Of Men and Women

I grew up in a family setting that presented to me men as a different entity from women. Oh yes. Not even being a last born in a family of six saved me from answering questions I was so sure my brother was better placed to respond to. Despite being young, I always sought to know why mummy chose to ask me why there were no vegetables for supper, cows had not been fed to her satisfaction (any “normal” African knows this is boys’ chores) and worst of all why there was no firewood. I actually used to struggle with that heavy axe in pursuit of pieces of wood as my brother probably sat on the wooden fence listening to soka.

Life was unbearable. I hated it. I always wanted to know why. Maybe by then I was so young to understand; so many years later I am yet to make sense out of the whole setting. Just that am now old enough to fight for myself. Old enough to look at my mummy and tell her the boys should worry of the cows as I get rained on in the garden looking for vegetables (Rain is a MUST in Kisii. Such a blessing). Men should just be men and women just what they were meant to be; women.

I am not an activist as some of my friends may be thinking. But I have never ignored the fact that I tend to disagree with what society has made us believe men are. Contrary to what many of you may be expecting, I am not and will never be a proponent of gender equality. I used to be. I tried it. It never worked. I learnt. And now I know better. God designed us differently; that women have their abilities which men can never measure up to and vice versa.

Anyway, the content in this post is not the gospel truth, especially bearing in mind that I bring forth my arguments based on my brothers, my boys and the men I have happened to share with. I always imagine marriage will serve me right. Then I will know what it means to lose breath when that pilau I might have tried to surprise him with decides to backfire. My married friends tell me its taboo to serve a husband with some poorly cooked junk. “The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach” It gets me thinking if, currently staying with my elder sister, some meal intended to be sweet turning out otherwise could really snatch some nice part of my evening happiness. It has occurred, so many times. Those many days I had to throw some good amount of lentils because they burnt(namaanisha kuungua) as i was busy responding to a tweet or maybe enjoying the google+ storify. I simply scream, curse everything, throw my phone hard on the bed and move on. I couldn’t do that before my husband.

Now, my fellow women. I write this to bring to your attention the realities of life. For quite some time now we have been living in the ideal world. a) We are not as fragile as the male ego. I can be a witness to this. Tamper with a woman’s emotions, she will cry it out and move on. Men and their ego!!! It’s sad news. I know of a man whose ego I teased close to 6 years now and he is yet to get over it. b) We are always at the receiving end. We always pay the price. Like it or not it’s us women who end up as victims of the “sins” we commit with men. Yes, that moment of love and sex will haunt you as the lady. Until the man puts on his pants and walks away when you start vomiting in the morning it’s always us. Until you are forced out of school to nurse that baby as he boldly denies ever having any affair with you. He will leave you 7 months heavy, move in with your best friend and probably do the same to her. Those are men for us. c) We always have a choice. I am one person who believes in choices as opposed to circumstances. Yes. Women choose to go to bed with the very men that will later dump them, leaving behind “fatherless” kids. Unless it’s a rape case, it’s you as the woman that dressed up for him that evening he asked to take you out. It’s you that agreed to spend with him in that posh hotel room, probably lying to yourself that nothing was going to happen. I am a bit sensitive with men; I always believe when they are being too good to a woman they are focusing at something. Darling, you had a choice.

I am aware the claims above don’t sound so good to any woman that has been in that situation, you are not alone. People make mistakes. I too have; from the platonic relationships that cost me so much energy to break to the relationships I have had to walk away from. I tend to agree with E.L James “You have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince” I have. It comes a point in a woman’s life that you have to live by your principles and standards no matter how ideal they may sound. Sooner than later you will realize the thing you used to hold dear never really mattered to you. Then in a while you will notice you were hanging on to people that never deserved you. It happens. If a man cannot be good when he is working hard to get you home, run. He will never treat you better once you are 8 months pregnant for him and relatively unattractive. If he cannot afford you a simple card on your birthday don’t expect him to afford a low-cost jambojet flight to Nairobi for free. Be sensitive. Read between the lines. Guard your life. Flee for your life.

“You must make a decision that you are going to move on. It wont happen automatically. You will have to rise up and say, ‘I don’t care how hard this is, I don’t care how disappointed I am, I’m not going to let this get the best of me. I’m moving on with my life.” Philippians 3: 13 Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead.