When I was Younger

These last couple of days have run through my head so much that I have suffered a couple of migraines and my eye is beginning to act up again. Last week, I could not see with one eye since it had decided to shut and refused to open. It was quite the experience, apparently, I was winking at people and giving mixed signals. It was not intentional. Anywho, Dr Agarwal's eye hospital choked my pocket, but opened my eye.

That is not the point of this story but since we have gone this direction, let me just say, Please, my friends, I beg:

Dim the light on your computer

Take a break from your phone

Do not touch your inner eyes with dirty hands (That one seems silly but we all kinda do it)

Do not NOT finish the eyedrops the first Ophthalmologist gives and

Wear the spectacles if they told you to wear them.

Back to my story

So these migraines

Usually for me, a sense of deep loss, frustration and pain trigger them.

You remember that run in with law enforcers and journalists this week? That one.

When I was younger, I wanted to be two things.

A journalist and later on, a law enforcer. Journalist, because I have always loved to write stories from my head, (I have a couple of blogs for that), but also to tell peoples stories.

Law enforcer because, TV I think, and the discipline I saw of the law enforcers in outside countries, made me want to be one of them. Someone who walked a straight line and protected others. The sense of discipline soldiers and police had - in my head - was to be admired.

My favourite time of boarding school was S1 and S5 because we got to do Muchaka Muchaka. I will tell you it was no joke. There was this particular afande who made us roll in that swamp along the fence of our campus and Kabaka's lake, then cane us heavily while our clothes clung desperately to our bodies which reeked of fear and sewage. I still loved it all. To have us all in line marching and and just holding up those sticks and singing songs together...that was something.

I like peace, order, discipline,...those things.

Fast forward to today.

Do I still want to be a journalist? Yes.

Might that get me into all kinds of coffin facing situations? Perhaps.

Will that get me bruises and broken teeth from stray rubber bullets, perhaps even midnight phone calls or visits with weapons of war pointed at my face, strangers asking me to get off social media and hold my tongue? Your guess is as good as mine.

I am not in the field much anymore. Now, I sit behind a desk or run up and about, some days in high heels, other days in pumps. I only smell the teargas when the journalists sent out in the morning show up at the station after hours offline because their phones went missing in the scuffle and so did their teeth and perfume. I admire them. I fear for them.

Do I still want to be a law enforcer? LOL