Incomplete Dreams….
“Look the Khalid family! Look at his wife an unlucky widow alone in a house with 4 children! She should get married soon.” Said one of the two women standing near our garden and whispering to each other. I was in the garden helping my mother digging and watering the plants when one of them were pointing straight at my mother. For a moment I thought that I knew that the woman I saw has visited our house once or twice when dad was alive, I wanted to ask my Mor (mother) but instead I tried ignoring.
Sameera is a young beautiful lady with four children who lost her husband that had a heart-attach and died in his early 30’s.Everyone in the village are talking about Sameera that she should either marry her brother-in-law or father-in-law. In Afghanistan a woman alone in a house has never been accepted. If she becomes a young widow she becomes like an object that is owned by her dead husbands family. For an Afghan woman the only thing she owns and should cherish is her purity
(chaste) and soul that can be pointed again and again her whole life. And Sameera who loved her husband so much that she couldn’t bear the thought of marrying someone else raises her three daughters and a son alone having everyone accusing her for having affairs with other men when the reality was that they were just trying to force poor Sameera to marry another man. She was a stubborn and very courageous woman that dared to decide living alone with her children and trying her whole life ignoring the people who pointed at her straight and whispered at her the back.
My life has changed drastically when I turned 10 years old. My father left us from this life and we were alone, my mother who was trying to take care of us, educate us and also get the money for us to eat something, it looked like she never had enough time for anything. Mom tried getting jobs but it seemed that no one wanted to help her out instead they were trying to ignore her existence even when she was talking to them. We got money for food by the help of our small garden in front of our tiny house we owned. If there was rain in this season and the plants grew very good we would have enough money to eat something for the upcoming year but when it didn’t rain much we would try living on bread and tea. Sometimes we wouldn’t even have the money for bread so we would eat the grapes in winter that grew in our garden which were left out from spring.
I would try my best helping my Mor (mother) with the chores and praying to God that someday our life will be easier that it will be easier on my mother and we all would be together living a happy life. Somehow whatever I hoped for sounded like a dream but I couldn’t stop hoping…
Before when dad was alive my family was complete and happy. My mother, I remember her eyes sparkling every day but now when into her eyes they seem dull as if the person that is in front of you may look complete but broken into pieces inside.
Days passed by people still made rumours about mom having affairs when I perfectly knew that she was with us or in the garden the whole time, why would they say this when it isn’t true? I never understood that…
One day when I woke up laying on the sheets that were on the floor I turn expecting to see my mother next to me but she wasn’t there. Instead I see my grandmother who was standing near the door I asked her: “Where is Mor?”she told me that she left to look for a job.
Hours passed by and I started worrying about my mother thinking where could she be? I go to the garden to water the plants and I see my mother laying on the floor with her neck cut and blood streaming out. My uncle that was my fathers brother was next to her with his pants laying on the floor he was standing in front of my mother and my poor mother… her beautiful dress that she was wearing that day has been ripped off her. What happened? I wanted to scream and call out everyone but i lost my voice instead I just dropped on my knees and started crying. Why was my mother staring blankly to the sky? Why was she bleeding from the neck…who should I ask? Who could have helped me…
P.s. Okay… I know, creepy. I wrote this last summer. When my mom was telling me things women go thru in Afghanistan. No, I am not saying that Afghanistan is this big hole where all this scary things happen to people. There are goods side of it too. And I will try bringing the good side to you too. But meanwhile, when I was reading this from my old laptop, I couldn’t take it out of my mind. So I thought I should publish it and ask you your opinion.
The Beat 