Happy International Happiness Day

This was so impromptu and I'm glad myself and Obute had fun writing this together (check her blog here: https://amnotablogger.wordpress.com/)
 I will be looking forward to your comments on what makes you happy and update the post with your contributions! Happy International Happiness Day or whatever the fuck that really means lol.

1. Happiness is blissful sleep. Waking up lazily at 10am because it's a holiday/weekend. Not at 5am, 5:10 or 5:15am by the consecutive alarms you set because you know one alarm isn't enough to get you out of bed and ready for work on time.

2. Happiness is food, not the fat or the calories, or table manners you have to be conscious of. It is purely from the joy of eating.

3. Happiness is you! Making me feel like a kid again. It is my heart before and during you, and not after.

4. Happiness is found sometimes at the bottom of your 4th glass of long island. It is when you become relaxed enough to twerk for the stranger watching you from the other corner of the bar.

5. Happiness starts on friday evening and ends with the massive hangover called monday.

6. Happiness is FREE INTERNET, CONSTANT ELECTRICITY, FREE ROADS and FUEL.

7. Happiness is the confidence of repeatedly swiping your card to get yourself new clothes without worrying about account balance.

8. Happiness is the smell of burnt toasts in the morning. Knowing he wasn't another one night stand.

9. Happiness are old rainy nights that have you cuddled up in your blanket .

10. Happiness is not going to bed alone. It is his scent reminding you that he hasn't left. Having his body envelop you with warmth and love.

11. Happiness is an unexpected credit alert.

12. Happiness are gifts, flowers, anonymous love notes that make us melt a little bit inside and feel appreciated.

13. Happiness are your little cute kisses all over my face as you hold my head still with your hands.

14. Happiness is when the light comes on at 2am and you know you're not going to die in the heat that already got your night shirt soaked.

15. Happiness is the laughter of my one year old baby, the excitement in his eyes, his cute cheeks, his front two teeth and little pink gums.

How to be Woman and Alive.

This is really personal for me and I am glad to be sharing. I and my friend Damola collaborated to bring this to you. I love how she brings out light and emotions in her words and I was so syched to be doing this with her. We hope this empowers those it's meant for. Check out her blog also (https://thenigerianstoryteller.wordpress.com/) & thank me later!

1. Remember the time your father called you his little banker. The time your mother said you held the key to happiness when you prepared vegetable soup to the perfect shade of green. Forget you're having trouble meeting up with both obligations at the same time. Swallow these expectations. Don't burst.

2. Be strong enough to dream, your dream is in a faraway location, modelling, writing, creating something, this is not compatible with the Nigerian dream of hammering. Do not forget to dream but more importantly remember to leave it at your bed when you wake.

3. Do not end up being a stifled voice with unfulfilled dreams. Listen to everyone around you filled to the brim with "could have beens." You don't have the guts to become who you want. Practice along with the crowd, name your dreams. Picture yourself at 30, 40. Weigh the consequences, choose wisely.

4. Think of your friend Chioma who is now 3 times her size, but lives with her husband, she says it is better than being alone. She says it's not just the food, there are lots of things you swallow as a woman, things you see and cannot repeat; husband's text messages, in-laws requests. The food is just something that takes you away for a moment and fills you up with something other than tears.

5. See yourself being a house wife one day too. Start practicing, do everything to keep him before he thinks of leaving. Wake up to make his meals, wash his underwear, wait up for him when he doesn't come home, talk to yourself alone in your room. "Do you like how it tastes"

6. I hope your goal in life isn't just bearing another man's name. no actually, you have bigger goals, you intend to bear six sons, all of who will also take his name.

7. I hope your mother's unhappy eyes haunt you, every second she spent trying to make it work. Every time she changed reasons. "I'm not doing this for him anymore, I'm doing it for my children". I love him but he's hurt me a lot. I hope you don't make the same mistakes.

8. Ignore how many times you've been called a slut. Don't explain anything to them, or how lightly you gave yourself away. How many men you let in between you because you liked the taste of their lips or how they pronounced your name. Or the times you just wanted some fucking attention because you're human.

9. It doesn't matter how they can't see you or what you're capable of becoming. How much you love the camera and how you can take everything off before it. You are a goddess, you are unafraid of worship. You are a goddess and even all his unbelief will not conquer you.

10. He talks to you about how you are older than this, now 23, an age where men need to find you respectable, to consider you. Fuck him, tell him you're not a candidate, you're the damn examiner. That you cannot be stripped down into a word, a definition. When you're done cursing, ask him if he considers himself worthy enough.

11. Baby girl I hope you always remember this last point. You are too awesome, too wild and beautiful to be defined, to be stripped down to wife material, or to just one thing. You are this person made of carbon, hydrogen and calcium and capable of incredible things. Baby girl you are a miracle.

For Okwukwe

CHEERS TO OUR IGBO PALM WINE. Sourced from the tree of her ancestors.

From deep within the forests of Anambra and beyond.

From the ages.

They worked for millenniums until they had made her.

After aeons of refining.

Rare. Pure. 

They had finally produced their best drink yet.

Always fresh. Yet aging like the fine wine that she is.

Masterpiece.

Fluid. And graceful in fluidity. 

Those she passed by caught  a whiff of her and yearned to taste.

Lusting for the intoxication that came with a drink of her.

But only few had tasted. 

Only few had experienced the intoxication of her presence. 

Of her kindness. Her intellect. Her laughter. Of her love.

We rise, we fortunate few, on the day she was born to say cheers to our Igbo Palm Wine.

She will live forever in our hearts. Even when she ages no more.

Happy Birthday Okwukwe. Our Igbo Palm wine.

Live forever.

-Baantu

25-01-2016

"What happened?"
 ...silence.....
 Stare into nothing. You are deep in thought. Pretending to try to remember what you never really forgot.

"Did you forget how to feel?"
"Feelings are visitors, let them come and let them go"
 Have teary eyes now. It is important you look like someone capable of exhibiting emotions.

"You used to be vulnerable and fearless"
"We all have paranoia inside us"
This wasn't a lie.

"I meant you were an optimist. What changed?"
"Reality"
This wasn't a lie either.

"Did someone hurt you? Is that what changed you?"
"I still carry memories of how each one of them left"
You were too intense. Most of them had said this.

You don't talk about the details.
That it is both a blessing and a curse to feel everything, so very deeply.
To feel real love and true happiness with someone in a way that made you complete
And then have it all taken away
leaving you the worst kind of hurt.

You don't talk of the huge man and his huge self inside you.
He was going to help you get a job so you agreed to visit his hotel room even though you were aware he had always looked at you with hungry eyes. Despite your tears and pleas, he pins you down and pushes himself forcefully into your tight space. His hand is over your mouth and no one hears your muffled screams. He rolls away from you, speaking as though to himself how disappointing you turned out to be. You are in so much pain for the next few days.

You don't say who you are. A drunk
You don't say you got it from your father.
Who after working 12 joyless hours with the other laborers at the site and answering "yes sir" to a boy half his age, could only find his testicles was in the big Ragolis bottles filled with vile tasting white water he bought mostly on credit from his palmwine tapper friend. Your mom had scars almost every time this happened, other scars cut deeper than the dark pink colored bruises on her skin.

You don't talk about the looks and whispers that came with being unmarried at 40.
For people to see you as undesirable. The looks of scorn, the unbearable ones of pity. Your younger sister had been married off while you were the stock fish drying up in your father's compound. Your mom would kneel and pray at night, binding the witches that were chasing men away from you.

You don't talk about the accident at your sister's house.
How you carried your married sister's baby in your hand and a cup of American honey in the other.
You slipped, missed a step and let the baby go. Her head met the edge of the step. There was so much blood. You didn't drop your drink however, It didn't even spill, not one drop. Your sister doesn't know the truth, but she doesn't forgive you either.

You don't say anything. You just stare into nothing.

Untitled

How do you know the one?
What sign is the universe supposed to give so you know
Your soul mate,
Destinies intertwined. Fates to become one
That this person will always love you.
Always understand
Never leave you.

