There is absolutely nothing that can prepare a mother for the day that she loses her child...
Nikki, Nikki, Nikki... I was not prepared for this. You have been the center of my life, for your entire life, and this is not unusual for parents… but in our case I was your mother and your father from when you were merely two years old… Every major life choice that I have made was in your best interest, even though you may have seen that from a different perspective.
This company started when your father passed away, so that I would have the most flexibility to be your mommy and daddy... It was my other baby that grew and evolved with you. Often you viewed it as a rival sibling, but it was merely there to serve all our needs, and it served us well…
You grew up at my desk and could identify a tailings dam from the plane before you even got to high school... those “damn” dams we would joke… Eventually you became part of the team and we worked together for more than a decade, with many challenges and deadlines.
It started before you even left high school, working during your vacations. Your CV was the envy of professionals with 3x more work experience… you were doing megaprojects before you turned 21… Jwaneng Pipelines, Gouda Wind Farm, Steyn City, Saldanha LPG, Cradock Ethanol Plant, Khoemacau Copper Mine, with many smaller ones in between, and then finally the Legaro Living Building
You made me proud… you worked hard and accurately… your work was of the highest standard. I taught you all my tricks and trade secrets… and you were a ninja on CAD.
The Legaro Living Building will become an important project for us… it was our last official project together, and as I re-design part of the project and work with your drawings I am sad and nostalgic, and I miss my Ninja designer… but I am so proud of you.
As we consolidated and moved into 2021, you decided to move back to Cape Town to pursue your other passion… MUSIC. It was a tough 18 months for me as we built separate lives… but eventually it found a new balance… you were finally on your own path, and I was focused on the foundation. Secretly I had hoped that with time our paths would find their way back together again and you would join me in the foundation.
The foundation’s mission was to ensure the future for you and the next generations so that you could live out your life on a healthy thriving planet, free of all the climate reality implications. As your mother all I wanted was to ensure your future was safe and risk free, and I was prepared to spend the rest of my life working towards that objective.
I never envisaged that you would not live a long life… or join me at a later date…
But life is fragile and uncertain with huge risks… and through a series of events, your life came to a sudden tragic end… there in no future on this planet that will include you or any grandchildren… this is the end of our bloodline…
With the rug ripped out from under me I sit here and question everything… I know there is still work to be done, and this was not only about you… but is this the END or a new BEGINNING…
But more importantly, will I still want to do this if you are not part of this journey somehow…
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