A costly Crush Program......

Last time I checked I was boarding a bus to Mbarara, Uganda....yeah that is a long time like mid September. I had weighed my options, it was either I fly to Entebbe then take a bus to Mbarara, that would mean that I had to not only travel to Nairobi from Nakuru ( 2.5hours) then check into the airport ( 3hours) not to forget the traffic jam in Nairobi ( 2hours) a total of 7.5 hours) flight time about 1 hour and a bus to Entebbe ( 5 hours) waiting for the bus to get full ( 2hours perhaps) With all the above I would have spent about 12.5 hours which is equivalent to me taking a bus from Nakuru and directly heading to Mbarara, plus anyway I was tired of flying. Honestly I was tired. Well, I went to Mbarara on a Wednesday night arriving Thursday morning, straight into a training and same day back to Kampala to prepare for another training in Busia the following day. Let me just say that, the Kampala evening was the best out of the 2 night I spent traveling to and from Uganda, this is another blog by itself! I must say I felt like Superwoman that weekend.....only for disaster to strike while I arrived home ( Kenya)

Well, I had a bad feelings when I arrived in Nakuru that Saturday at the wee hours of the morning, some would call it Friday night. I somehow took my time waiting for a cab at the station, which was not normal for me. On normal accounts, a cab would be waiting for me. Well, a colleague was to pick me up but I cancelled last minute knowing the time I would be arriving hence did not want to inconvenience him. Where was I, yes the bad feeling. I arrived home, and a sudden sort of fear engulfed me, nothing of the sort has happened to me in a very long time...since I cant remember when. Somehow, I went straight to my kitchen and voila! My kitchen door was open. At  some point I tried to figure out if I had left it like so but noooo....I slowly walked towards it...what struck me was the broken glasses on the floor, and instantly I knew I had been robbed! A burglary, seriously, on 3rd floor? Back door? On quickly glancing around what I noticed was just my gas cylinder missing! Well at that point I didnt think it important to worry about my stomach. then I saw footprints that were still went. I quickly called the watchman, yes tat place has a watchman.....just wondering!I had to ask him to ask check all my rooms just to ensure the thug whoever it was, was not still in my house....Inspection inspection inspection! Laptop one missing, laptop two missing,.....camera gone...new pair of shoes gone...plus the gas cylinder!! Everything else intact...oh plus my hard disk drive!! Argh! The last one is what just "finished me" yes I say finished me, because it carried all my data! All my data and 4 years work plus all the memories of places I have been too ( pictures I mean).....It was devastating....I didnt know whether to cry or cry....I just went blank! I couldnt sleep. This is when I wished I had just spent the weekend in Kampala and came back and shortlived my house so that I could wish it to all go away!

I thought I was in a bad dream...no nightmare and that when I sleep and wake up I would go to my laptop bags and at least get my HDD!!!

Well it didnt just happen! I had to live with that nightmare for the next 4 weeks, bad dreams of someone coming back for the rest of my house stuff...consider I wasnt even in that house for the next 4 weeks, because of why...( know its bad Kenyan English, you dont have to tell me), you guessed right, I took another business trip to the land of Kabila then to I had to kiss Sata before coming back...One thing remained engraved in my mind, I seem to look at all those guys who were around me in Nakuru as thugs...imagine even my "friends"....can you blame a girl.... Police officers did not make it easier as they did not even recover the stolen property as usual, I had to even offer them transport to come examine the crime scene ( like really???) I PAY TAX!!!!! Yenyewe, that was just tops!

Costly, I must say....I had to invite one of cousins to stay in my house, had to feed her, had to try and even get some electrician put some electric sort of fence at my back, which by the way, never worked! I had to keep calling all the time to find out if the doors were locked...its was a crazy period I must say...

One thing remained, as much as I had nightmare, there is always a good ending to a bad dream....that I will tell you tomorrow and am living it now...has other dramas...but well, I must say I am coping well...trying to re-build from where I lost...building something bigger and better.......

