VOF Week 2; The Diary of An Itinerant - Glowing with the greatest, like the blue of the very still waters...

I am thinking of many thoughts this morning. I am thinking of Oprah, and Maya Angelou and Dr. Toni Morrison, a handsome woman indeed. Toni Morrison, who tells me that time has come for me to increase the volume of my life. And alas, is it not so true, that I, and indeed the world, can ill afford to have me live my life in silence and defeat? That I must live my life in such a way that I live finger prints, and foot prints, and most important, heart prints? I think of these women because their lives have 'heartbeat'.

I think too of people whose names we might not all know. Say for instance Sharon. . Sharon, who lives with her jobless mother and three siblings a one room - 5 by 5ft at most, where there are two double-decker beds and another single bed, and here they cook and sleep and change and live and entertain. It is here that I met Sharon, who is 12 years old and has sickle cell anemia. Sharon, beautiful and elegant and with the eyes of the gods, tender and knowing, and passionate and full of life and who has been sent out of school for not paying an equivalent of twenty dollars! I think it is a disgrace. So I pay. And to see her absolute joy at the possibility that she can go back to school; this kid’s thrill brings tears to my eyes.

Her determination, her willingness to try, to live just shakes me to the core, and redirects my soul to the basics of life.

And then I think of me. Every day of my life I have that growing sense that I am a flower – may be even as a winter flower. That in spite of the expansive snow, I still grow. Indefatigable, I suppose the word is. Unbeatable. Beyond destruction. I speak not of external beauty (though of that, I have plenty!) This beauty is part of my essence. I am a winner.
I feel connected to Oprah, and to Drs Angelou and Morrison, and to Sharon. And to all the other beautiful women in WorldPulse, and the world.
So here I am celebrating us. All of us. For it is within us to win. That like Sharon, we have the power to live beyond the pain in our lives, which is anaemia in her case; to celebrate and to look forward to the many possibilities. Because our identity is not negotiable. That what we suffer from, or who is bigger or better or prettier than us is not an issue. Because each one of us is beautiful in her own right. Because the lushness of the grass is not reduced by the majesty of the oak tree, or the blue skies.
That I, we, must shine and glow. Not in the overbearing way, but rather in the silent, convincing and soothing way, you know, like the blue of the very still waters….