you don't know the cost of the oil in my alabaster box

Have you ever met those people who are so sure they know everything there is to know about everything? Now there are those who do, those are fun to listen to, like listening to  a geek going on excitedly about something or other i probably will never get Then there are those who are just plain annoying, propagating ignorance with such a sense of righteousness in their own eyes.
I'm one of those people refer to as plus-size, thank God for development and activists, before i was just "fat'. At some point this was something i definitely minded, but in recent years after it was concluded that it was not going to go away, I daresay it's now a thing I don't completely dislike about me. Every so often though there comes a few crude Kenyans who test this resolve. Yes, you know who I mean, those who not only call me 'fat', that's a good word, the Swahili word they use is far much worse, 'mzito' translated 'heavy'. The picture drawn in my head when I hear that word is a 90kg sack of maize slumped against a wall. I'm talking about those people who insist on asking you really rude questions that are none of their business, like "Huwa unaenda gym?" (Do you go to the gym?) Those who assume that you automatically eat a whole lot, "Uko sure utashiba?" and when you don't they assume you are on some kind of a diet, "ama unajaribu ku-slim?" (Are you full, or are you trying to be slim?) It's worse when you skip the meal altogether!
I like to think we're in a new season where everyone is allowed to be who they are. But that aside, in any case, what should give you the right to make someone feel bad just because you got thin genes. My mum says as long as they still make clothes that fit well then there is no problem. You don't know where people have come from,  you do not know what they have overcome to be able to stand up straight. i like Cece's version of Mary's story, you don't know the cost of the oil in my alabaster box. Before you try to point fingers and claim I am wasting it, take time and find out its cost.

heroes 101

"Heroes didn't leap tall buildings or stop bullets with an outstretched hand; they didn't wear boots and capes. They bled, and they bruised, and their superpowers were as simple as listening, or loving. Heroes were ordinary people who knew that even if their own lives were impossibly knotted, they could untangle someone else's. And maybe that one act could lead someone to rescue you right back."
— Jodi Picoult (Second Glance)

Is there a class that teaches the art of heroism? I wish there was some kind of a manual. If she starts crying hold her and let her cry. When it gets to this point let go, it's no use, she won't listen. It probably would be one long long manual, there are as many ways of dealing with conflict as there are people. But I seem to think Jodi captured the entire syllabus right here. I tell my folks they are my hero one at a time, usually depending on who has what I want at the time :) I tell my brother he's my hero, as well as a select few of my friends see criteria above :) Of course the parents caught on soon enough and the brother never believed it, sadly.
I'll admit, I'm a little liberal with my use of the word. A hero for me is not some political figure with a great philosophy he lives by. It is not Mahatma or Mandela or Condoleeza Rice why would I pick her? They are great, but not to me. I've got this friend of mine who's been there since primary school. In this country those are usually hard to find, because probably by the time you're through with high school you may have lived in five different towns. And Facebook only just happened. Keeping in touch was next to impossible. But many years later, here we are. For me, there's a hero, and at my wedding, God allowing it, when i ask her to stand beside me it will be with pride, and honour.
My parents are my heroes. They tell me how far they have come, and I look with wonder. Last year I had a job over my long vacation, when I got paid, I thought whoa, what a sum!! Two days later I couldn't see where it all went, and not that I squandered it. Just for never having slept hungry a day in my life, never having missed school and never having been abandoned, they deserve to be lauded. my brother too, in his own way. I don't know why, but even though he's a bit introverted and not at all like me, he's a man I admire. He always does the right thing, and he stands by what he believes in this is sometimes not something i appreciate, i try though.! ;) My friends are my heroes, special attention to the pre-technology ones. Sticking by someone takes guts, even just a friend. Listening, loving, praying, travelling long journeys, sacrificing time,bringing humour to humourless situations. I could not ask for better friends that these.
I thank my God upon every remembrance of them, those men and women who, in ways big and small, have made me what I am. My heroes.

gold in the morning sun

Don Williams wrote the song 'I'm just a country boy' about a simple country boy who loved the prettiest girl in town, but never did have the courage to ask her to marry him because he didn't have the money to take care of such a girl. It's chorus went like:

'Cause I'm just a country boy,
Money have I none,
But I've got silver in the stars,
Gold in the morning sun,
Gold in the morning sun.

