Wildflowers of the mohave

I read something the other day about normalizing respecting children, and truly, I was rattled. As though this concept wasn’t already normalized—which it isn’t. I wish I had grown up in a home that taught me about the importance of every being’s existence, but learning it on my own through my own experiences has proven to build me up to be quite the fighter. My biggest passion is value of lives. I’ve run marathons for this cause, raised thousands and spoken endless words on the topic, as though it isn’t something that everyone already believes. I think the sad part is: they don’t. It is not normal to care and respect everyone who lives differently than we do. It got me thinking why this is all too common in this life. Why is it so easy for us to look at another’s circumstances that maybe make us uncomfortable or confused or distracted because we don’t know how to “fix” it, or even worse, have no desire to even acknowledge it, and decide this person is lesser. Is it pride? Is it self-esteem? Is it lack of empathy? Lack of education? Lack of exposure to variety of livelihoods?

My Ghanaian ma is the most pure person I know. And when no one knew what to say or how to help, my ma always seemed to know. When I was living in Ghana I was wildly sick. Emotionally and physically. My ma’s arms quickly became the only thing that allowed me refuge and restoration. And as I would curl up inside them on her plastic-y couch on a steamy day in November, my heart felt the most seen, not because it didn’t hurt or because it wasn’t confused, it was actually because of those reasons now so enraptured by love that fluffed me into a peaceful state; love that didn’t try to look at something hard and make it magically heal, love that chose to hold you while nothing made sense and everything hurt.

I am infuriated by a world that views life in competition with their own. I am exhausted and heartbroken by hearts that blind themselves to heartache, to honest and true vulnerability of another’s experience. A world that acts on the defensive and has a “prove your story” attitude instead of one that chooses “I hear you”. If heaven was all we could see, this would be it: arms that held and didn’t question. Arms that fought and sought and raged, and ones that were still in power. Arms that declared value over every life passing through it’s wrinkles, not because it was simple or because everything was understood, or loving was easy, and being kind was a reflex, but because it’s rarely any of these things. That is why we declare value on people. You are a human living among humans. This is an extraordinary privilege. You are gifted everyday with the option to be the sun that everyone runs towards or the shadow that pulls behind. I hope entirely slouched somedays, but I hope and I hope through the heartache and pain, the discomfort and disappointment, that there is a day coming where value of all life is not measured. Where lights of eyes and arms of welcome become the very core of this world we inhabit.