The little great things....

I have many a time mentioned in my hang out circles that most of things in life never come easy...no they do not,you have to work hard and I mean extra hard. The last two weeks have been more like a trying time for me and full of adventure too. From being told that showering is a way to reduce weight as the skin sheds off. Wherever that came from ( as I have never had of that) to being offered a job in some foreign weird place to getting my acceptance letter for my M Sc. which all made one confused person not knowing what to take and what to rejected. Anyway I must say I have respect for those guys who do not shower, reason, they have 1001 ways of avoiding water. This is one of the latest adventure stories I have heard!!! Read the below carefully and tell me why even you shouldnt join this band wagon (lolest): 1. Showering causes weight loss why, a layer of your body ( read dirt) is shed of hence causing the weight loss. Now how does this happen. I was with the notion that unless it was hot boiling water one is using so that all the fat could have melted upon one emersing him/ herself in the hot water then the slimming session would begin but again wouldnt one be burnt during such an exercise? 2. Big people dont shower as much as they cannot reach all their body parts hence the uneven growth of some areas??? Seriously, like okay am not even sure what to say about this one...really this guy is from Mars 3. That why do we see a lot of stuff when showering ( dark stuff- read a lot of dirt)I only concluded one thing, that either this particular person does not shower and even if they do its after the longest time ever... Trying to argue the above out proved to be futile so I had to end that conversation trying to explain that I shower twice a day and I have never grown thin...and I was told that is why I dont seem to add weight??? That is the best nonsense I had heard in the longest time. Then came the job offer, this was something that even I was tempted and I mean really tempted to just take up. Packing my bags would have been easy I must say but wait, do you just wake up one day and pack your bags to a foreign country just because you have been offered a very attractive package? As a young person I would say, yes I would but as a mother I would think twice....perhaps eve thrice. Two things were happening at the same time...having this great opportunity but at the same time having an even more greater opportunity to further my career though at my normal rate here in Kenya. Furthering it by having an international exposure, yes I have been offered to present as a Key note address speaker at an international conference... I sit in various committees and of late more offers are coming up..This is a trying time and I had never in my life prayed to God to relieve me of some of the duties by not letting me turn them down but have the offerers let me know that perhaps I should wait a little longer. Well I must say prayers are a great things, for those who havent started praying for anything yet, please pray and act as you do...so far I must say all in course and am not going to travel anyway as I am here to stay and further myself locally. I know a time will come when I will have to accept or turn down the offers myself...and I cant wait for that time...for now I have been asked to wait...as I prepare myself more to accept these opportunities in the near future...just not sure how near near is...but am sure God knows best!! It has been a true marathon for me...and above all I thank God... I still know I have the scriptures to write...yes the scriptures that I talked about last time...the book that my so called followers seem to have a better idea that I read from..perhaps next time I will write about these...as I unveil another blog of my high school love letters!!!

Flowers and proposals? Hmmmm....

