This Chic: Single and Happy?

The best bit about being single is the time I have had for self discovery.

I have done many summersorts in my efforts to know who I am what I am and what bits of myself I hate. And what bits I really like about my personality.

The result is each each that passes I say to myself. Gosh I was such a dimwit last year.

And I'm glad that it is all happening within my own circumference. 

30 Day Writing Challenge 

Day 6 : Single and Happy 

Day 4 and 5 are topics I'm not ready to poke at this moment. Day six didn't look so threatening.

Yeah I'm ready to reveal scars but not all of them. As yet.

When I was younger, I used to think that I wanted to get married yes, but could we have separate rooms?

Then I thought that yeah I possibly would like to get married but not before 29 because what if I discovered I didn't like the person anymore and wanted a divorce at 30?

So I thought maybe I should wait until I am past 30, so that the desire to divorce someone would have ended and I'd just be happy to have mūndū wa kūndirithia ūkūrū.

And then I got used to being single because that was the life I knew anyway. It was my mother's life and my grandmother's life and my great grandmother's too. The former two lost their husbands early in life. My mother, well, my mother, we'll poke at that another time.

And me, well. I needed to sort my issues before I got someone's son in the mix and made them miserable.

But how could I be single and happy without being lonely?

Honestly, unless someone mentions it explicitly, I hardly ever feel like my happiness would multiply from marriage.

In my singlehood/ness. I have learned what works for me and what doesn't.

As a creative, I know how to be alone.

I think marriage to someone I really like would add to my joy, but not like from 50%to 100%  but more like from 100% to 150%.

I also have learned that if I am not happy and comfortable with myself now, no son of Adam can make me happy and comfortable.

I have to know how to be happy right now.

I am happy too for the kind of tight deep reaching friendships I have had time to develop.

After marriage, one still needs these other connections.

I am happy that I can be empathetic to those who would really like a mate but haven't found the right one, or haven't been found by the right one or have had to leave the right one because of reasons.

I am happy too to have good relationships with members of the opposite sex without it needing to lead into anything. Just pure brotherly fatherly uncley relatinships.

I've had to come to terms with accepting my position as a middle aged woman in relation to single men slightly older than me  and my position in relation to single men way younger than me.

It's a balancing act of knowing how to be a single woman. A younger woman the older ones could date  or a big sister  to the younger ones but still the sort of woman they might find attractive. 

And the continued condescension between me and single men my age

So single and happy can ? Yeah. 

#singleness #growth#innerwork#adulting

Embracing Vulnerability: Crooked Teeth

I grew up being made fun of my brown teeth. I had white teeth once, then they fell out and what grew out next were big rugged uneven teeth that started to turn color the minute they got out of the gum.

People told me a there is nothing beautiful about a girl with brown teeth.
One teacher, when she found me kneeling next to the headteacher's office(coz I had been caught singing in class during prep.
I was probably just showing off or bored or having adolescent issues) The teacher asked why I kneeling.
I didn't feel like telling her.
She wasn't in my class
So I just smiled
And she said
How dare you smile at me with such rotten teeth?

I stopped smiling, she went her way, I shrugged but then I started smiling again coz she didn't get her answer to her nosiness anyway.

 My first day of high school

I had just met some new girls and we were happily talking then a girl who had been in my primary school but now a class ahead paused in front of us and instead of saying hi.

She exclaimed

Gosh Shishilia those are such ugly teeth!
I didn't smile much after that.

But I did some figuring
My uncle, the first man I ever loved had brown teeth. But he was funny, he worked hard and he took good care of me and granny. So you could have brown teeth and still be a human being.

I also realized my teeth didn't pain . And when I had my first dental appointment he said my teeth were quite clean.

I had been brushing my teeth furiously all my life.

My mother supplied me with a toothbrush three times a year as well as a bag of sweets to last me until her next visit.

I would brush, carefully every morning and every night
Then I would tuck in two large pieces of candy into my mouth and get into bed. Mwana no mwana.

Anyhow. I also learnt that I loved other part of me. I loved my fingers, and my hair when I washed it and it came out in dark brown curls.

I also loved my nose because it was large and not tiny or flat.

And I was happy with that
As long as everything worked why stress so much about it and in any case I wasn't trying to win a beauty contest.

Then one day a girl in my class said
Wow Cecilia you have such a beautiful smile.
I said
Really? Thanks.
And I went to have a look in the mirror and sort of believed her. So I started to smile more.

She set me free.

Years later I read a book that had a teenager in it who was worried about something in her body and someone told her- you cannot have it all dear, but one thing is sure, if one thing is not right then everything else is perfect.

And I see that in many instances.
Someone might have terrible skin but they've got hips from here to Moyale.

Or another will have bad eyesight but gal those nails!

(I write something about guys here but I'm not sure I wanna say it)

Because we are not just one thing.

We are a whole lot of other things.