Daniel Inspires

REVAMP           Things worsened for mom. Mother-in-law was too rough, mom resorted to be resilient but the pressure from the on-laws was too much to bear. The only person mom trusted for as friend had died, dad was so busy with work for him to notice  what she went through, she had to revamp her earlier plans to go back home. This time, she had to be smart and careful, she had no option, that was the only thing she had to do for the better life she wanted.                  Mom had an ego. She narrates how she could not accept to be in an affair with any man from her neighborhood. None deserved a beautiful woman like she was. Unlike many hyperactive women in the village, mom stayed home, cooked and washed all day. When the chores were done, she either slept or sang the catholic hymns she learnt at the local catholic church she attended. It is in this, dad won her heart. Dad had visited his sister, Gladys, she...

THE PRETENDER           Mom had to use the nearest route possible. The day was still fresh. The African share of the sun slowly brought Kitale a brighter and warmer essence. Dad had not seen them though. After seeing dad in that state, mom was immediately confused. She could never even explain how on earth she managed the 3 kilometers back home. She had even forgotten that Nekesa had accompanied her. At home none suspected had left earlier that morning. Breakfast was brought and lucky enough she had arrived. Mom explains that dad used to drink those days.It was after this that he came home and physically abused her. She would scream her lungs out for the neighbors to arrive for her rescue.           She explains such an occasion. After seeing that it was quite a burden to the sisters, dad decided mum should be preparing her own meals and that of dad. Dad got mum three cooking pans, plates, spoons and a small basin. He brough...

HOLDING THE REINS          The time they reached the hospital, Grandpa was as cold and still. Dad could not believe it. Grandpa was dead. The night shift doctors were heartless. They refused to have grandpa laid at the morgue, He was to be taken back home, the morgue attendants were not around they argued. They had no choice but to ferry him back home. How weird. The night was so dark. Cold and mean, the night seemed sorrowful too.          The screams and cries attracted a crowd. Many wondered what the issue was. Their esteemed neighbor was healthy all day, how comes by evening things change this quick. Some termed it as God's will. Some questioned the food he had eaten at the party that afternoon but none could not relate this with grandpa's sudden demise. Mom was stuck in awe. That morning, Grandpa had passed by her house. He had commented that mom was good and that soon she was going to be at comfort with nursing me and brother Mo...

SET BACK           Auntie Nekesa was cool. Mom was at ease now that she had help. But life was not any different, they still depended on the mean in-laws for food. Grandpa was a carpenter. The little he earned from this was quite little that almost none was left after food was bought. He was an Evangelist too in one of the local churches.           At one particular Sunday, merely a month after our birth, Grandpa had to attend to a particular party organized by three white Evangelists. Grandpa was to be given a title deed for some piece of land as an appreciation for his warm attitude towards the American visitors. What he never knew was that his colleagues were not happy. To them , Grandpa had enough land for his family and for farming and that the offer should have been given to the "poor".           The party ended at about four,Granny had not yet been given the deed. Grandpa was a man of few words, mama...

GOING OVER           Mom had to be taken home of course. My aunts came over, i came to know, later the following day. None liked my mother. To them, my dad didn't deserve a woman of her kind for a wife. She was a witch who had cast a love spell to Harun Wanyonyi Wafula, my dad. My late grandma wasn't any different, she too wasn't enthusiastic about her son having such a young woman for a wife, mom was about 19 years old.           The journey from Kitale District Hospital was a silent one, my mom narrates. she further explains it as a silent one. How could they talk to a person they disliked that much? She never minded though.           This was on a Friday. My dad was to leave for job in Eldoret. He was a mechanic at Raiply woods company. This meant mum was to be left ll alone with me and little Moses. Grandpa was the only one mom thought she wa...

THE RUDIMENT.                      On the Wednesday of 11 November 1998, at Kitale District Hospital, I lay, wrapped in a lesso, beside me, Moses, my twin lay too. Quite but terrified were we of the new, acrid and cold world we'd just been born into. The light, of course, was so piercing that my eyes remained close. I had just been born! Mrs Gladys Naliaka, my mother whose name I came to know four years later lay too. Just like me and little Moses, she too lay tired for having me and Moses living inside her womb for close to 274 days. The labor she had just experienced 20 minutes earlier draw her into deep sleep. Later on we were to have our first taste of her love and care, both of which we required at that  moment of our beginning life.