3.

..
i remember too...

third day after losing my papa,
i received this message.

it's quite a long and nasty one and loaded with venom.
i'm blurring most of it out of love for my brother-in-law.

but this is neither about the person

nor that message -

both are equally irrelevant here.

i remember how i felt
whilst reading this again...

enraged. 
yet relieved. 

and... 

strangely at peace. 

enraged.

because he was at it again -

the bullying.

the desperate attempt to manipulate.

the gaslighting that was ever so familiar.

and relieved -

because finally,

i could disconnect...
without the grief that comes with cutting off familiar ties.

at peace - 

knowing my child will* grow up without the toxicity. 

and for a moment, 
i was sincerely distracted from my grief. 

but the realisation of the disparity brought me back to it -

that i was lucky to have a truly great man for a father...

but my child will* grow up without him. 

..
i used to predict all our arguments -

me telling Yoyo off most of the time

perhaps for buying things again* my son never needed,

for letting him eat this and that again*,

for attempting again* to spoil him.

my papa would have always riled me up,

we would have fought all the time.

i had always had different principles and parenting rules, 

and he would never have adhered well to them. 

we would have fought all the time,

and that would have been better still.

than this -

than nothing at all.

after all,

he had always loved me 
and shown me love in ways he knew how,

in ways i had never bothered to understand. 

he had always tried to respect my choices
albeit his traditional upbringing...

though he tried but sometimes failed to understand,

he tried.

and it's heartbreaking to realise that too late.

..
Yoyo would have loved my son
more than he had ever loved his daughter, 

and my son would have loved him
more than i had ever loved my father.  

..