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Fadzayi Maposah, Correspondent

The mornings and the evenings are chilly. Mid-morning, it gets warm and by lunch time it is hot.

Some people did not get a chance to wear their winter boots earlier on, so they are wearing them now.

When you see someone wearing their winter boots, allow them to enjoy their shoes. Is it not that you do not know why they are wearing them now? If you have the guts, politely ask!

I remember once that I got a summer dress just as winter was beginning.

Do you think I would wait for the whole winter season to pass to wear my dress?

Life is short! Besides dying, which is probably the first thing that came to your minds when I said life is short, there are other things that could happen.

I could gain weight. Remember I am in the pre-menopausal phase where weight gain is highly possible.

I could lose weight as one who is keeping fit and watching what they eat.

If either was to happen, the way the dress fits would automatically change.

The other thing that could happen, I am not really bothered by it. The dress could be out of fashion or no longer trendy as the young people put it!

I am not one of the people who get worried about fashion trends because I have realised some of them are like one hit songs that are short lived.

When buying clothes, I do my best to be economical and realistic.

I cannot be chasing each fashion trend because I will not keep up.

There are people who are just waking up to design clothes while some of us go around doing health promotion and writing articles to share what we have encountered.

The passion and the commitment on both sides is high, each one of us determined to make a lasting impression and leave positive imprints in this world.

Have you not come across a committed motor mechanic, going about his work happily in a soiled work suit?

I am not sure what drives these people to work in such soiled attire and happily so. Back in my childhood days, we used to think these people were not careful when working and as a result they soiled their clothes!

Lack of information is dangerous.

This was the time that we used to think that anyone in a pair of overalls (there were no work suits then) was a mechanic. We did not prefix the word with motor then, we just corrupted the word to be makanika!

Imagine the astonishment upon realising that motor mechanics is just one profession among many, where an overall is required.

There are auto electricians, panel beaters, diesel plant fitters, fitter and turners, fitter machinists among others.

Learning also that some have minimal grease on their overalls was an eye opener.

The key take away from all of this is, it is not fair to judge when you have little information or to cram people in one category because of the little information that you have. So even if you see us wearing our winter boots or our summer dresses and you think we are going against the weather please let us be.

You may never know the full story because some battles we choose to fight silently.

The one place that teaches individuals many life lessons is high school.

Looking back now, I realise that there were many actors and actresses that never received awards for their perfect acting.

The high school years can be considered as some successful seasons of movies that were never released. It is in high school that people claimed to be orphans when none of the parents were deceased.

Some even told others that their parents were their aunts and uncles!

Others did not eat certain foods because they alleged they made them sick. Looking back some of these were wrong coping mechanisms.

Once one starts lying, they have created extra work for themselves, they need to remember their lie precisely.

When one goes to high school, they need to be highly assertive because this is where training for the real world begins, more so if one is a boarder.

One stays with others all the time. When one is a day scholar some aspects of their life are left closed.

For girls, one aspect to differentiate them is the sanitary ware they use.

Some girls claimed there were cotton wool cheer leaders for life and nothing would move them from the `white loaves of bread` during a critical life event (menstruation).

This they did confidently and in the process recruited others to the wool team.

I was with one of the faithful cotton wool users from high school recently.

I applauded her for being a faithful cotton wool user then. She said it had been a coping mechanism.

She knew what her family could afford, she had learnt to live within her means.

She said from an early age, she had learnt to love what was within her reach and make do without having to cause unnecessary tension and pressure back home.

We smiled as we remembered how she had promoted cotton wool and made it appealing resulting in some crossing the floor!

Now she has access to variety of sanitary ware but she remains faithful to cotton wool and has over the years mastered its use.

She confessed she has tried other sanitary ware which are good but, in most instances, prefers her roots!

When others said they failed using cotton wool, or it failed them, she is able to say to cotton wool ‘till menopause do us apart!’

Like the one in the winter boots at the end of winter and me in the summer dress at the beginning of winter, no-one has the right to judge without the full story. Not everyone in an overall with grease is a motor mechanic!