That this person will not fall out of love with you
Bola didn't know what that meant till her husband for 22 years told her he didnt love her anymore and he had fallen in love with another woman.

That this person will not become your abusive husband.
Sara finally got the courage to leave her husband,  showing up at her parents' sometime after midnight, swollen faced in torn clothes sobbing out two years of domestic violence.

That this person will not make you feel like nothing, undesirable nothing.
Irene knew her husband chased younger girls. She now weighed 3 times more and wore big unattractive clothes to hide her tummy folds. It had been years since her husband touched her or even wanted her in that way. But she wasn't the same person in their wedding photo that hung on the wall of the living room.

That this person will not make you see love differently, smaller than what it is.
"You shouldn't show you care so much, it's the number one rule of the love game" Anita advised her heartbroken friend.

That this person won't make you pretend that you are happy and what it is love just because the truth is too painful and the loneliness unbearable.

09-12-2015

I hope your boyfriend isn't a philanthropist. Boyfriend to the boyfriendless. A listening ear to their many problems. a shoulder for them to cry all their lonely tears on.

I hope you will not end up loving someone who will leave you. Someone who will dizzy you such that anyone after him will seem like a shadow and love will become that bitter regret.

I hope you don't grow up witnessing your mother live in a loveless marriage. I hope your heart doesn't break looking at her ever sad eyes and her feeble attempts at smiling. I hope you are unaware you are the reason she is sacrificing her happiness.

I hope you do not look at your life, years from now and feel like shit. I hope you will be able to forgive yourself for all the wrong decisions you made in the name of love, the careless ones you made because you were tired of being lonely.

I hope you grow up scared of men, their sex and their semen.

The man is the boy with intense eyes that told you he loved you, the one whose stares were so hot you got nervous and fidgeted with your sweaty palms. The man is the boy who made your heart flutter and your eyes dreamy. The man is the boy who made you smile a lot, who made you hope. The man is the boy who left you after you bared your soul to him, the one who made living unbearable.

Their sex is his penis, standing like a sharp weapon, ready to tear your woman space. Their sex is his sweaty voice in your ear, telling you - "just the tip", "i'll be gentle", "i want you so much right now". Their sex is the deafening pain you feel when he puts more than the tip inside. Their sex is his violent thrusts despite your tears, pleading and feeble attempts to push him away.

Their semen is morning sickness, weight gain and a stomach the size of a pumpkin. Their semen is a big round secret under your dress that can not be hidden. Their semen is disappointed parents, your yelling father and your crying mother. Their semen is stopping school because the principal thinks you are a bad example. Their semen is leaving church because you can not deal with the judgemental stares. Their semen is housing another human inside you, their semen is labour pain, your baby splitting your body open to come out. Their semen is a crying baby, money for baby things, raising a child by yourself.

17/11/2015

It had been a bit more than a year since you had told someone those words
"I love you"
Admitting that you were helplessly drawn to another person. Making yourself the worst kind of vulnerable. Giving your heart to someone else. You remember how that wrecked you. How you had struggled to live after he left.
How everyone thought you were stupid for making yourself miserable for him but they didn't understand you did not know how to go back to being strangers with someone that has seen your soul.
How it had been 10 months since you spoke to your best friend.
And somehow things were never the same.
You do not know how to tell people he took a part of you with him, how the bits of you left cannot contain anyone else but yourself.
Now no one gets close enough to know you. You managed to leave every beautiful thing that could have been love.
The guy last year, on your birthday dinner, with hopeful eyes and a diamond ring in the pocket of his jacket. You told him not to embarrass you in public.
He never got the chance to bring it up again, that was the last day he saw you.
You just knew they were all going to hurt you.
The one who wanted to know your name the morning after drunken lust and meaningless sex. The one that looked so appealing after your sixth shot of tequila the night before at the bar.
You told him there's no need.
Your friend asks you why you are being difficult and why you have refused to try again, you tell her they are all going to leave, she asks you how you know, you tell her you can smell rejection from miles away.