The past 3 weeks have been interesting ones..... I term them as interesting as it saw me receiving a bonquet of flowers for the first time ever of rare flowers. Not the usual suspects and they were beautiful. i absolutely loved them. The other thing was the number of proposals I received that ranged from I want to sleep with you to I just want to marry you...of course I did not take them seriously as usual since these are people you meet just once and they have given you a history of themselves, where they are at and what they want to do with you. I am not saying that it is a bad thing no...on the other hand I believe its a good thing...no actually a great thing since I get to hear the opinions of people that I never thought I never dreamt of listening to or even interaction with....And more or so, the beauty of hearing someone speaking their mind and heart out. I have been told many a time that I have a script I read from, not sure why and even which one, but perhaps due to the fact that I can clearly handle the other species well when am interacting with them. Of late, I have had too much of that experience. Too much that I am thinking that it would be a great idea to write a play in the name of How to Make a business partner with no strings attached!!!- In a man's world, things are normally regarded as okay when a female species responds and agrees to everything that a male species tends to put on the table. In my world, I have learnt to take the things that are put on my table and turn them to either favor me and/or the other party without necessariry hurting anyone in the business circles. Hate or love it being a woman in an influential position has its own repercussions which sometimes are not really the best considering that some in these position are well respectable people. Sometimes you may wonder how you can clearly draw the line between business and pleasure? That line it thin I can tell you....why I am telling you all these? Is it that I have fallen prey and at times decided to have more pleasure than the business itself? Is it that sometimes I get annoyed and walk out of any potential and would be predator ( business partner) and hence jeopardizing the business environment created for and by the company for this client? Well a lot maybe said and done but hello? Wake up in my world, its a balancing act, so far its been well...hence the script bit...I hear that a lot. At times getting challenged by well positioned people to either hang out with them or loose the deal. By hanging out I dont just mean going out but to the extent of sleeping with them. Ask me why I have a heart of stone sometimes, caring less about what people feel...and I would tell you its the above experience that has turned me to be so. I however to not take it home...I leave it at the doorstep of my office and when I get home...I am a mother, a great mother for that matter...strict though... Next...writing my own scriptures?

Interesting developments.....

The past few weeks have been witnessed with lots of drama partly by those I slated for myself and mostly those that others thought were to be addressed by me and only me. Well, I tried and took things as they came and finally I can rest. The part drama included overlapping on a public road, I say public because I am one that follows the traffic rules and always make the most noise when some fool overlaps. I am not indicating that this particular day I was fool, but I want to state by fact that if my foolishness did not tell me to overlap I would have slept on the road. Reason, a truck driver decided that its time the truck did some summersalting forgeting that this is a public road and if by chance the truck did not land one its many tires then, automatically it would be a disaster to everybodt else behind him...by the way have I told you this was not the first incidence of an overturned truck this past few weeks? There were quite a number an indication that either we are just careless or I dont know what is happening...anyway back to my overlapping story...So my foolishness asked me to overlap and I thanked God for that foolishness since there was more than a Kilometre of trucks on the roads and why the rush? I had an appointment? But in most cases I normally think, if one overlaps then they would have better woken up early so as not to cause problem for everyone like the rest of the guys are not in a hurry :-( I am not sure I made sense with my last statement but hey, does it matter? I am confused too..... Anyway, all in all, I was able to get to my meeting early, now the most of the drama...work related, need I SAY MORE!! Nope...now that I cant let me sign out, but will have to gather courage to write what went down someday, maybe.....just perhaps!

I decided to share the picture of my son, the one adorable thing that I have in my life...the one thing that keeps me smiling and longing to be a better me, so that I can make it better for him...:-)

A COME BACK?

It has been a while but at times, silence is golden and again...sometimes when one goes quiet it only means that better things are coming up and something serious must be cooking. I decided to take a break and concentrate at the same time refleting on issues of my life, as all of a sudden things were moving too fast for me to handle, I think... Well, last year saw me decide to throw myself back into the a sort of relationship, was on trial, but was all worht it...6 months down the line, I discovered that perhaps we both needed to re-evaluate our priorities...well put, we took a break....okay of course for the better since it seems both of us or perhaps I was too busy managing what i know best rather than the relationship at hand. Needless to say, the distance was not helping much and perhaps we both just gave up easily. Well they say if at all things are meant to be they will be eventually and sometimes its just good to let nature take its course :-) But that was a great 6 months that I had...could not have asked for more. Now 2012 brings itself and yes, this year, intresting stuff is cropping back. Let me call a spade a spade...my baby's dad has re-surface and for what? He wants me back???At this time when I had decided that I want to take the couple agenda of my topic of discussions, when I least expected that I would be going for dates, when I least expected that he would be the person who would be asking me to sit down with him and have a discussion about "our" future? Clearly, I need to be picnhed to wake up or maybe sleep and wake up again!!! I am not sayin that he is not a guy I would listen to but really, after ten good years, he shows up? And why? Because what he had has gone sour and he feels he made a wrong choice and he should have married me a long time ago? Really? I am not bitter but am just asking myself a lot of questions right now....Well at some point I wonder if I decide to do it his way, if he wont wake up one day and say he is bored with me and go back to what he left again...after ten years??? Its these questions that seem to kind of slow me down....making me think twice about the possibility of ever even listening to him. I love my life, with no stress, sometimes sleeping on the couch, sleeping hungry by choice ( coz I dont feel like cooking) and am thinking, would a marriage of convinience really be of benefit to me? And I already know the answer...especially now that I have too much to handle and less time for myself.......

ANTHROPOLOGICAL BEHAVIOURS???

Today I had very interesting encounters that have really made my day. One which I would call a well thought conversation with one of close friends. He had very intelligent ideas as to how the weather patterns have subsequently changed from the regular to irregular patterns to what scientists are calling global warming. I call them intelligent because they got me thinking of it as a possibility of what could be happening to our sudden change of weather patterns. Well, to him its an abnormal behaviour of the weather which is caused by some of the way human being are behaving, let baptise them anthropological behaviour for now. By the way, that title may as well be as permanent since his explanation will get your mind thinking as well.

Long time ago our forefathers had a very simple lifestyle, where women knew their roles and men were so much more responsible. I am not going to tell you how we have such unequal distribution of work or roles to the extent that I want women to be equal to men. Let’s face it, women will never be equal with men…ask me how; I will tell you that in a different forum. Back to the point, now let’s psycho-analyse the era then and now…..well am not criticizing anything trending in fashion right now but let’s try and trace back where the rains started beating us. Women dressed decently and while our parents never saw the era of men trending the sagging style and wearing Mohawks and women wearing unfinished dresses, we are seeing a lot of these in our generation. This generation Y…please note that am from generation X. Apart from the fact that some traditional cultural practises and taboos, it was a curse for a women to reveal anything that was termed as Holy to her surrounding and especially during the day. Take for example, in Europe where the climate….global warming began being noticed….look at the trends…except in the really cold winters…everything is left for nature to evaluate….and that is the reason why you will find that it has been taken normal to not fully dress up while leaving the house and entering a public domain.

Now spin the bottle and set foot in Africa….evaluation is being done for areas where no rain or even signs of rain appear….like where we have recently found oil, the coastline and especially there. You will find that these are areas which are like the Summer holidays in Europe…and don’t take me wrong but let’s assume the weather takes note and automatically notes the sudden changes of dress codes….if the sun sees and notes that human beings are enjoying basking in its glory and that we curse the rain every time its blesses us…is it supposed to hide its face behind the clouds, or smile even more and scorch some of us?

Well, in some Kenyan cultures as mentioned, revealing some of the parts of human body was and is still a taboo, it was a curse…am not sure for what exactly, but in my friends case, it is a curse to the environment and the weather to be precise such that its keeping the rain away.

Now I made two promises to him:
• To try and get opinions from the rest of the team
• To try and get the female species especially to completely dress up and stop scaring the rain away

The above EXCEPT the two promises were not my words, I was just trying to put myself in my friends shoes….but honestly, I cannot make head or tail of his conversation but come to think of it…it might just be true…your views?

Diary of a Single Mother: Some character traits unexplained?

Diary of a Single Mother: Some character traits unexplained?: As you drive around Nairobi, there are a lot of things you can chose to site see, not that you would like to but at times the traffic is jus...

Some character traits unexplained?

As you drive around Nairobi, there are a lot of things you can chose to site see, not that you would like to but at times the traffic is just too much and keep yourself busy, you could either be updating your Facebook Status of how frustrated you are because you have been moving a distance of 5cm per half hour or how a certain crazy Matatu has decided to pull a double overlapping stunt! Double because at that particular time, they would be already overlapping and this particular one would just be adding to chaotic nature of the so called normal traffic hours.Or at times, this would be the best time to tune into your favorite station so as to listen to busted or at times even be tempted to call in and pause as the lady or guy being played by your spouse so as to generate a discussion. That is just how crazy traffic can generate and create innovative people.

Personally, I always choose to do one very interesting thing, look around me.....and trust me, there ae a lot of interesting things I get to see! Some interesting some very sad...some a pity to look at, really a true pity. Ideally, I should be using Thika road when heading to the Ruaraka office but at times one would like to just cut traffic by using the joining estate roads and this is where the trouble or entertainment begins. Take for example the section between Pangani's Juja road and the Outering Junction...this is one section that passes through 3 sets of lifestyle, the extremely rich to the extremely poor in a spun of 5 mins when the road is clear and 2 hours when there is a bad traffic. Of interest was this lady, who had a little baby tied to her back. When I first looked in her direction she looked like a drunk mama, trying to carry her child and I immediately though to myself, how a mother could carry her child around while going to her drinking sprees. In my head, I imagined all sorts of bad things about her...while she walked towards my direction, I realised that I had not only judged her wrongly but she was actually from the special talented group of people. Automatically, my heart melted with pity, thinking of how in her condition she still carried her child around, a child of breastfeeding age and she confidently did it. It is amazing how motherly love and instincts are the same for everyone, whether specially talented, a street child, you or I. It made me think twice at how many opportunities we miss out as parents by not being there for our children.

I have witnessed another of the same group being hit by a matatu,those who want to just drive and not even give way to students just around St. Teresa's girls...and they never burt an eyelid when they do these, a great shame in deed! I have learnt to look around me, since one never knows and the comparison you get when you drive aroung Nairobi. Each area has a juxaposition of its own, set in the same environment and using the same resource only perhaps others would have exploited it e.g tapping of electricity for the simple reason that they cannot afford it hence have to get it anyway. Life teaches you a few things when you look around you. It is not necessariry that one has to be taken to a classroom to be able to learn what is going on around us, but by seeing, we learn and by learning we gain experience and wisdom and by these we appreciate each other and learn to live and accomodate one another.

Anyway, on a lighter note, I have also watched the Naivasha baboons opening up those yoghurt packets and actually drinking the remnants or using their fingers to lick out the remnants in the pack! They behave like human being sometimes I tend to believe the scientists who decided that man evolved from Monkeys...lol..

I have seen Zebra crossing the highway, and now I understand why the pedestrarian crossing points are called Zebra crossing. These are some of the brighest animals I have seen.It is on a rare occasion that you will get a Zebra has been hit by a vehicle? Reason: In a pack, they always have a leader, the leader will always head to the road and stand close to it but far enough to avoid being hit...the rest of the pack will join her/ him and will not cross until s/he signals them to do sO. If there are any on coming vehicles, the leader Zebra will block its pack from cross by moving up and down where there have stopped to cross the road...

My advice....lets learn from our environment, we learn by looking...God gave us a pair of eyes and ears so that we can see and listen twice at any one time :-)

Any comments? Post them here... I will glad if you shared your experiences too..

Airtel.....

The only way I can keep tabs with the rest of the world right now is through my Airtel number, yes Airtel now I think its Bhati airtel, but as it I feel like I want to sue them. It all started last week, the network went haywire, neither have they explained to us, their customers, what happened, nor even taken the initiative to try and apologize even if its in those 10cm by 2.5cm piece of advert at the back page of the Newspaper unless am worng, someone kindly update.

I am one very frustrated mother right now, I cant even communicate to my son!! Reason, the Airtel number am using to roam right now has been on and off for the past say four days since I landed in this part of Africa...and by the way, its a one network country. So, what am I supposed to do? Okay I had to purchase a local number which I am currently using and neither is it cheap for me to call or even my family to call me on!! Airtel, what is happening to you? Is this speculation for another potential change of ownership? Just asking? I have noted its a trend when you're about to experience a change ownership!!!

