By Scophine Otieno
Wafula walks briskly to his mjengo working site in Yaya.
The cold breeze rips through his mtumba jacket and feeds on his flesh. He sniffs hard and quickens his steps.
He could have taken a Mathree at 30 Bob from Kawangware but the money would suffice for a plate of Githeri during lunch time.
He would trek back home in the evening where his two year old daughter would flash him a one toothed grin that often got his heart threatening to burst with love and pride.
His wife Nanjala is a good woman who knows how to budget with the meager notes he shoves in her palms every Saturday when he gets paid.
A Cool Toyota zooms past him.
“Wow, now that is life, I am only existing, some people are living” Wafula muses to himself.
Oblivious to him is that Andrew seated behind the wheel of that Toyota bought the car using a loan, he has a mortgage he’s paying for and a son with special needs.
He just found out that his wife has been sleeping with his best friend and his daughter might not be his.
The grass is not always greener on the other side. If you have LIFE, good health, a genuine hustle however small and a happy family… You are RICH.
Sometimes, behind those Porsches are broken, disturbed souls, behind the Marble doors hinged on the Bungalows are fountains of tears.
It is beautiful to be rich and being able to afford the finer things in life is an augury that truly Heaven is not a White man’s hallucinations forced on us.
However, learn to appreciate the things that you have even as you strive for a better life. Count your blessings – you have a degree? Millions don’t have it, you could afford tea this morning? Thousands are dying of hunger, you have kids? Marriages have broken and lives turned upside down out of desperation for the cry of a child.
If you have breath and a functioning head, you have the stock-in-trade to be whatever you want to be.
And don’t fall for social media razzmatazz to impress strangers. These people are strangers! Don’t hire cars to impress us, don’t borrow from Tala to buy Red bottoms just for clicks, don’t hook up with a nonentity because your timeline is filled by engagement and wedding photos.
Pick your lane and run your pace. In the race of life, everyone is a winner, after all is it not God that determines when our race ends?
Happy NEW MONTH my friends, this timeline ain’t nothing without y’all.
(And sina dhundo, fun to know you fell for that…😉😉)
This piece was fisrt published at WWW.KNATV.CO.KE
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