When I think of courage, I think of my friend M. When I first met her she was a happily married woman with five beautiful children and a nice home, living what looked like the suburban dream.
A couple of years later she had six children, was pregnant with the seventh, and had just lost her beloved mother to cancer. And then her husband left her for the woman he'd been having an affair with for a couple of years.
These things happen. They happened to her. She fought hard for her marriage, hard for her family, and she lost.
He quit his job and put his assets in his new partner's name so he didn't have to pay maintenance for his children. He never paid a cent, despite being ordered to by the courts.
M. brought up seven children on her own. She got up early, she went to bed late. She put her creativity on hold, she worked as many jobs as she needed to. She got sick. She kept going. She made good nutritious meals out of next to nothing, and she accepted charity with grace when every fibre of her being rebelled against it. She made her home a loving, welcoming place. She got out of bed day after day after day when she was sick with grief and exhaustion and she did what needed to be done.
She has made heroic efforts to allow her children to have a positive relationship with their father. She spent Christmas on her own every second year. She never denigrated him to them, and she grit her teeth and attended school functions with him for her children's sake. She negotiates with her ex-husband's new partner to make sure her children are cared for when they are at his house. She feels sick and shaky and often cries when she puts the phone down, but she does it and she does it with grace and courtesy.
She has done this, suffering from depression and poverty and illness for more than 10 years now. Her older children are out in the world and starting to understand her sacrifices. Her younger children are still heedless and demanding. Every one of those children has been clothed and fed and cared for and loved. And every day M. gets up and does it again.
I hope that I can help her to hang on, so that one day she will have the time and energy to write and paint, and make the children's books that have been burbling away inside her for a long, long time. Because they're going to be very good and that courage and integrity is going to make them the books you'll want to buy for your children and your friends' children and children you've never met.
(name withheld by request).
A couple of years later she had six children, was pregnant with the seventh, and had just lost her beloved mother to cancer. And then her husband left her for the woman he'd been having an affair with for a couple of years.
These things happen. They happened to her. She fought hard for her marriage, hard for her family, and she lost.
He quit his job and put his assets in his new partner's name so he didn't have to pay maintenance for his children. He never paid a cent, despite being ordered to by the courts.
M. brought up seven children on her own. She got up early, she went to bed late. She put her creativity on hold, she worked as many jobs as she needed to. She got sick. She kept going. She made good nutritious meals out of next to nothing, and she accepted charity with grace when every fibre of her being rebelled against it. She made her home a loving, welcoming place. She got out of bed day after day after day when she was sick with grief and exhaustion and she did what needed to be done.
She has made heroic efforts to allow her children to have a positive relationship with their father. She spent Christmas on her own every second year. She never denigrated him to them, and she grit her teeth and attended school functions with him for her children's sake. She negotiates with her ex-husband's new partner to make sure her children are cared for when they are at his house. She feels sick and shaky and often cries when she puts the phone down, but she does it and she does it with grace and courtesy.
She has done this, suffering from depression and poverty and illness for more than 10 years now. Her older children are out in the world and starting to understand her sacrifices. Her younger children are still heedless and demanding. Every one of those children has been clothed and fed and cared for and loved. And every day M. gets up and does it again.
I hope that I can help her to hang on, so that one day she will have the time and energy to write and paint, and make the children's books that have been burbling away inside her for a long, long time. Because they're going to be very good and that courage and integrity is going to make them the books you'll want to buy for your children and your friends' children and children you've never met.
(name withheld by request).
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