Out of the same frustration I am now about to explore other potential roaming networks...perhaps a move to Orange, yes Orange since I have noted I can now receive texts so am assuming even I can...problem is, I am not sure which top up card to use to update my account so as to be able to receive better services...Right now I am one frustrated mother on this International Women's day....

Please do not advice me to move to Safaricom...these guys, charge a fortune not only to receive but to make calls....and as much as I am not from the saving dime protogeny...Ill just not agree to be exploited!!

Airtel, Bhati Airtel!!!! Why oh why!!!!!You were one of my best networks....what is happening??

Getting my act together.....

The past few weeks have seen me toss and turn at night, over the issues I had raised last on me moving on. For one at least I have managed to get a few skeletons out of my closet...literally. First thing fast...I managed to delete some numbers out of my phone books and de-friend some Facebook friends...reason you may ask? I noticed they were a number of people who have this negative energy on me, trying to drag me down, even when they didnt know yet they did just by me flipping through my phone and seeing their number. Others, especially on FB, were those that are always posting about what they are not, putting me in that questioning mode of what hypocrisy people live in, lives that they dont have or lives that they are trying and struggling so hard to have.

Secondly, I blocked some few characters who were not adding value to my life by calling me every other day...I am the type that will receive your call but hey, the silence and me hearing you doesnt mean am listening, does it? Well I just realized that I cannot keep hearing the same noise every day??? I just had to block them...and trust me it helped. I thank God for giving a human being the brain to have made phones that can block numbers. It really does help.

Anyway, that has been me for the past few weeks and I feel rejuvinated..really I do..or perhaps I am trying to convince myself that I am..lol...

You know the best thing about the few things that I did, at the end of the day, I felt a really new person and ready to move on...to a next new level...and I hope I keep that way...I promised myself to never be a sucker for some things...was it my new year's resolution? Hmmmm.....let me wait and see how it turns out...

Another one of those days....

My son does not stay with me, typically because I travel a lot and it may not be very ideal to leave him in the house alone or in the care of a house help. I actually discussed with my parents and it seemed more logical for him to stay with them.

I find time when I am around to visit him while working, every once a month. So last week I took the opportunity of seeing him. It had been a while since the 1st of January, therefore approximately 29 days since I had last seen him. Being the apple of my eye does not make things easier for me since sometimes when I get a chance to see him, I sort of re-evaluate why am working and it makes me feel like quiting my job and being a fulltime mother, just to take care of him and cook for him, tuck him, read or tell him a story and kiss him every day before he . Sometimes it is really agonizing knowing that the only way you can provide for your child is the one source of income that you have.

It got me really thinking, I want to go back to school and do my Masters...in something rare, something that is sort after so that I can only work as a lecturer and/ or a consultant and have more time for my little boy, who by the way will not be little any more come two years from now.

It puts me in an awkward situation sometimes when he has to ask me to stay on with him. I have to explain to him always that I cant otherwise he might not have the holidays that he may want with me....but I know what every one of you will say, that he is right, he is right yes, but would it be fair to deny him the lifestyle that he has already? Would it be also just to be an idle mother and not get some work experience and exposure? Would it be worth it just to wake up one day and quit my only source of revenue and seek other avenue which by the way may just take a little effort to grow? Would it be?

Sometimes I just wonder....but wonder is all that it can be...

Let me know your thoughts :)

Some questions I may not answer…as yet??

Schools close and I am excited just like any other parent to have my son at home, knowing the kind of schedule I have normally, this is a time I take off and make sure there is no travelling and that I will be spending time with him no matter what even if it means taking him to some of my field trips…for him it would be a trip so see Kenya and around Kenya.

This particular holiday was not an easy one, August school holidays, I didn’t have any special arrangements for him to go out but had ensured a visit by my niece who together with my son, are quite a pair to handle. Keeping in mind both of them are the only children, they can only consider each other as a brother and a sister, something that they have always said, my son being the elder and my niece the younger one. At some point when am out with them, I always introduce them as my children :-) Well back to today’s agenda….the questions that popped up last Holidays were those I had been fearing in quite a long time, I knew that time would come and I would have to answer some questions however difficult they may be.