It's the last week of my holiday. I'm glad, because I spent it with people I love.I've seen most of those I had not seen for so long, it was simply delightful. I realised something out of all this, my wealth is in my friends. Kahlil Gibran said once that each friend represents a world in a person, a world not possibly born before this meeting, and only by this chance meeting could this world be born. And he also said that what one loves most in a friend may be clearer in their absence. The time-out I have had from most of my friends has wrought more clarity in its wake than destruction. A few of those whom I had previously given up on came back, perhaps to reawaken in me the old girl who would move heaven and earth for friend. I've got confidence, it's gonna be a good year. And if it gets tough, I've got behind me a host of people who would bear me up despite myself. And that, my friends, that is something worth treasuring. Don Williams' song has got a twist to it. This young man decided he wasn't gonna be married, now that though he loved her he couldn't take care of her. But who knows? Maybe she could have said yes if only he had asked. He didn't take a chance. I won't be like the country boy. Life has a way of giving you what you least expect. It may not always be a good thing, true, but it also isn't the worst thing ever, methinks.

happy new year

Someone asked me something interesting towards the end of last year. We were talking about stuff in general and I was just saying how much I was looking forward to next year now this year so I could maybe start over. He asked me, "What if Jan sucks, then Feb and March suck, are you going to sit around and wait for the next year?" I didn't have an answer. Everyday we get a chance to start over again and take back the wrong decisions we make day after day, but the thing about a new year, much like a birthday, is that it gives us a perfect opportunity to actually start over with the calendar backing us up. One could start over in December, but January just seems better, I suppose. And January is here. 
A lot of things will happen this year. I become a senior in September, I go for internship - the first time the reality of life as a biochemist will dawn, i turn twenty two among other things. More than anything else though, I want a lot to change inside me. There was a time last year a friend and I were talking about quiet time, and how confrontation with God is hardly a peaceful experience. Those moments reveal to a person things about themselves they never even knew existed, base and wicked attributes. Which is why most of us fear those moments of silence when He speaks. I know I do. I've seen stuff in me I didn't know was there, and it scares me a lot.
I've never had resolutions, i used to think those are just a few more things I'll have to look back on and regret come end year audits. This year I have a few resolutions. I want to bet on people, bet on life, bet on opportunities. I've lived in cynicism and skepticism because no one you don't expect a thing from can disappoint right? The greatest One I want to trust is Him. I just realised that I trust no one. And that's a sad way to live. I'm gonna be like Anne Frank, I'm gonna give someone a chance. I'm gonna believe that people are really good at heart, like me, they just make some really stupid choices sometimes, and then taking them back seems impossible so they just keep going. Sooner or later I'm gonna have to take a chance on someone or something, why not now?

i love you but i've chosen darkness

There is one thing that is common to most of us; we all have that one relationship in our lives that takes out of us more than we ever get from it. Sometimes even more than one. And the thing that sucks most about that is that it’s the one relationship we can never seem to let go of. I too have had my fair share of those, and well, though I’m not proud to admit it, have been like that to a few of my friends, especially lately. Be that as it may, I can say that I have tried to be a good person in every one of my relations, whatever my part in them. For purposes of this discussion though I shall exclude family, and stick with friends, the ones I get to choose, and decide to stand by (or not).

I have three brothers, all of them older than me. We talk, but we’re not overly tight, and especially growing up, boarding school and etc. So I made friends, lots of them, girls I could talk to about boys and about family and just stuff. But I carried most of them in my hands, I would always be the one who went to their house, or wrote the first letter, or shared first. I’m older now, but the more things change, the more they remain the same. I still make the first call, I still go out of my way to find them, and I’d still move heaven and earth for a few of them. Even though for the most part few would ever do the same for me. I live in Mumias, that’s quite a distance from where most of them are based, so once a year I take a trip to the city to reconnect.  Very much like the one I am on now.

Last year we had a high school reunion and I came all the way from Eldy to attend it. This year I was here all along and yet that Saturday morning I woke up and decided not to go. I don’t know why, or I do, but for some reason I didn’t feel like i wanted to go and play friend with a group of ladies I haven’t talked to for way too long. Once upon a time I cared about most of them, but now, now it’s just plain ol’ indifference I feel. I haven’t called the usual people I call when I’m in town even for a day and even though I’ll be here for two more weeks, I probably will not. And I don’t feel guilty about it.

It’s not a good thing to find out that letting go is something I can now do so easily, but it isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s just there, it’s just a thing. It’s a new year soon enough, and perhaps the one thing I want most to do this year is declutter. I'm pretty sure I've held on long past the expiry date. it's a saddening thing, but ces’t la vie. That’s just how it is. I hate to do it, because I love you, but I’ve chosen darkness.