Leslie Musoko, click
here to update your pages on AuthorsDen.
Blogs by Leslie Musoko
Kissing Despair.... 7/15/2010 6:00:02 PM
Summer 1998, ‘Dzien dobry….’ or ‘Good afternoon… where the only words I caught from the beautiful flight attendant in the LOT airlines as our efficient pilots maneuvered our plane deftly to the arrival terminal. This was one adventure I hadn’t planned for but it was something I had to do. I had invested a lot into this relationship and I had to see it to the end whichever way it turned out to be.
I alighted into the warmth of Warsaw with apprehension of what lay ahead for me. My destination was Legnica, a polish town that was remote from anywhere and I still hadn’t a clue of what means of transport I was going to use to get there. The airport was busy as people walked between terminals and I followed the exit signs in the direction of local flights. I told myself that there might just be the possibility that I could get a flight to a local town in close proximity to Legnica. I was in luck there was a flight which departed three hours later for Wroclaw another large polish town in the west of the country and only 100 miles from my destination. I bought myself a ticket and took up residence with all the other passengers that waited tiredly in the small terminal. As I watched the couples with kids stride in and out of the small shop that sold confectionary I contemplated my reasons for being in this country. It had almost been a week since I had received a distressful phone call from my girl friend telling me our relationship was over. She explained how sorry she was and hoped that it all hadn’t come as a shock to me. I was aghast at first unable to do much. It was too much to take in by its suddenness. I had pondered over it wondering whether it was feasible to end a relationship that had lasted for three years over the phone. I needed to hear her say goodbye to my face; I needed to understand what I had done wrong, where we had failed, whether there was any possibility of us getting back together. I needed answers and I believed seeking her out was the only way I could find peace.
Wroclaw wasn’t as busy as Warsaw and I drove without incident north from Wroclaw admiring the curving motorway that followed a path through a long forest of trees. I passed many cars jammed with holiday travelers visiting different parts of the country during the busy summer months. Poland was turning out just how I had imagined it to be. It was a country forgotten from a time of war yet it held many mysteries unseen to the naked eye. It was the kind of place you would observe for something unlikely and intriguing to occur.
I entered Legnica in the early evening after losing my way several times through the many back country roads and followed the signs for miescie centrum or city center as I had been directed. Eventually I made it to the confines of my hotel room after almost nine hours of traveling. I told myself I was here now and it was time to seek out my girlfriend. It was time to find out why my life was heading into the unknown with very little hope for survival.
To perform an act of kindness by the grace of the Lord is not to seek anything in return. In the spiritual world I had learned not to expect anything from anyone. Whatever I received I believed was given to me as a result of the Lord wishing to reward me for my kindness. In this sense I worked without expectation for many things in my life just being grateful that my own success had been granted to me by the kindness of our Lord. This was how my relationship started with Gosia. She was a single child from a poor background with a mum who had worked hard throughout her life to provide the best for her daughter and parents that she felt responsible for. Gosia’s dad offered no support whatsoever to Gosia’s mum and so Gosia grew up believing that she had only one parent in whom she could trust. Eventually as time passed and Gosia grew up the toll of her mum’s labor began to show as Gosia became the parent directing and making most of the decisions for her mum and helping her through the tough times. I came into the scene when Gosia was twenty five. I gave her other options, Gosia was driven to success yet she needed help to make her dreams a reality. For me I looked upon it as an opportunity to invest in the goodness of our world. I thought of the hardship that I had faced in college and felt that if the Lord had made me successful in my career then I could repay him in my own way by doing something for one of his own. I offered Gosia what little help I could, motivating and supporting her ambition and eventually we grew to love each other. It came as no doubt now that I was in Poland seeking what strength I had to pull us back from despair.
I sat in Gosia’s office and saw how the hard beaten nature of the land had eaten the woman I had come to love. The greenness in her eyes was still there and the fire that soared from her red hair was unmistakable. Yet there was the thinness in her appearance and the sadness in her demeanor that told me I had come to the wrong place to seek solace.
‘What could this girl offer me?’ I pondered. She looked and felt worse than I did. How was I going to explain to her my grief and despair when she looked as though she needed more help than I did? I found myself offering again to help her in any way that I could even though I knew that her decision about our relationship was final. We had been talking for almost three days since my arrival, in which time I had met her mum and visited their home. Gosia had almost gone into shock after seeing me but had recovered since then and tried to explain why our relationship could not continue. She explained to me that Legnica was her home, these were the people and the things she felt comfortable with. As much as I deliberated over the past and the time we had shared I knew that what I had to offer fell on deaf ears. My reasons for being there where a means of completion from my part that at least I had done what was needed to give her the choice in life that we all need. If it backfired then so be it but I knew within myself that I had tried.
I suffered tremendously during my time in Poland. I was faced with a girl who I had to understand came from a poor foundation and my own needs and emotions which where blowing like wildfire at the time. I suffered defeat and humiliation because even with all the love and effort that I had given Gosia over the years I could not pull her away from her decision. I questioned my faith at the time as on several occasions the need for revenge, rage and anger came to my mind as I thought about the years that I had lost in this relationship. Unable to watch television or do very much I settled for chess, a game that offered my mind the challenge that it needed to rise from the depths of despair at the time. During this time I was unaware about the decisions that where being made for me in the spiritual world. My ascension into this highly sophisticated world was happening around my pain and yet I could not see a way out in the loneliness of my hotel room. I prayed for good times to come again into my life hoping that since I had managed to control my temper and the rage within me the Lord would grant me my wish.
‘For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things…’
