Five Things I Hate About Valentine's Day

I've spent the past week dreading this day so I woke up this morning with every intension to stay in the safety of my house all day. My sister, who came to visit over the weekend, insisted on going out to watch 50 shades which I had no intension of paying my hard earned money to see, but the appeaser in me relented. And so I was faced today with the 5 things I hate about Valentine's Day.

1. The Couples. I hate those pairs that look like they were made for each other. They have the same dress sense and seem to move in the same circles. I have no idea what my dress sense is so I wouldn't know what my valentine would look like. Thanks for that reminder,couples!

2. The love statuses. Not that it's different on any other day, but on Vday it's every. Single. Status update. Now, all of a sudden, people are poets and smoother than R Kelly! I don't care, dude!

3. Love Statuses unrelated to an actual lover. Love messages to friends, kids, pets. Newsflash! Valentine's day is meant for people who are romantically involved. You're not fooling anyone with those, my friend.

4. People who refuse to celebrate Valentines Day. "Let's go out wearing all black just to prove to them that we don't care about Vday." I see you! You care! Stop fronting!

5. It's-ok-to-be-single blogs. Nothing makes me feel like more of a leper than those blogs that go on and on telling you all the reasons why you should be glad to be single. They tell you that you are better off on your own because you have more time on your hands, you answer to no one and have no responsibilties what so ever. My heart bleeds as I read through all that nonsense because I know  that all I want in my life to be smothered by the presence of another, not free time!

Here's the truth, though. I hate being alone. I hate not sharing my life with anyone, coming home to an empty house and Valentine's day is a bitter reminder that this is my situation; I am alone. So, dear world, I beg you with tears in my eyes. If you have the privellege of loving someone and being loved in return enjoy it ( but not too much because it makes me sad) and if you don't, shut up! We all know you secretely want it! And for those few that are genuinely indifferent to love days, don't rebel against them. You just sound ungreatful.

Tatoo

I need a slap accross the face. I need a punch in the stomach, a kick in the ovaries! I need some kind of awakening to the beauty of my life. And not in that settling type of attitude because what else can you do but be grateful, but a sincere content feeling; a peace. All I want is peace.

I seriously considered getting a tatoo. I'm turning thirty this year and I want to do big things. But to be honest, I don't have a good enough reason to get one besides the fact that it is slightly taboo. But seriously, how many taboo things have I been doing all these years? And is it a good enough reason? Wanting to do something out of this world? Well, out of my world anyway because my world has become incredibly dull and morbid. I wish I was in another world. I wish someone would come in and make it brighter and better otherwise I fear that I will disappear into oblivion; actual oblivion and that is the saddest most terrifying thought....

"Ugly" Black Woman

"Ugly" black woman who resembled a boy, had grazed knees because she always ran instead of walked and hated the sight of shoes. She just wanted to play.

"Ugly" Black woman who never wore skirts unless for netball, who kept her hairstyle simple to keep eyes averted and cracked jokes to keep them at a distance. She hid behind her six string, eyes closed hoping they couldn't see her. She really just wanted them to see her though.She just wanted to find herself.

"Ugly" black woman who tried so hard to be pure in His eyes but still felt like  she was failing. She just wanted His affirmation.

"Ugly" black woman who waited and waited and is still waiting. "Why don't you see me?" is her persistant question. She just wants to be enough.

"Ugly" black woman. You are fire. You feel everything  painful and it's ok. Your heart is shredded and now it's  numb dispite it all. But someday. Someday you'll feel the beauty and the love too. One day your smile will match your heart flutters.

Let's Celebrate

I walked into my mother's house during the December holidays exhausted from a long and irritating trip to the homeland and all I wanted to do was relieve my swollen feet and get out of my  clothes that reeked of brandy and  overnight body odour. It took me a second to take note, but the lounge I grew up in didn't look like the lounge I grew up in. We had been robbed! The couches I've always known were replaced by leather ones!

Earlier last year, my mother  decided to resign from her job of 18 years and the department she had dedicated 29 years to so that she could enjoy her home. One of the things she was advised to do with all her retirement money was to buy one big thing that would be a physical symbol of her emancipation - she decided to change our lounge suite for the first time in 29 years.

I stood in a tired amazed stupour staring at this room that was changed for the first time since I was born. I was suddenly in awe at how far we had come. For the first time in a long time, money was not a problem in my immediate family. My brother has a job he is happy in and I have the privellege of seeing him whenever I like. My mom is finally in a place in her life where she has most of the things I always wanted for her - And peace of mind. These are things I've always looked at with other families, things I have always longed for for my own family and for the first time, we were that family.

With the new year just beginning, people around me are setting goals; new things they want to accomplish, old habits they want to give up on, better people they want to be and all I want to do is celebrate.

I want to celebrate that this year, I turn 30 years old, my sister turns 21 and my mother turns 60! Those are important milestones! I want to celebrate our success as a family, where we come from and where we are. For us, this is not the year to self-improve, but rather to sit back and marvel at all that has happened over the years. We are trully blessed beyond what we could ever dream in abundance and in need.

Friends Forever!

There are different types of people that come in and out of our lives. There are those that leave because you outgrow each other and those that stay usually do so because you choose each other.

And then there  are those that walk in and stay by accident. Karolien is that friend. We played in bands together at university. We never really moved in the same circles, but we always got along relatively well. When university days came to an end, she was the last person I expected to still have in my life 5 years later. It started with daily google chat conversations when we both hated our jobs and lived for our google translate conversations that varied from French to German! In retrospect she really got me through those 15 months. We had an opportunity to catch up today; see each other again for the first time in years.

I walk away now so grateful to have her as a friend and grateful for such flukes in life. We don't always know who is best to have in our lives. It's nice to have certain people that we have no choice in having.

I Can't Get No Satisfaction

"Drink from that wishing well but may it never quench your thirst."

 I hate this concept because it encourages us to keep desiring more from our lives. But when you want more it's usually out of dissatisfaction with how your life is in the moment. It's the dissatisfaction that I hate. On the seventh day, God looked at everything he had made and said that is was good.He was satisfied. Sure, it was really the beginning of huge disasters that He knew were coming, but in that moment, He was satisfied. I don't want to be God (obviously) but I want to be able to look over my life and say the same thing. I want to be satisfied with the way things are in all the different aspects of my life and to make changes based on a desire to tweak what is already there. I am nowhere near this point because I feel there are too many big changes that I still need to make. I'd like my thirst to be quenched in that sense and the continued thirst to be about smaller things; things that will not leave me anxious because  I haven't changed them.

I hate discomfort. I hate constant change. I hate that I have not yet arrived where I'd like to be. I hate that I am constantly restless. Take that away and I think I will function better and enjoy my life a bit more than I am right now. I'm rambling again...

Sleep

I wrote this last year in an attempt to romanticise what has now become my nemesis. Every day I wake up in the wee hours of the morning - wide awake.

Sleep deprives me.
Thoughts crowding my head.
So many hours lay ahead.

Ahead. I thought I was moving ahead.
Now I'm five steps lagging.
Ahead is now actually behind...

What lays behind me, I'll one day say out loud.
Alternatively, I'll always hold it inside in hope that someday, I'll forget...

Forget. It's easy to forget what I mean to you.
Have I forgotten or have you just not told me yet?

Yet through it all, He sees it all, knows it all and will take me through it all
It's all for my deer feet.