The Turbulent Discovery Stage (20 – 25)

If it is your first visit on this site, you might be wondering what is turbulent or discoverable on an E-Commerce site that sells children’s clothes. Please stay calm and stay with me, you will know soon enough the why of this website; for now, read on. It is my hope and prayer that my story that I have decided to start telling today will inspire one person to tell theirs and for those that are still in their 20’s, that you will pick a lesson or two from my experiences. Happy Reading!

At the prime of my Teens, I was still shy but I loved deep conversations and every so often you would find me either in my hostel room or Mary Stuart visiting my friend, Joan (may her soul rest in Peace) and occasionally at Akamwesi hostel visiting another close friend. As I transitioned into the 20’s, this routine changed a little bit. I fell in love with a boy. (Clarity in these things is important)

I needed to type my Course Work-I don’t recall what course work that was but I didn’t own a laptop at the time. When I asked for one, my Uncle, bless his heart asked me to remind him during the holidays so that he can organize one for the next semester. One evening on my way to class, I chanced on a pretty nice looking young “man” carrying what appeared to be a laptop bag. I “monitored” him throughout the class and yes, he had been carrying a laptop. Shyly or rather confidently (it is always either or depending on what lens you are wearing) before the class ended, I approached him and inquired if I could borrow his laptop. He beamed and yeah, the next day he was kind enough to drop off his laptop at my hostel so I could start on my course work. I was blown away by his kindness and like they say the rest is history. Sadly, our ‘romance’ was short-lived, he traveled abroad for holidays and never returned. When I think of this story I am reminded of Chimamanda’s “Americannah”. This was at the genesis of social media, and my Facebook wall screamed of this innocent romance with my own “Obinze”. For the longest time, I didn’t have the courage to love anyone else because I was afraid the next person would also come and leave.

In my final year at University, I was open to trying again. Unfortunately, all my possible suitors were people who from the onset had intimated that they just wanted to be friends. I remember one very wonderful guy I will call JK who felt it was important for him to organize a lavish (lavish by the standards at the time, things have changed) beautiful birthday party with some of my friends and his in attendance. I was delighted and grateful but a few days later when he took me to dinner at Protea Hotel and asked me to be his girlfriend, I was crushed.

The game plan seemed to have changed too soon, I wasn’t ready. I know some of you are there judging but shuuushhh, it is not your story. He he. Do not jump at this my conclusion and judge me, hold up and hear me out. I was not used to being wowed in his kind of way; his proposal after lavishing me with so many gifts, birthday party and now an “indecent proposal” was confused for a bribe. I felt like he did everything he did in preparation for this day; I wasn’t ready for another heartbreak. You all must guard your Hearts, jealously!! Incidentally, later in life when I accepted to give this “our” relationship a chance, these luxurious offers reduced, and what this did was to confirm my earlier fears. Like the first relationship, unfortunately, this “romance” too ended before it even started. I must, however, note that JK is one amazing man, cool by all standards and very focussed and I wish him every success in this life. I pray that he finds great love and that the hand of the Lord will always be upon his life. From him, I learned ALOOOOT! The other thing I need to mention at this stage is that there is something about “laptops” and or “ICT devices” so beware. My final draft dissertation disappeared from my flash disk, and when I sought for help on Facebook, I didn’t only get help; I met someone that would form part of my story. Social Media isn’t everything bad, after all! Winks.

I completed University and enrolled for my Post Graduate Diploma Course; through the years I made great friendships most of which I have maintained to date and yes; I also experienced the greatest losses thus far. Significantly, three months, after my University graduation my paternal Grandfather passed away. My Grandfather Mzee Francis Rwalinda Rukimbira (may his soul continue to rest in glory) is the man I grew up calling “Daddy” and his wife “Mummy” (God bless and continue to sustain her). You see, “olaba” for my local Luganda speaking friends, I am lucky to have many Daddies and Mummies. My biological parents and the entire support clan! It is a blessing! I will tell you about this, one day.

His death came at the wrong time in my view but I have come to realize that perhaps it was the right time. After so many years helping people and serving his community back in Kisoro District as a Teacher, then a Politician (he was the first Mayor of the Town Council), husband, father, and grandfather, I believe the only thing he was waiting for was for his “favorite” granddaughter aka “last born” to graduate from University and he retires to Heaven. The Lord heard him, saw his pain in the last couple of months after my graduation and decided to call him back to himself. He had run his race! The story of his pain is for another day. Maybe I should say, that God planned it in such a way, that after graduating from the University with or without my grandfather I would survive. In my mind, this was an impossibility. In those years, if I was asked what my greatest fear was, I would say “losing my grandparents”; and here I was facing the reality of this fear.

