of sundays, voices and utilitarianism

 Disclaimer: A random post if ever there existed one! I'd read on anyway... :))))))))

I haven’t written in a very long time. Not for other eyes anyway. I think part of it may be attributed to the fact that I decided a long time ago that my blog was not going to be a whine page. It was, naturally, soon after I had turned it into a whine page. So the last few weeks have gone by in a blur. Some have been happy, some not so much; most of them have been busy though. And all I need is one week away from writing and pretty soon I’m all about the keeping quiet.

It’s Sunday night. It will be Monday morning very soon. It was a good Sunday, a really good Sunday. Certainly the best Sunday since before that Sunday I was back in Busia with the main man of the hour (that would be the guy leading Sunday service with the mic right outside my ears (not really, but it certainly felt close enough to them)) woke me up with a series of choruses he would sing for exactly one minute at a time. He wouldn’t even allow the congregation to be done with the response, before he juxtaposed (see how I put that there oh-so-naturally) the next ‘number’. He continued to do this for close to an hour. Even mum, who had been trying to sing along as she went about her tasks, got frustrated.

I know I should have been attending service rather than asleep, but I had just travelled 600km roughly, jolted awake every hour or so during the trip by some mishap on the road that forced our driver to employ all his magical emergency braking skills. I was tired. So naturally all sounds that were not of soothing music lulling me sleep-ward were scowled upon. Nonetheless I woke up to contribute to my share of the things that needed doing, after I figured there would be no more sleeping that morning. Mum would prefer if I said it was because I hadn’t after all travelled 600km and survived biting cold for an hour in a cold dark room with strange men to come and sleep. Nary, I had not. Yes, I know that wasn’t a nary situation.

That turned out to be an okay Sunday, despite how it began. But everything about this Sunday was perfect. Mostly though this Unchained Voices double album launch thing I went to at Alliance Francaise. Teardrops and Mufasa, launching their album, Sarabi, H_art the Band, Stacy (whose voice is so gloriously sophisticated, and whose style reminds me of something between Adele and India Arie). Sarabi’s rendition of Amandla was way cooler than what they have on their album. Somehow now I can’t imagine what it would be like if they performed Msalimie live, I think I might swoon. That’s a distinct possibility. I looooooooove Msalimie.

And there was the MC. His name is Elsaphah Njora. Also known as Benjamin from Village Christmas 2010. Youch! He was hilarious. And deep. And hilarious. I’m still smiling. For real he should be the next Groove Awards host. I certainly know if I’m ever placed in charge of planning any event I will be frantically looking for him. Oh, he was amazing.

So back to why I haven’t written in a while. To illustrate my point, I’m going to share a paragraph I got from my research of the first article I ever wrote for Martin: "How to write a good article". By the way, #someoneTellMartin to change that topic, yaaaye. Anywho, paragraph, if I can find it:

I was the language crank, the one who swooned over sentences. I could forgive much in a book if it was written with force and beauty, if its story was told in a voice unlike anything I’d heard before, if the writer was finding new and mesmerizing ways to employ the same words that have been available to all American writers for hundreds of years. I tended to balk if a book contained some good lines but also some indifferent ones. I insisted that every line should be a good one. I was—and am—a bit fanatical on the subject.       ~Michael Cunningham~

Yaaaaay, found it! You can read the full article , and if you hope to ever be any good at writing, I’d strongly suggest that you do. Not that I have done much of what the good people say, but it’s got some valid points one ought to go back to from time to time (added to list of pinned tabs). 

When my mother was in college she wrote an essay on Shakespeare once in her English class. She scored 18 out of a possible 20. The lecturer was known to be quite stingy with marks (I know what you’re thinking; parents say things like that all the time). Well, dad corroborates the story, and thinking that they sat down thirty years ago and plotted to mislead us with such tales seems to be too much trouble. Ergo, I believe them. Also I saw the essay. Yes, she kept it. Not just for the marks, but because after giving her that mark the lecturer went ahead to write “I am tempted to give you a much higher mark blah blah”. 

The point was not that my mother was a brilliant writer, even though she is. The point is that those are the people who raised me. When you get used to a certain standard of grammar, finesse and quality in writing, you cannot help but become an editor. So I am one. Unfortunately it’s the reason I’m also afraid of writing. I have written a few okay pieces in my day. I consider this one to be one such, flowing with the ease of a river moving downstream. 

But more often than not, I feel ill equipped to maintain the standard I have set for my writing. I know that if I open my mouth, I may score a few great sentences, but most of them will be “bland, slack utilitarian” sentences that “serve no other purpose than to transport the reader from point A to point B”. Michael again.  Therefore I keep quiet. Until the urge hits again like a bathroom break, and I cannot sleep for all the itching in my fingers. And I go at it on a Sunday-almost-Monday night-stroke-morning. 

And all of a sudden, the universe in no longer so skewed upon its axis. The reason I wanted to write this piece in the first place was to talk about things you cannot change. I won’t be doing that. Because these are 1000+ words. It is sufficient. But now you have a reason to return next time. I’ll go read that editorial so my sentences can remain as intriguing. Hopefully.