Dead-Mouse Morning

Almost stepped on a baby dead mouse, yes, not a good morning sign. But I survived the day and others did not.
The last time I heard “I hate to be the carrier of bad news” Tiswahin, my sister’s fish died. This time I heard the phrase but it was way much serious and the news came from Baghdad. The phrase was followed by “Poor Hiba…” my heart skipped a beat “…. Her husband died.”

Hiba, my mother’s second cousin, who got married less than a couple years back and recently, had a baby girl.

I asked how. “Yesterday, during Karada’s mishap, the missile fell on the house next door when he went out to turn off the water boiler. A shrapnel landed on his head and dropped him dead instantly”

I was in a shock for a moment. I’ve never met him but I knew her since we were kids. I tried to process the bad news but I couldn’t. My parents were taking a nap and I thought I heard my dad’s voice and went in to their room and couldn’t keep my mouth shut. My mother was almost asleep and she woke up on the horrible news. I could process that it was not a bright idea to tell her while she was asleep and still couldn’t feel anything.

I went to my room, tried to go back to my book but I couldn’t. it hit me so hard that I started crying, not for the man deceased man I never met, nor for poor Hiba, but for the poor baby girl who will be raised without a father. No matter how much she will be loved, no matter how better the situation will get in Iraq, which I doubt for the current time, this girl will be raised without a dad.

Not only this girl but an entire generation will be raised without a father, mother or someone close to the family, and will carry the emotional scars with them all the time wherever they go.