Throughout the time he was hospitalized, I would commute from Law Development Centre to Mulago hospital, and during this time my general performance significantly went down. I was hopeful that he would recover and every so often I would try to refocus and go for discussions since my oral exams were due in April, that year. I am not the kind to tell what problems I am going through so; at the time I must have confided in one or two friends about what was going on. Those that I spoke to encouraged me and others visited. JK and another friend I will call SN braved the long tedious journey to Kisoro to be with me and a couple of other friends were with me both at church and at my Uncle’s home in Buwate. One even helped me work on a photo collage that to date hangs in my grandfather’s house. (You guys have a special place in my heart too)

When I received the news of my beloved’s demise, the clock seemed to have stopped ticking for me, worse still more calamity befell me in this season but this is a story for another day so I will save you the detail, today. Thankfully with the help of a dear and near friend I will call MS, we explored a couple of available recovery options. (Dear MS, you will always be close to my heart!).

If you don’t know what one failure can do to you if you have never failed, then you need to look out for my future post on this. You get these feelings of incompleteness, worthlessness and feel incapable of success, to say the least. Your sense of purpose and self-worth goes with the wind. In summary, my manna seemed to have ceased and I had no clue that there was a flood of goodness in store for me, God’s bigger plan, greater provision, and more divine connections. You couldn’t convince me about any of these things.

Your mind is flooded with so many questions with no answers. You ask questions like, does everyone view me as a failure? Will doing something differently validate me? What kind of lawyer am I going to be? What can I do with my current credentials? Can I still pursue a career in modeling or mass communication perhaps? I once went for a TV Screen Test at NTV but they told me my voice was too low. I would be gracing your TVs right now but alas! Anyway, during this time the questions are endless, and at that time if you don’t refocus; stagnation becomes your portion SO Don’t DO IT! The simple solution I have recently found is that you PRAY about it, keep your mind on the POSITIVE and SPEAK to someone about how you feel or even WRITE it down as you figure out the answers one by one.

Fast Forward, things started to fall back in line and I honestly had a great support system in form of friends and some family members especially my maternal family (My mother’s sisters are the “realest” MVPs), it is a privilege having a stream of your blood flowing within me. Also, the friend I referred to as MS always shared his work benefits including but not limited to Airtime and checked in tirelessly, and another I will refer to as AN who visited me regularly and was there through this season.

The interesting thing about this season is that I participated in all social activities like nothing had happened but deep within there was a raging fire and when night fell and the world became quiet with no Whatsapp/Facebook notifications I would wail under my pillow. It was lonely in the night.

I remember once, during my clerkship one of the Partners at the Firm where I clerked had intimated that there is nothing as painful as losing a year; your colleagues will be ahead of you and you will struggle to catch up.

Upon successful completion of the Bar Course, I had no time to rest; I had to catch up with the time! A whole year so as you can imagine I spent sleepless nights preparing job applications starting with the place I did clerkship from. Plan B as I wait for the jobs to come through was to sit at one of my Uncle’s Law Firms. Being an entrepreneur has never been a niche of mine so business was not on the list of plan Bs and Cs, I recall once before JK changed the dynamics of our friendship, he had asked me what I can do given a sum of money to start a business and I was clueless. I spent a couple of days thinking about it but I didn’t get back to him with an answer. Later in life, I would wonder what his assessment of me was given my cluelessness in business. With the job search, every single rejection, during the application process meant a well of tears and moments of wishing Grandpa was still alive. Grandpa was a networker, he knew the who is who within the village, being a politician and in a position of leadership and service brought him closer to every single important person in the community and he knew how to leverage on these networks. Everything you needed was a phone call away. I found it interesting that everyone called him Uncle, Mzee, etc, it seemed like everyone was my relative and to date, I struggle with calling several people Uncle, Auntie because they referred to my Grandfather as such and I grew up thinking they were my relatives. It is an honor knowing each and every one of them and I am humbled that my Grandfather had the slightest influence on their lives however minimal.

