The Burdens We Were Never Meant to Carry

Matric Dance 2021: Welkom High School

My daughter has become fascinated with crochet.

She uses her fingers to make tiny little creations and the other day she asked me:

“Can people actually make clothes from crochet?”

So, we started talking about scarves, beanies, socks and jerseys.

The wonder in her eyes was priceless.

But it also quietly took me back to my own matric dance.

We didn’t grow up having everything. We lived an ordinary life, and my mother was the kind of woman who prayed about everything and made what she could with what she had.

I remember not wanting to be a burden because, even then, I understood that things were sometimes difficult financially.

At one point, I truly didn’t think I would attend my matric dance.

But somehow, through faith, sacrifice, determination and God’s provision, I did.

I wore a gold and maroon crocheted two-piece outfit made by a woman who herself carried struggles and health challenges yet still created something beautiful for me because she was moved by my mother’s love and determination.

My outfit was different.

Simple.

Elegant, and I loved it.

Now that I am older, I realise how many burdens I carried that were never actually mine to hold.

No one had asked me to carry them.

Yet somewhere along the way, I quietly did.

And perhaps that is my reflection this Sunday:

What burdens are you carrying that was never yours to carry?

Did anyone ever ask you to carry them?

Remembering that crocheted matric dance outfit brought back so much:

the love of my dearly departed mother,

her resilience,

her faith,

and the way she did everything within her power to bring comfort and joy into our home.

It also gently reminded me that some of the most meaningful things in life are created quietly.

Thread by thread.

Prayer by prayer.

Day by day.

Moment by moment.

Not rushed.

Not loud.

Not always visible while they are forming.

Maybe that is true for healing too.

For identity.

For motherhood.

For growth.

For becoming.

Sometimes we only realise much later that love was stitching us together all along in ways we did not fully understand at the time.

And perhaps many of us are still becoming -

slowly,

softly,

quietly -

into more whole versions of ourselves.

May your stitching become as bold as you were created to be.

Happy Sunday Everyone!

Yours in Resilience

Keke