Dear Journal: Would I end up like my mother?

Dear journal,

Would I end up like my mother? Angry, desolate, single in my marriage, emotionally and physically abused, hopeless, sick and waiting on some divine power to turn back the hands of the clock so I can re-write my past. Waiting on some divine power to heal me… make me whole.

Would I end up like my mother? In a performative marriage, with performative children who I would try to mould their lives to fit who I had planned to be. Would I end up like my mother trying to live through my children rather than let them forge their own path…let them be architects of their own destiny?

Would I end up like my mother? Angry at the world and blaming everyone and everything but myself for decisions and sacrifices that I was solely responsible for making? Would I end up like her wishing I had kept contact with certain people and wondering what had become of them? Would I remember the “good old days” that were characterized by suffering and how I had wished at that age that my latter end would be better than my beginning?

Would I sigh and groan whenever I remember my ill fortune, and only get bursts of happiness from mundane things? Listening to men of God, praying that mercy can be shown to me? Would I grasp happiness from whatever and wherever I can get it?

Would I end up like my mother? Filled with regret, my heart heavy with profound emotional pain, reminiscing about the glory days when I was the belle of the ball, wishing I had done things a little differently. Made slightly different decisions. Would I spend my latter days old and grey, thinking of all the “what if’s” and having ill hidden resentment for my husband? Would I spend my latter days in pain instead of riding it out with a sturdy partner by my side? Would I look at the world through the eyes of pain, and anger, and suffering? Gaining solace only in sleep?

I find that I am already halfway there, crippled by fear and afraid to step outside the safety net that has been created for me. I like to look into my future but somehow, despite all the plans made, it looks bleak…unclear…like I have nothing planned.

I fear that in my quest for knowledge and money, I am missing out on a lot of things. I am in my early twenties and I already have a ton of regrets, and it would seem that I might end up like my mother but a different version.

My version would be old and grey, worried about her skin getting sunburn, alone save for her eleven cats. My version might be the angry, rich, old lady who hates and envies her secretary for having found love. My version might hate my gateman whenever he asks for permission to visit his wife’s grave, angry at the dead because I know that she loved and was loved.

My version might hate on the much younger girls whenever I see them on trips making memories with the ones they love. I would scoff when I see them go to the clubs and do stupid shit like get tattoos of people they aren’t sure of their place in their lives. I would hate them because I wish I had done that I had done that in my prime.

My version might end up so lonely that I fill the void in my heart and soul with alcohol every night. I might end up paying off boys young enough to be my sons to scratch the itch between my legs. The sex lacking the passion and companionship that my soul badly craves.

Or maybe I would get married to a sweet, dark skinned Yoruba man whose accent would be as thick as his beard. Or maybe I would marry an Igbo man who mixes his R’s and L’s. I wonder if he would still love me when I’m old and grey. When the beauty has become a thing of the past, would he still call me the best thing to happen to him?

Would he stay when my back begins to ache, and my sight begins to fail? Would we hold hands as we navigate old age and reminisce on the past years when we first fell in love? Or would he hate me? Would our children still love us? Come to visit us once a month?

Dear journal, would I end up like my mother?