Grief’s Inheritance: A Lesson in Hindsight for Gen Z
My son, I look at you now, with that same hopeful glint in your eyes, and a part of me aches, knowing what shadows might yet fall across your path. I suspect I know your despair, for I too was once there. In 1982, I first discovered Kenya was not special. The illusion of an island of peace shattered, and the country spiraled. I remember the silence that fell over our streets, the distant burst of gunfire and the frantic whispers of my parents. It was then, seeing the raw terror in their once-assured eyes, the whisper of civil war, a phantom thought, rooted itself in my young mind. The idea that even neighbours could turn in a moment of rapture. The 1982 coup attempt burst my bubble of assumption; I saw real terror and helplessness in my parents.
After ’82, a heavy, unspoken blanket descended upon our home, and indeed, the whole country. It wasn’t just that no one spoke of it; it was the way conversations would abruptly cease when a certain date was mentioned, the way our elders’ eyes would glaze over with a pained look while watching a political rally on TV. The most potent memory: a history of hangings, the death penalty, and broken men returning as ghosts.