The Inevitable

You know when quiet unassuming guys think they can run from your cray cray self and find themselves a quiet Betty Crocker girl but ...eventually they find that your particular sauce of cray cray is what drives them, makes them feel better about their quiet, understand their quiet and appreciate their resolve. I often ask myself, why do they even run? You think women are always meant to be curt with an apron and a smile. Some of us are made with crazy. There's love but there's also a whole lotta crazy. So to that Politically Correct guy who's waiting for that color coordinated girl to match, that one that resembles somewhat the lovely wholesome daughter in law his mother imagined. IT IS INEVITABLE. We. Are. Meant. To. Be.

Blank Mind, Blank Canvas

I haven't written in months. 

Since October to be exact. The new job. The new sparse location. Inadequate living quarters. Smashed computer screen. I just haven't written. There's so much creativity harnessed in our own space without having people jibber jabbering when you're trying to be one with your thoughts. And even when I find that solitude that is enough to tap into my thoughts, I loose it because there's no space for me to sit and write, or it's too hot, or the space gets cracked with a voice or a phone call or a reminder to send an email, complete a report, or wash the dishes. 

I haven't written. 

I got a new computer so it would energize me to write. New keyboard, new resolution screen. New Apple everything. Still. Still I haven't written. Not one rousing word.

How do I write?

Someone said to me in between one of the lunches we had over the Holidays that saying as a single person that you should embrace your single status is just you being sorry for yourself. That being single isn't something you should be proud of. 

I went on to explain my stance and I thought that was something new to write about on Anita Writes that embracing your single status is not us single people trying to fake the funk, it's us trying to wear our badge boldly and saying: "until that shit, that situation changes, this is us, we're here, we're single and we're not gonna sit in our apartments and cry about it."

Alas, that article is still not written. 

There are all these thoughts and ideas that come to me from conversations, the few ones I had in Lagos, and interactions and uncertain random musings online. I have still not written. I don't know why. Words don't mean quite as much to me now as they used to. 

I am not as connected to my "soft."

Why?

A Lady Walks Into a Bar

It's been a year since I made the post - A Girl Walks Into a Bar. A Whole Year.

Since that time I've been walking (and drinking) in bars all over Lagos and Abuja, hoping my emphatic presence would somehow sway prejudices. I'd like to say that the mindset of gentlemen everywhere towards single women seated at bars has changed in the past year but as a matter of fact it has not. It has substantially stayed the same. Not worse but the same. Sometimes it hits you when you least expect it that, "Wait, I'm a woman and I cannot sit at a bar or lounge alone just because it gives everyone the wrong impression. What a cross I bear along with all the others women have to bear. What an unnecessary cross."Who created that cross? Culture. Society. Men?

It's so easy to blame men. But did we women encourage these prejudices by letting them relegate us to...the kitchen?! By shunning the bar and considering that sinful place only men are permitted to go.

Just the other day whilst on a business trip at corporate lodging in a hotel across the street from EKO Hotel Lagos, I, being the green living woman that I am, walked across to EKO Hotel for dinner. As I made my way through the gate, an uncouth slouchy "market-woman" woman that had been placed at the gate stopped me. I thought she wanted to go through my bag, but instead she stated in her broken English: "We do not allow single women or unaccompanied women to go to the restaurant or bar."

I was dressed in casual jeans and a tee-shirt. In no country does this qualify as "hooker gear." I asked again, "What did you just say?" And she repeated herself. This time emphatic that it was management's rules. I offered to show her my business card but she rejected it. Probably unable to read. I wondered for a brief second if it would make a difference if I got into a cab and drove in through the gate as opposed to walking in. Why waste the money? If she had her instructions to keep single women out of their establishment can you imagine what the mindset of management and other patrons would be? I sucked it up, downtrodden and walked back to my hotel. Feeling defeated for all single women out there.

Single women - we have our work cut out for us. It is a long road filled with a lot of prejudiced men (and women!), loved ones included. We need to decide if this is a fight worth continuing or accepting defeat. As my feminist aunt would say, "Don't date a man who wants to keep you in his kitchen." Women are meant for a lot more. We mean more to society so we should enjoy the rights and privileges of society sans prejudices. I've just had one entire year of trying to convince my African friends and loved ones of this right which according to them is nonexistent and is not applicable to African women. Why? Because it's just not done...in our society.

Right now, I am on the fence bruised from a bloodied fight.

End of year...Awakening

Paris Streets at Midnight

As the year ended I had to find a way to settle into myself, into me, the subtlety of me. I could only do that by going on vacation as I normally do, take a trip for the last week in the year. It required a little juggling around, a lot of unexpected expenses and a lot of pampering but I was still able to swing it. And I'm glad I did. 

I had a good time. But for a couple of mishaps here and there and the almost 4 hour wait at the airport to get back. It was a swell time. My first time being in Lagos with some change in my pocket, not a whole lot, but enough to keep me entertained and sponsor myself. You never know how good it feels for you to sponsor yourself with a drink, a dress, a perfume, a fancy meal here and there. An occasional splurge is just what the doctor ordered every time for moments when you are unsure of yourself. Women don't know there's so much power in that. 

What is my summary of 2015:

Regardless of what I posted here and there and in reading them you may have come up with your own summary of my flailing psyche, my summary remains that in every thing you should always stay humble, stay hungry and trust God for your miracle, for your strength, for a way to explain away the chaos, for calm and most especially, for comfort. He's the reason I made it through 2015 smiling bigger and brighter than when I entered it, and He will be the reason I make it through 2016 even better. 

2016:

Whenever a new year starts I am not as overtly optimistic as the rest of the world. Perhaps it's my cynical "glass half empty" mentality, I don't know. But there's always some reservation on my part, "Oh wow, what's this year gonna bring on me this time around?" I murmur to myself amidst the jubilant choruses of Happy New Year. New Years are hard...economy is in flux, new governments usually come onboard with laws that wreck the equilibrium, everyone's broke from the Holidays, it's just a very sparse time. It's only till the summer that the year starts getting its own groove. For me, 2015 was just like that. I went through many lonely moments, periods where I couldn't process what I was feeling, numbness at times and just plain anger. 

I pray those moments slowly ebb away this new year. I pray to understand what to do at those times. Most especially, God help us all.