Memoirs of a Forlorn Daughter

It’s ironic that the journey taken in life is always emphasized rather than the hardships faced along the way. It is the hardships that made us who we are. It is the hardships that determine the course of the journey taken in life.

  I learned the painful truth of life when I was nine. On the day my father died, my whole world turned upside down. My hopes and dreams shattered on the day life opened my eyes to her. My mother was heartbroken but for the sake of both my two younger brothers and I, she stood strong for our family…what that was remained of it.

  We moved in to my grandmother’s house and most of my childhood revolves around there ever since. Life didn’t change for the better after that. My family and I faced constant mockery from my aunts and uncles. In every children’s story book that I have read at that time, families are depicted as a loving bond between individuals but in my eyes, all I saw was hatred, pure hatred.

  The same old story repeated in school. I was teased mercilessly at school for wearing rags as uniform and slippers wrapped with cloth as shoes. I wasn’t exceptionally bright, I was aware of that. Therefore, sour remarks from my teachers were nothing new to my ears. Once, one of my aunts told me that I would be a useless girl and rot in the street together with my family. Her words somehow reached my heart and like blades, they cut deeply and tore it apart. I cried my heart out that very night. When I was on the brink of giving up that night, my mother comforted me and told me something really important that it changed my view towards life. “You might not be a rich girl but don’t ever let that stop you from becoming a girl rich with knowledge,” those were the words of wisdom from my mother and those were the very words that resounded clearly in my head every single morning I woke up.

  I turned over a new leaf after that night. Gone was the girl who never saw the light in her life, gone was the girl whose despair was the one thing that assured her that she was still alive. At school, I studied very hard and listened attentively to what that was taught by the teacher. After school, instead of going home, I stopped by the public library and studied there. I passed with flying colours in a government examination and got the offer to study at a boarding school. I was hesitant to accept the offer at first seeing that my mother’s health condition wasn’t so good. However my mother persuaded me to accept the offer and I eventually went to that boarding school.

  After a month at the boarding school, my dearest mother passed away. At the age of 16, I lost the pillar of my strength…I lost my mother. At her funeral, I realized that I had lost both the sculptors of my spirit, I was left fatherless at the age of nine and seven years later I am a girl without a mother. I was left heartbroken for a very long time but I somehow got to my feet and continued living my life. I resumed my studies at the boarding school while my two younger brothers lived with my aunts and uncles. I completed my studies at the boarding school and furthered my studies at the groves of academe after obtaining a scholarship. I worked for a prominent newspaper as a journalist after I graduated from the groves of academe.

  Time passed us by like the wind, we sometimes don’t notice it but it always passes by. As I sit here and think of all my yesterdays in my house, I gazed out the window where the rain is falling through the gloom. The scene of the rain reminds me of a happier time. It reminds me of the time when my father was still alive and my mother was still healthy, a time when they were playing with my younger brothers and I in a park. I saw a flash of lightning in the horizon and I saw myself as a little girl at my father’s funeral and as a teenage girl at my mother’s funeral. My younger brothers and close friends gathered around me after I came out of the university hall on my graduation day but in the middle of all those happiness, I felt sorrow because the two most important people in my life weren’t present…my beloved mother and father.

  I think of the times when people teased my family and I. I remember the night when one of my aunts told me that I would be someone useless and rot in the street but here I am. I rise against all odds and I am someone. Through the education I received, I managed to get a job as a journalist. Through my writings, I could somehow contribute to my country and the world. I could make my country and the rest of the world a better place.

  As the rain gradually stopped and the sun appears in the horizon, I saw my reflection on the windowpane. Everything that I have been through made me who I am today. Of being here and being there back then when I was a girl on the brink of giving up, I am grateful beyond words that I am here. I might not be a rich girl, but that never stopped me from becoming a girl rich with knowledge.

A note from the author:

Though the story above is fictional, I actually write it based on the life of someone I knew. She managed to rise against all odds and now she is someone who has a family and life of her own. For those you out there who feel down sometimes, stay strong and live your life.