orochimaru

 

i notice hate harbouring up inside of me
and I want to catch it
and throw it
with all my strength

it festers
and conjures up echoes of words that should be forgotten
and images that should long have faded

it festers
like a curse mark
that gives unimaginable strength
but drains the soul in the process

 

 

Disclaimer: There's nothing wrong with me and I'm not filled with hate.

This post was written on the 10th of July after watching an episode of Naruto

 

 

2012

When I was in high school, my mother kept pushing the idea of me following a career that would allow me to work from home.

As a 17 year old, this conjured up images of me being alone at home, "vrotting" away by myself, meeting no-one and exploring nothing of the outside world.
The corporate world, with it's fake smiles, corporate dressing and medical aid benefits seemed so much more appealing.

Little did I realise that 5 years down the line, working from home, would be one of my greatest desires, the corporate world would have chewed up and spat out different parts of my soul and all my ideas about life and living would be toppled.

The breezer believes it's 2012. A movement of consciousness that won't allow people to remain living the dull, empty lives they've been allowing themselves to live.

The 90's saw a move away from the traditional 9 to 5 job as well as the traditional "stay in one job your entire life" mentality.
The 2000's were career driven, with people having set paths and single-minded goals. It was school, then university, then entry into corporate life where you attained as much on the job working knowledge as you could and worked as many hours as you needed to to make ur directors sufficiently rich.
People were okay with being paid almost nothing because they decided they could live off loans and both parents could work and they would make a living that way.

Then, the recession hit. And everything came crumbling down. People lost their jobs and could no longer pay for the things they planned to pay for off their

salaries. The retrenched people realised they couldn't find jobs and their mystique with the corporate world fell away. They decided to open their own businesses or find alternate ways of earning money.

People are starting to do what they love, rather than just live the lives society dictates they live. I have images of Maslouw's hierarchy of needs and us, as a society moving up and bettering ourselves as each of our needs gets fulfilled.

I hope I'm right.

Her mind moved endlessly. Planning 'escape routes'. A life that would be different from the one she was living at the moment.
Simply pulling herself out of bed in the morning felt like a chore, but she had to do it so she could get the kids ready and out of the house.

She raised her hands above her head and used the edges of the headboard to lurch herself out of it. She'd found this was the best way to pull a stiff body out of the warmth of it's blanket haven, without the protests of the mind becoming too overwhelming.

Lukie was already up and excited for the day ahead. She entered the boys room to see him running circles around his brothers bed and singing 'hey chakalaka' at the top of his voice. he looked at his mother for a moment, as if to gauge whether he was in trouble or not.

The look completely warmed samantha's heart and she bent over to catch him as he came running up to her and grabbed her tight around the neck.
This was what she was living for. This made the long drives in bumper to bumper traffic and the hours of sitting behind a machine typing out boring document after document, all worthwhile.

She wanted to remain like this forever. Holding her one son and watching the other tucked warmly into bed, sleeping peacefully.

these are the times when we're growing up
when responsibility is morphing choice
when we need to realise that love still glistens and glows
and can be reignited
but sometimes needs to take a back burner
to life

She stoops to conquer

My nani is one of the strongest, most amazing women I know. She was in the first matric girls class in South Africa and was one of the first female professor's in the country. She studied medicine in time when the norm was that muslim indian women wouldn't go past primary school.
And she got married. after completing her medicine, which was late, late 20's.
Oh what I'd give to see the looks on the faces of all the women who saidher father was mad for letting her study because she would never get married.

She's had many, many other achievements in her life, like highlighting issues that affected women in rural KZN and proposing and implementing the first ever village for independent living, which allows disabled people to live together and help each other out, relieving them of the need to be at the mercy of their families and the rest of society.


The thing is, if you look at this soft, quiet, 82 year old woman, you would never say that she is an intellectual at all. She goes from flying all over Africa and doing regulatory checks and reporting on the states of hospitals in this continent, to fetching sandals and carrying bags for her husband; from writing scholarly research papers, to doing the daily grocery rounds at pick n pay.
I used to wonder how she can be so humble and serve her family so tirelessly even though she has this whole other life where people call her "prof" and sing her praises. She seems never to get what she wants, because she's always putting her family's needs before her own. She doesn't even buy herself her own clothes, or spend her own money, ever. She always, always gets advice and permission from her husband and never does anything that would anger him.

But Nani is wise. There is wisdom in a woman being humble. In a woman stepping down and putting everyone else on a pedestal. When I think about my grandparents marriage of..I dunno, over 50 years, I wonder if it would've survived if my nani was a power hungry female who would want to "wear the pants" in the relationship.

