Belonging - If you ever felt like you didn't, read this.

Dear reader,

Have you ever done something that makes you so incredibly uncomfortable that your body responds in a way that makes you feel like you wanna throw up and shit yourself at the same time? 

Today my body felt like that all the way to a funeral. The funeral was for a young woman who was older than me, she never showed any signs of caring much about me all my life but we had one thing in common. The same blood running through our veins. Her dad, my absent biological father, the same man. 

As I drove, I prayed for strength and I called upon his grandmother whom I'm named after to be with me. I pulled up to the very last car park conveniently free just for me. From this block away from the funeral home, I prepared to walk alone.

I got out of the car to see a beautiful elderly woman who could totally pass for my grandmother, she was walking on this random street for the same reason as me. "can I walk with you" I asked this kind-looking stranger, "of course" was her response.

After a quiet kia ora from me and a kiss on my cheek from her, I asked her how did she know the family. "I know the parents" she replied. Then she asked me, "how many daughters do they have"? My answer caught her off guard, it gave her the realization she didn't know them as well as she thought.

All my life I’ve been their families' inconvenient truth, their dirty best-kept secret shrouded behind shadows of scripture. 

I am the consequence of what came forth after their Dad and my Ma had a brief love affair. 

Today the holy veil came off as I walked through those glass doors and down that funeral home aisle.

She, the much loved and respected leader of her generation.

My eldest sister by blood (only) lay in her white coffin fit for a queen. 

A man approached us as we entered the glass doors, “Are you Tongan”? 

I didn’t answer, I just kept walking without really processing the ridiculousness of his question. 

I walked past the full house with my head up, every seat in the room taken and he, whoever he was raced to tell on us to the man whose Tongan blood runs through my veins.  

He stood there at the altar waiting for me to arrive.

He embraced me with open arms in front of all their people, their society who have never known about me or if they did, they’ve never known who I am outside of a mere hush of gossip from his past. 

Today I was visible for all of them to see, in the flesh. 

His blood, his other daughter created and born outside of their bible pages.

Bible pages filled with verses, verses that so many people memorize and preach for the sake of preaching yet don't bother to apply in real life where it really matters.

As I released from his embrace, I locked eyes with her right beside him. 

The single word that came from my mouth….”Sorry” with a thousand more behind that in my teary eyes from one Mother to another. She embraced me with Mothers warmth and told me “Thank you for coming”. 

I didn’t intend to go up to the queens coffin but I followed suit after my cousin led the way. 

Forgiveness, respect, sorrow and condolence is what I kissed to my hand then gently smoothed it over her forehead. 

When I turned back to the audience, my spirits lifted to see the youngest sister and in that moment the audience disappeared for me. I bent down, I held space for her, I hugged her, I breathed for her and gave her my shoulder to cry on as she wept and sobbed. I rocked her in my arms gently and whispered “I’m here for you”. 

This part of the funeral was healing. 

The rest of the service was awkward and uncomfortable AF as it became clear very quickly that we must depart immediately to go back out of this sacred space and stand on the outside.

Outside looking in through the glass doors with the non-family members. Just what I've been doing all my life, standing on the outside, looking in at a family that I’ve never felt like I belong to despite sharing the same whakapapa, the same blood running through mine and my childrens veins. 

It took all of me to show up there today after years of feeling unwanted, years of rejection. Countless times I’ve reached out to build relationship. All those attempts and I still remain clueless to know who I am and where I stand with them, including the Queen who I was there to pay my respects to. 

I held space for myself to stand there on the outside looking in, listening to all the preaching. 

The preaching that mostly was said in the language of my ancestors on that side but a language I could barely understand. When the preaching switched to the language I grew up with, it stirred something in me to piss me off. 

God fearing, dedicated to Jesus, child of god, christian family; were the announcements made in honor of the Queen and her family. 

Don’t get it twisted, I am a believer, I love my heavenly father, I pray in Jesus’s name every time but I don’t fear god because I know I come from him and that he loves me at my best and more importantly at my worst. I prefer to hear and speak from the core. That’s where everything that matters most to hear and speak, comes from.

I know this to be true because that’s where god lives within each and everyone of us. At the core. 

I never had the opportunity to get to know her at the core but I know dam well she was more than those conditioned surface labels. 

At the end of the day my resolve is this, nothing is harder than losing someone you love so much that you feel like you’re gonna die too; Your child, your parent, your aunty who loved you like a second mother, your sister that always had your back, that is what I acknowledged was way fkn harder than all of my showing up today.

I’m greatful for all the beautiful cherishable memories and experiences every other single person at the funeral including my own whanau had of her and from the family. I’m glad she showed them love and leadership in the way that I would and do show my love to the folks I care about. 

I never experienced her like they did but that’s ok, I send her nothing but peace, love and forgiveness to take into her next chapter on the other side. 

If your body has ever felt the compulsions I described in the beginning, put your ego to the side and muster up ALL the balls you have in you and push through it. If you don’t you’ll just continue to torture yourself into a state of misery and unwellness. 

I’m here as proof to affirm from the other side;

If you woke up today, you still have time, your inner Freedom and Peace is priceless. 

I see you, you are never alone XO 

Erena 

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