Seldom do you find a dad that stubbornly stays a brother and friend to you. A dad whose conduct only asks from you prefixes often accorded to cousins and peers. A dad whom when you hear others call papa you realise that indeed he was your dad you still preferred to call bra papa, bra Jimmy or Abuti Poppy.
I am reflecting here on a dad that was so urbane that he became a node of fashion sense to us his sons. A dad with whom no subject was beyond reach and limits. A dad who would at ease discuss with you manhood matters like you were a class mate. A dad who would genuinely solicit your opinion on matters because he values that opinion.
He was a dad not only because he was married to my mother's younger sister, but a dad I grew to see as such because he
1. Respected the son I was to him in a way few would in his position
2. Befriended my dad to levels that we all felt he was indeed his younger brother
3. Addressed and respected my mother as his sister-in-law that his voice calling her 'aus Martha' still reverberate in my auditory memories
4. Passionately called and respected my uncles, whom he called 'Bra Bizzah and Bra Moni, as his flesh and blood brothers
5. He accorded my grandmother the motherly love only reserved for biological mothers. He would in fact have a sustained conversation with her in as much as he would have it with us his sons and daughters.
A dad amongst only four we had as a generation born of our mothers. He was Abuti Poppy that joined Abuti Mahleti (my biological father), Abuti Ali ( babumncane) and briefly Abuti Robert Molepo. They were together a wall of parternal security we all lived under. They were conduits of fatherly blessings that can only be deposited through a father by the bigger Father in heaven. They commanded wisdom resources you ignored at your own risk. This specific dad, Bra Jimmy, would deliver this wisdom with a unique smile and giggle that disarmed all your male egoistic posture for his wisdom to prevail.
Socratic in teaching, he would ask you questions whose answers will make you master the lesson he was teaching you. Quick to accept his faults in order to teach you see your faults. If wisdom was a person, it was his closest friend. He had a way of boasting about his children that was uniquely his. He spoke more of what they should be doing that what they have done already. He would continuously make us to see their weaker side so that we are burdened in closing the gap. A great soul he was.
In his last days he was battling a kidney problem that slowed him down. As an interpreter at courts of law, he captured the language of law into various mother tongue dialects for lay persons to understand what the various lordships he worked under were saying. It is this interpreter role that made him translate the pain he was feeling being on dialysis into a joy that fooled us of the seriousness of his 'thorn in the flesh'.
Yes, COVID19 could not be satisfied of all the people it has so far taken away from their families that it announced its arrival into our family through him. It took one of our 'first borns' as though we have the pharaohic stubbornness to let God's people to go. Yes, we are in a pandemic era, but we did not ask for evidence that we lived through it, as we are in our own ways surviving it, we are saying to the God that we pray that one too many is too much. Our Dad must be the last to succumb to this wave of death engulfing our country.
To Mama Shadi, Mpho, Fathu, and Lebogang (who will come out of this wave to be witness to the power of God), Papa Bra Jimara, I mean Abuti Poppy, came and became who he was to you. Please cherish the best memories and moments you all had with him. He became a purpose he was there for in your and our lives. As his Soul has rested in Peace on the 7th July 2021, let us facilitate a dignified send off of his mortal remains.
There are brothers who have learnt from him to be fathers where you feel his gap. For God still loves us he has kept in that Generation Papa MADI. He is the standing tower that represents the rest still with us.
For those that have pictures of Bra Jimara please post as many as you can on the group. If there are songs that remind you of him send us you tube links to join in this celebration of what our Brother and Friend, and his now eldest son Godfrey Sono calls 'A BEAUTIFUL LIFE'
Rest in beauty Bra Jimmy, Abuti Poppy, Papa Mpho, Fatu and Lebo, Papa wa Rona Kaofela. Amen.
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