Men need their ego's fed. They need a woman to make them feel intelligent. To give them ideas
and stand back and let them take the credit for it. To laugh at their jokes even if u don't really get them. (the ugly truth reference kinda)
The feminist movement has it all wrong. You don't fight with a man to get what u want, u stand down and tell him how wonderful he is.
If he shouts at you, you don't shout back. You stand down and take it and his heart will soften when he sees the pain on your face and realises that he's hurt u.

I know it's a strange stance to take. And I know that it doesn't always work. In some cases, you really need to fight for your rights, but in most cases, a woman can get what she wants, without fighting the fight a man's way. Also, it's good for your soul and breaking down your nafs.

It's a difficult thing to accept if you're brought up in a 21st century world, but it's something that's well understood by indian women of a certain age and calibre...and it works!

Lose the battle to win the war.

Happiness is..

sitting on the grass overlooking a dam with people you love on a beautiful, clear day.


also, finding a perfectly shaped fairy-tale-like toadstool in the dry grass

When letting go just isn't an option

People say that women who enter into abusive relationships and remain in them
have no-one but themselves to blame. I think this is a very narrow minded way to look at a situation .Especially if you're looking in from the outside.

I can absolutely relate to someone who would stick to something that is harmful to them. I do it all the time. Like the love affair I had with my beloved alfa.
Everyone told me not to buy her. Alfas are notorious for being unreliable and they cost an arm and a leg in repairs, but she was just so pretty so I had to have her.
I wanted her and I went and bought her. Didn't even tell my father I was buying her. In fact, specifically didn't tell my father I was buying her because he'd ranted about
the unreliability of alfa's when I just mentioned the car to him.

Within a day of buying her the problems started. Firstly, no-one wanted to insure me. A 21 year old female with less than 2 years of driving experience,
was way too high risk and no-one would take the chance.
I phoned around everywhere, asked for help online, tried to insure through my mother with me as a principal driver, but none of this helped.
Eventually I managed to get first for women to give me third party cover. And then I was happy :) I could finally get to drive her.

I took out her manual and read all about caring for her. Went and bought the right kinda selespeed transmission fluid and the right kinda oil put them in the boot.
(I'm quite partial to taking personal care of my cars and doing my own services if possible.) I tried to learn as much about her inner workings as possible.


The first 3 weeks were glorious. I loved her and was so proud of my new car. She was a "driving weapon" to say the least. But then one day, she beeped and that dreaded message,
selespeed system failure flashed across the screen. I read up about it and decided to ignore it, because it had just happened once. About a week later, it happened again.

I phoned alfa and immediately took her in to see what's what. They said the actuator wasn't working properly and quoted me R21 000 to fix it. Next, the boot of the cv joint went. Then,
the gearbox selectors and some pipe in the gearbox. Then, the fuel injection pipe. One after one, parts of my alfa (or romaana as nooj named her) gave up. Each time a part of her broke,
I'd be left stranded on the side or in the middle of the road. I was very lucky to have found a guy who used to work for alfa breakdown as a mechanic. I'd phone
him and he'd give me instructions on what to do to get her moving again. I used to keep oil and water and spanners and tow rope and jumper cables in my car at all times.
Even so, I still needed to be towed much. And spend hours waiting, stranded in the middle of the road, with cars hooting all round, for the AA to come and tow me away. At one point I needed to be towed four times in a single week.

I had no car more than I had a car. Every time I used to drive her I was in fear of seeing the selespeed system failure. She beeped continuously, complaining about every single part of her.
Eventually I took to cringing at the beeps, but ignoring them and dealing with the problem once I'd broken down, because replacing parts each time she complained dind't seem to help in any case.

I had her for just about a year when the crash happened. It was raining and he was drunk and he smashed the whole left side and some of the front. My heart lurched and the selespeed system failure message came up.
I didn't think I would ever be able to fix her, and I was right. She was declared a write off.

I didn't want to write her off. I had her towed home. I wanted to make a plan and I wanted to see if I can fix her. She lay their in my garage. I made many plans to call the panelbeater to ahve a look at her, but I didn't ahve the heart.
I knew if a panelbeater came and looked at her he'd say she was irreparable and I dind't want to hear that.

Now, a year later, she's being sold for spares. Her heart was removed and put into another alfa. Her radio, her tyres, her bumper and badges, every little part of her is being ripped and stripped and taken to different cars.
It hurts me so much to see her like that. When I enter the garage and see the remains a I feel a sense of sadness, like she's broken into pieces and nothingness.

She was bad for me. Very bad. SOme months my entire salary went into paying for repairs on her, but I still just could not let go. The accident was a huge blessing, because had it not happened,
I would probably still have had her. I'd still be paying so much money all the time and getting stuck all the time. I wouldn't sell her. There simply can be no price on something you love.