The mothers of Mending a Crack in the Sky meet in a Weston Road classroom early on Nov. 30. MOE DOIRON / TORONTO STAR
By Wendy Gillis
The introductions are a formality meant for any newcomers to the weekly Saturday meeting, called to order before much of the city is awake. But, in truth, the women inside this Weston Road classroom already know each other intimately. They’re neighbours and friends who call each other “sister.” They know all too well why they’re here.
There’s Shamso Mohamoud, whose 18-year-old son was shot in the head near a Yorkdale Mall housing complex in 2008. There’s Shamso Elmi, whose 24-year-old son was killed in 2015 in Vancouver. There’s Ayan Ali Abddow, whose 17-year-old son was fatally stabbed outside an Etobicoke apartment in 2016.
There’s a mother whose son is recovering from a stabbing — “he’s alive, thank God,” she says — and a young woman whose brother was recently fatally shot, and yet another who had buried her nephew Irshad the day before. He was shot and left on the side of a Kitchener highway last month.“We are all nervous in the neighbourhoods that we live in — and if there is one problem with one family, it affects all of us,” says Halima Adan, a Jane and Finch-area mother who fears for her son’s safety.
Every woman here has been touched by the violence they say is crippling their community.
Source: Toronto Star