She wakes up before the crack of dawn to check if the household is alright after a brief episode from a nightmare.

Windows closed, check.

Main door locked, check.

Her little ones on the other room just next to hers, still sleeping. Peacefully. No sign of any harm or danger there.

Then that sigh of relief overcomes her. She then takes a cloth to wipe the fear and worry which have both revealed themselves upon her as sweat all around her beautiful face.

It takes some time for the reassurance affirmation that ‘everything is alright in her home’ to sink in. She breathes in and out, as if attempting to go through a long list of ‘to-do’ things on her plate for the day ahead.

It’s a pity that the nightmare shock meant she could not go back to her beauty sleep. The clock appeared to have other plans for her.

She woke up to prepare school clothes for the oldest child, Lindo, who is ten going on eleven years in a couple of weeks. Her little one, Lihle is four years old. It’s winter time already, so she doubles-up on the warm clothes – gloves, scarves, warm socks, the lot. Her emphasis is always on having warm vests for her kids to put on underneath to keep warm. That, she does not compromise on.

Then it’s lunch boxes. With such a lack in the food variety inside the fridge, this tends to be her least favourite of tasks to do but she does it in any case and makes a plan at the end of it all. ‘I need to stock up. soon.’ she reminds herself.

Amid all of these tasks, she spares a moment to wash her face and freshen up. Then it’s the little one’s turns to be bathed. Thankfully, Lindo is now old enough to bath himself, she only steps in when Lihle gets her turn. When the kids are putting on their clothes, she goes through their backpacks and checks if they have packed all that is needed.

It’s at this point that she remembers that she forgot to read the note from Lindo’s teacher. She makes a mental note of reading the note later on that day. She came back home quite late from work the previous evening – outbound calls had to be made as deadline for the end of the month target drew near. Food still needs to be put on the table after all.

She then prepares breakfast, soft porridge or tea with bread often does the trick. In the midst of Lindo and Lihle sitting down for breakfast, she slots in time to get herself ready for the busy morning that she has already tackled. A short prayer usually gets a platform as well during this treasured time. Then, before you know it, she is ready to depart with her little ones. She usually drops little Lihle off first at the local day care centre. The owner, Mama Nontobeko, always opens up her home earlier for Lihle’s drop off.

Then it’s back home, to await for Lindo’s school transport to pick him up for school, this is usually about twenty minutes before she needs to depart for the taxi rank.

She hopes the queues will be shorter this time around, if not for a taxi strike which will then mean that she needs to either use a bus or train to work. The journey to work takes about an hour and forty five minutes, depending on the traffic along the route. She hopes to be at work by 7 am or else, she will have to bear the brunt confrontation with her supervisor on this.

Her work day begins.

A lot of walking, pacing up and down, paper work, talking, screaming to ward off, close offs, inbound and outbound calls, keyboard clicks – a call centre is always a hype of activity. Thankfully, she has about an hour to herself for lunch. She always looks forward to this moment that she aptly refers to as her ‘me-time’ break.

Then the last half of her work day resumes. She ponders on what to make for dinner that same evening as she rushes through her work commitments. She also worries about Lindo who gets back home first from school. She has made arrangements with the transport to drop him off last in an effort to reduce the time that Lindo will have to spend alone at home. Lindo is almost 11 years now as she hopes that her little boy grows to be a responsible young man who can take care of himself and their four-roomed home in the township. Lindo will need to walk himself to school soon (the walk will take him about 35 minutes) as transport costs are escalating.

Almost time to leave work now and she prepares some cash to go to the grocery store just after work to get some food items for her home. And she does that, spending about R300, leaving her with just enough to get back home. It’s another dreaded wait at the town’s busiest taxi rank as masses, almost similar to her, are now making their way back to the township after another day’s work.

Luckily this time, she gets home just before sunset and is surprised by what she finds at home. Lindo has managed to collect Lihle from Mam’Nontobeko’s and this kind and mature gesture from him moves her. The house also seems cleaned. Two less things she has to worry about. She always starts her journey back home by collecting Lihle first from the day care center, by this time, it usually charges her over hours costs, which she arranges accordingly with Mama Nontobeko.

‘My little boy is growing.’ She silently says, proud of what her little boy has done. As she is about to sit down to take a breather, Lindo brings her a cup of tea, just the way she likes it: with 1 spoon of sugar and powdered milk as opposed to fresh milk. Her heart melts with joy at the sight of this as well.

She remembers the note from school that she has to read from his teacher and asks Lindo to bring it so that she has a close look at it. Before she reads the note, she checks up on how Lihle is doing: seems to be doing alright, although she appears to be coming down with a cold. Luckily her medicine cabin is fully stocked up so she knows just what to do to curb the cold virus from getting any stronger. Medical aid is costly. If only their father was around to help her out, Lord only knows where Samson is in the world.

Lindo’s academic performance seems to be showing an improvement. This is the message from the school note and she could not be any happier. Her son has been struggling with numeracy and literacy for a while now. She was worried that the situation could deteriorate.

‘An improvement? How is that even possible?’ she wonders to herself. ‘Maybe she could have made a difference?’ owing to the fact that her weekends for the past three months have been dedicated to assisting Lindo attempt to read, write and count. If that wasn’t enough to do the trick, she was already considering extra tutorials for him.

‘What lovely news this brings!.’ she thought as she stood up to prepare another wholesome meal for her family. This, as an effort to celebrate the good news and minute strides her family is making daily towards the road to survival and happiness.

I decided to purposefully not mention this woman’s name because she represents many around our country and the world who epitomize her greatness and strength. The many, who this piece is celebrating. The heroes with unique special powers that make life more meaningful, worthwhile and bearable.