According to my Mother, this was supposed to be the year I got married. She has never been one to hem and haw over what she wanted. Well, I guess almost all Mothers are this way when it comes to this particular talking point. ‘you are thirty now.’ ‘A woman’s eggs dry up as she ages.’ Bluntness saves time.
The kid whose parents asked if her friends had their own homes; because she was always the one visited. The kid whose parents were a hundred and one percent certain they would meet at home when they got back from work. I was that kid.
I recall my Father once asked, ‘do you not ever get tired of being indoors?’ ‘Why won’t you go out sometime?’ ‘Your body needs sunlight, you know?’
I remember the first night I was at Cubana (Cubana is one of the famous night clubs in Lagos), invited by a friend whose friend was celebrating an honorary doctorate conferred on him by a University earlier that day. I had gone to their Banana Island residence that evening with plans to leave for my house a few hours later. However, my plan changed. This friend was able to convince me to join them in the club. We got there and immediately directed to the VIP section to join this friend’s friend. All settled, the waiters kept exchanging the empty bottles of champagne with new ones. Two hours in, the crowd was going crazy as the Dj navigated through the old and new generation music. Everyone seemed super excited. It all felt so superficial. Maybe it was the alcohol, but I found the atmosphere overwhelming.
At that moment, I remember some of the weekly club activities stories shared by my friends in the past. ‘Is this what these people go through every Friday night?’ – I thought.
‘How is this even fun?’ ‘And why was everyone screaming so much?’ ‘Were they also celebrating like this friend’s friend?’ ‘or Perhaps, this was routine for them.’
This friend on whose invitation I came, obviously felt that I was yet to embrace the energy in the room, as he kept coming to me with fresh-filled glasses of wine and tugged me to join him at the dance floor.
But the truth was, I was just plain bored.
Here I was, in a room full of excited people, some of which were celebrities I had seen on Tv and yet, I was bored out of my mind.
Am I a Loner?
A few weeks ago, I had an honest conversation with a few of my close friends. Some of them expressed how the lockdown was driving them nuts. I listened because their anxieties were real, even I have my fears, though different. But the truth is, this lockdown has in no way altered the course of my life. It is having so little effect on me. I live in lockdown all the time, and I love it.
Anyway, my mother is worried. She is concerned that with the restriction of movement and human interactions, I may not be able to socialize as I should. And so, finding a man who would marry me may have become an arduous journey. I love my mom, and I acknowledge that these genuine concerns are from a place of love and warmth. So, two days ago, while she prayed for me over the phone, she ended with ‘even with the situation the world is in currently, God will give you a good husband.’ I said a heartfelt ‘Amen.’
For all the Sundays that I falsely told her, ‘I went to church’; meanwhile, I was either tucked in my bed reading a book or playing CandyCrush, I join my faith with hers and hope that this is the year it happens too. Above all, I hope that she never finds out.
I like my space, but I would want to share it with a man.