that only YOU can tell

 

xoxo

Mama

 

© Aluta continua, as they say.  A Heart Full of Stories, 2017

A Prayer Answered

If you have ever lost someone you love, you will know that it sucks the life out of you.

 

Standing at the shore, I let my heart break. The pieces fell hard and wave after wave picked up a piece and took it away. Completely centred, I stilled myself more, allowing the feelings to come and the waves to go.

 

Softly, the tears fell. Softly too, the waves came in perfect rhythm.    

 

My prayer that morning was a simple one :  I asked that the same one that made the waves, the same one that made my sad heart, would hold my mother in tenderness as she traveled back “home”. She had just passed away and the smell of her still followed me everywhere.

 

Looking back at the footprints and with the sound of the waves getting more and more faint, I realised that the prayer was not only about my mother. It was also about me. For me.  I needed her to journey well, so that I could journey well too.  My happiness was contingent on it.

 

Knowing for sure that my prayer was answered, I began to walk back to the boardwalk.  The connectedness I felt to the ocean, its rhythm and the creator of it all was not for me to try and understand in that moment. (Or perhaps ever!)

 

Instead, I bowed my head for a second in gratitude, delighted that there are undoubtedly magical moments and miracles on the most ordinary of days. Indeed when we’re silent and centered, plugging into the rhythm of the divine flow is not only necessary, it is completely instinctive. A rhythm most divine.

 

 

Ask me, I know.

 

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2017

 

Aluta continua, as they say.  Allow me to wish you a million opportunities on the most ordinary of days to plug into the magic and surrender to the rhythm that sustains us all.

Reflections on Mama Karma through 3 generations

 

My daughter is beginning to get embarrassed by me. Not by anything I do/say/wear or how I use my hands to eat. Just ME. The whole package. Even when I am silent and using a knife and fork to eat pizza.

 

There’s a blush beginning to develop. A very faint pink flush but it’s there all right. It’s there and I know it well.

 

From experience.

 

It really brings into focus my relationship with my own mother, who was a non-conformist of note. And while I can be a real people-pleaser, never wanting to cause any waves, she was very much the opposite.  

 

She would embarrass me constantly too. Not by anything she did/said/wore (well sometimes the Converse trainers and expletives were a bit much) or how she smoked with the young girls while her peers drank tea in a circle saying the rosary. No, just by being herself. 

 

And history will judge us both.

 

Me for being me, slightly too teacher’s pet, always wondering how I can change/ tone down/conform.

 

And her for daring to stand out.

 

As for my daughter, the blush still needs to mature to a deep red, I’m afraid. I mean, what’s a childhood if not filled with cringe worthy moments unwittingly created by our parents? That’s karma right?

 

Hopefully by the time my sweet girl becomes an adult, her reflections and experience of the “blush”, will guide her to a place where she too can just BE. You know, just be herself, with the full appreciation that we are all different, all the same….and that’s wonderful.

 

Now shhhh, don’t tell her this BUT if she leans a little more towards the nature of her rebel of a gran, then that means my work is done.

 

That will be karma too. A fate I will gladly accept.

 

 

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2016. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

The Power of “Thank You”

I have always marveled at the way mothers perform their miracles. 

To me, these superpowers seem to really come alive at Christmas, Eid, Diwali, Birthdays, Weddings and Barmitzvahs. You know, those milestone moments that go on to the mantelpiece for a lifetime. 

It fascinates me the way these moms press-on despite limited budgets and family dramas, despite the exhaustion and lack of appreciation to create something out of nothing for their loved ones. 

It also fascinates me how “thank you” seems to be the spark that ignites their hearts and gives them enough energy for another 600 rounds of madness. Those two little words seem to be the magical formula. 

I had sat down to write a story about Gratitude for these mothers (and my own miracle worker mom) when another story fell right into my heart. 

He was drunk. No, he was pissed. He said that he was drinking because he was sad but I thought that he was sad because he had been drinking.

The man told me about the loss of his kids to drugs, the loss of his cash to gambling and the fact that the red wine in his hand was his only real friend. 

His wife was home preparing Christmas Eve dinner for 20 people. He told me that she always went “overboard” and that it was a complete “waste of time and money.”

I would have loved to listen to the rest of his story, but I had to dash. My husband sent me a text message telling me that the coast was clear to go and set up the “milk and cookies” scene at home.  

As I left, the grumpy man proudly showed me some pictures of his family. I noticed that they were all special occasion pictures of birthdays, Christmases and graduations gone by.

I prayed that one day he would remember how to say “Thank You!”

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2015.

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and http://www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction t

The Cupboard & The Horny Old Man

My brother built a cupboard.

It was horrible. I walked into my mother’s home and it was the first thing I saw.  All tact flew out of the window and I said “That thing must go! It is terrrrible! God, it must go. Today!” 

He was lying sleeping on the couch. He threw his cover off and flew into a mad rage! A silent one.

I had NO idea he had built the cupboard. I also had NO idea my words had caused the commotion.

I was still focused on the cupboard. God, it was ugly.

My mother knew it was ugly too but she did not have the heart to say so. When she saw the explosion of feelings in her kitchen, her eyes met mine. They begged me to retreat. I ignored their silent plea.

I proceeded to contract my younger brother (read bribe) to tear down the ugly cupboard for me. We hatched a plan that as soon as the builder was out of sight, the plan would be executed.

The plan went well. The cupboard was torn down.

Very pleased with myself, I jumped into my car and planned to speed off before the cupboard artist returned. I turned on the ignition and there was the familiar sound from my young days. The damn car would not start. I tried again. It was stuck.

It was getting dark. I was annoyed.  My son helped my blood pressure rise by crying to get out of his car seat. His moaning was driving me insane.

That’s when I heard a call. A high pitched sort of voice. I looked out of my window and saw a man. A horny old man.

He was standing on his balcony, with just a towel around his waist. He said “Are you okay?” and I said “Yes, I am! My brother is just 5 minutes away, thank you”.

My son upped his volume. He seriously wanted out of that seat.

Next thing, there was a knock on my window. Yes, who else but the towel guy?

He peeked into the car. I was kneeling on the front seat with my bum in the air trying to reach my son in the backseat and calm him down. Yes, you can imagine the old man’s pleasure seeing that bum up close.

He said “Do you know what you can do with 5 minutes?”  and I replied “Call the cops and let them know that I am being attacked?”

“Attacked?” he said.

That’s when my brother showed up and we forgot alllllll about the cupboard.

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

MAMA

I respond to the name MAMA.

Sometimes I want to forget my name.

But most times, just hearing it reminds me of how beautiful I am, how strong I am and how amazing the miracle of life is.

I invited it
Life created it
I embraced it
I incubated it
And now I get to watch it
This miracle is something else!

And today, I am grateful.