On the 21st day of April, 2025 (exactly a month ago), the world was suddenly hit by the sad news of the death of Pope Francis at the age of 88 years, who was head of the Catholic Church. A week later, on 3rd May, Rajiv Ruparelia, son to the richest man in Uganda also died in a car crash at 35years. Then a week later, on 10th May, my beloved grandfather, Mzei Justus Kashisha passed away at 100 years of age. And a week later on 17th May, my friend's 9 months old baby girl passed away. (I have only picked these four because they are the ones I knew of).
This has drowned me into quiet moments of depression barely able to express exactly what I am feeling. For all I know, death is the only assured occurrence "in this life" but we are never prepared to face it. I am certain that every one of us has lost someone in their lives either close or distant and each one of us will die some day. The magnitude of how deep someone's death hits may depend on so many reasons than I may actually comprehend. In fact, some people think dying at a younger age should be more devastating but how young is young enough for a loss of a loved to hit hard?
The persons mentioned above were in totally different age brackets and classes but death doesn't know nor respect any of that. On the eve of the year, I made a commitment to stay indoors for prayer and worship and top of the list was healing for my grandfather and my friend's baby girl who was only 4 months then. They had both been very ill and I didn't know how better to help than to pray for them. Even when they are both no more, I am grateful to God for the life He has given them and the lives they have been able to touch while here with us.
Where I'd feel like maybe I didn't pray enough, the Pope would have said otherwise and where I'd feel like maybe if I had more money to attain better health care, the richest man around would say otherwise. This reminds me of the words of King Solomon in Ecclesiastes especially Chapter 12. This whole book teaches us that everything is meaningless, the pleasures, wisdom, folly, toil, oppression, friendliness, advancement, riches because no one will survive death. And as he concludes, he says that to fear God and keep his commandments is the duty of all mankind.
Despite his long life, (long compared to most) he has also left with some unmet ambitions and desires for himself and the offspring's (including carrying my children, his great grandchildren). I am however very grateful for the life God graciously granted him. He lived a very modest but somewhat fulfilled life. It baffles me to know that his mother breathed her last immediately after he took his first breath but see what the Lord has done for him to live over 36525 days.
Lessons from my grandfather; I may not say it all but a few of what I have learned from this incredible man include hard work. This man has been grazing and milking his cows up until his death bed so much that on several occasions, he'd take "sick leave" to go check on the status of his cows. He has been a very smart and clean man often acknowledged in society as the smartest old man. He kept his hat on, cherished his white shirts which he always ironed in advance and lined up in his room for the whole week. In fact, he trusted a few family members to wash his clothes because of how clean he desired them to be. (I may have picked OCD from him).
Walking alongside him as a child, whether we were going to one of his favorite bars or merely moving around the farm, he picked every polythene and plastics he came across (because he feared his cows may be harmed by it). He loved and hated loudly, speak of living authentically. Often times I cringed at the sight of someone I knew he didn't like because he never missed an opportunity to let them know how he felt. There was never a day I saw this man pretend through good and bad times. This made him fierce and uncompromising towards any sense of injustice. For a man who never stepped in a classroom, he made such a great human rights activist.
Sometimes I look back and feel strains of his desires all cluttered along my career(s). As a lawyer, he often called me to follow up cases which he had filed in different courts concerning random people whose rights he thought were not being respected such a woman in my village whose family chased out of her husband's estate upon his death leaving her and the children nothing. Mzei Kashisha walked miles and miles from Rukungiri to Mbarara to pursue this case with the Uganda Human Rights Commission and eventually, the woman and her children were given what they rightfully deserved.
Because he never got an opportunity to go to school as a child, he harassed every parent whose child he found loitering around the village during school days and I believe many conformed while others despised him for it. As an individual he has been sooo close to my heart not just because he was my grandfather but because of the values he lived by, always thinking of the next venture to earn him a living and always thinking of the next person to lend a hand. I have seen him fight battles and while he won some, others he lost but one thing he never did was to look away where he believed he could do something. I will miss my old man with a hat in so many ways and for soo many reasons but most of all I will miss his random calls from his farm just to remind me of how much he loved me, his very warm tight hugs often lifting me off the ground, and the twinkle in his eyes even in his very last days.
For anyone mourning a loved one, whose body (dust) has returned to the ground it came from and the spirit to the God who gave it, may this God comfort you, your family and friends. I also pray that this article reminds us to be grateful for each day, make the most of it and find peace in the fact that we are all just passersby. To be born may be chance but to die is certain; may God bless and guide us as we navigate and find meaning in the life in-between.