At 24, a few months’ shy to 25 I got my first job at a law Firm where one of my friends had been working and was planning to leave. It took them a few hours to give me the job, but I didn’t experience much growth as I expected or maybe I was impatient and after three months I tendered in my resignation. The pay was little, but in the beginning, I felt it was better than staying home until my mental wellness was threatened. Law Firm practice at some places requires you to be shrewd, ambitious and for lack of a better word overbearing. You will have both good and bad days and on the bad days, if your employer can’t take it in, he/she will unwind on you. It is not a safe place for someone seeking peace of mind. It was certainly not safe for me. This is how my desire in Firm practice dwindled, besides I wasn’t about that litigation life. At law school, I loved criminal proceedings but my interest was more in investigating and evaluating evidence than it was in personally arguing out that case, and punching the other party in the face with words.

As most of my close friends, may have noticed by now I write more than I speak in public. I don’t have the energy to raise my voice to be heard but I have the energy to put down on paper how I feel and what I think the right approach to an issue is. Even at social events, I struggle to fully engage in conversations, I am happy observing and making a few comments here and there BUT as a lawyer, more is expected of you. I am a behind the scenes person. At events, I am happy planning an event without my name coming up as the Chief organizer; at work, I am happy doing all the work and having someone else report on it. I don’t see the need for making a repeat report just because they need to know you are working. This I am learning to adjust for purposes of showing up and allowing to be seen especially now as I begin a new phase in my long beautiful life BUT….

Personal Take Outs:

In summary, my early 20’s were full of new discoveries, turbulence, failure, loss, heartbreaks, and entry into the job market. When I look back at what these years have been like, I realize that God has been so good to me and it breaks my heart that it is only now that I am able to boldly say it and put it out there. If I was to speak to my younger self now or even my little siblings, I would say;

1. It is okay to love, it is okay to be heartbroken and it is okay to start over again. You don’t have to wait forever to start all over again, the time to start over is now. If the boyfriend or girlfriend has moved on, it is okay to move on and start over again with someone else, it is also okay for you to zone out for a bit and love you first.
2. It is okay to enjoy every little moment of your young life, a time will come when you can’t do this.
3. Invest in your friendships now, some of the friendships you will build in your prime years may be the ones that count the most when you are older.
4. Invest in beautiful memories. Love. Live. Laugh. And Laugh a little More.
5. Give yourself a chance to love without questioning every single thing that has happened in your life, some of the best memories are created when you love without limitation.
6. It is okay to be young, innocent and naïve! We have all been there! Don’t beat yourself up over past mistakes. Leave them in the Past.
7. Your story is unique, feel free to share it. You never know who it may impact at that moment.
8. When you lose a loved one, it is okay to cry every so often; healing takes time but always remind yourself that your loved one would be delighted knowing that you are pursuing what sets your heart on fire and striving to be the best version of you.
9. Most importantly keep chasing your dreams and commit them to God. Pray that if indeed the dreams you are chasing are in accordance with his Will for your life, he will perfect them and bring them to fruition and if they are not that he will direct you towards the right dreams. Seek him.

The situations in your life may bruise your heel and change the way you walk but it will not break the promise that is attached to your name; you may limp sometimes but purpose to walk on. I recently read a blog post where the author referenced God’s definition of who we are in a simple ABCD format;

You are “A” — Accepted. Your worth does not come from appearance, accolades or achievements.

You are “B” — Beautiful. God knitted you into His masterpiece. And “C” — Chosen. God picked you.

You are “D” — for Delivered. He delivered you from old patterns and made you new!

If ever, you feel any sort of way that is not positive; be reminded of the above ABCs and quickly snap out of the zone.

I hope you picked one or two lessons from my story, I will be back with the experiences of the Growth Stage. If you have some lessons to share, please leave them in the comment section or send me an email on fabfamshop@gmail.com.

I wish you and your families a wonderful and plentiful, 2020 of SHOWING UP!!

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Gallery of a few memorable moments I could retrieve from this stage!

Ps: This is not conclusive. There are two critical pictures not in this gallery but they will be coming up in the next one! I am looking for them but this post, couldn’t wait! It is Urgent! LOL.

Ignore the alignment of the images! This is all a first-time blogger’s problem when you try to be professional but it will get better. Stay Firm! Okay?

Fortunate Ingabire R.M

(F.I.R.M)