Well, it was one of those days when you have a great day and that you ensure you have made all the necessary arrangements to ensure that the two are comfortable. Come evening, as I come from work….I find my son has not taken his usual birth and is insisting that I have to bath him…”for heaven’s sake your ten!”.. I quip. This did not deter him from insitisting that I am his mother and that as his mother once in a while he needs me to bath him…Okay, I of course throw in the towel not knowing the agenda….in the process this are some of the questions I have to encounter?

“Why don’t I have a brother or a sister?” “ Can’t you get another sister or brother so that I can have someone to play with? You know I get bored”….Okay Okay….I have to think quickly… “think think think…..” And voila…. “ You will get a brother or a sister when God’s time is right for you to get one…if He plans that you stay as an only child then so be it, ” What did I just say? In my head I am thinking hard if he bought that story or if will be pop up at some point!! Its scary..really it is.

I have actually thought of adopting a child so that he can have a playmate…honestly I have, but again, would it be fair to adopt a child who I may not be there for? And again what am I looking for when I adopt a child? Will my son take that child as their own brother? Then the “what ifs” on my side…start building….Am I just one scared mother trying to seek an exit strategy in the business of giving birth to my own children? Like really? Would it be worth it to lessen, even if by one, the number of homeless children who will be more than glad to have a parent to take care of them…..And in reality, that story I told him about God's timing, he didnt buy it, since that question still keeps popping up :-(

Unanswered questions…..many unanswered questions…just to mention but a few…there are worse I have had to deal with...and I can only spare them for another day..gotta rush, and tuck him to sleep...a routine we have since formed when he is around or when I go and visit him :-)

I have been toying with the idea of sharing the life and days of a single mother and this year 2012 seems just the right time to do it... I have seen a lot in my 10.5years of being a mother and I believe this is just the right time to put everything together and share it out to not only encourage all of you out there who are not just single mothers, but single parents trying to give their children a decent lifestyle, everyday by sacrificing your time and working hard so that they can have a good life.

Being a single mother is not to me by choice, am not regreting it either since I have learnt with time to overcome the shame that society tags with being a single mother. In fact I am proud to be the mother of my 10.5year old son since I know that there aremany other who wish to have the same but have not. I would have wished to have a father for my son, but as it is, they can only talk once in a while. Being a single and working mum means that at times you may be forced to miss not only some of the precious moments that one can spend with your child/ren, since you have to ensure that you must work to enable them have a good life. At times I sit down and ask myself if it is really worth it to be away from home for at times 4 weeks, with little and limited phone conversation with my son and I wonder how he is feeling being away from me.

My job is not that friendly, it not only makes me unavailable when I am within but keeps me without most of the times....working and being a parent is not easy at times I am forced to advice young people to ensure they have time for their children and if they are going to be a globe trotting couple, then its better not to have their children then :). I try my best to be home for most of the special occasions and when I cant make it home, I have to make advance an apology and prepare him psychologically that I may or may not be available for that special occasions. The best thing with my job is that I get to travel therefore when he is on holiday and I have loval travel, he gets to tag along with me. Boring for a 10yr old as under normal circumstances he should be out playing in a football field...but yeah sometimes I am forced to.

A single and working parent is not the easiest to date, at times she has to choose between her job, child and the person s/he is dating, at times compromising too much and looking like they do not care a lot but hey, that is life, and the sad reality. If you asked me to choose between a man am dating and my son...am sure you would know the answer right? But it doesnt mean that single parent cannot date, they can, there are many limitations and some are just those you can avoid.

Well today I was just going through a general view of a life in a diary of a single mother...and/ or parent..next write up will be on specific areas that one undergoes as a single mother especially...my focus will not be on the male gender but specifically on the female gender...looking forward to your reads and comments, feel free to ask questions :)