Thirty years....

Yep...I am thirty today. I have always thought I 'd go out of my twenties with a big bang...a huge party, lots of alcohol to drown out the echos of past mistakes...but here I am...here I am. On an Island. There is nothing to see but the occasional boat passing by....the clear blue sky and water.... I write something every year, but this year, I am writing it on my blog, so it can stay forever and ever and ever and ever....hehehehehehehh

So what infinite wisdom do I have to pass on to my fellow womenfolk? What great advice can I give after these great years of youth and folly? I thought about this all morning....what should I write? Should I write about my catastrophic experiences with the opposite sex? The number of frogs and grasshoppers I kissed? Should I warn about that nasty ugly thing in between the legs of men? Should I write about that great pounding thing called heart...in the chests of men? What should I write about? I thought of all my favourite writers, my favorite philosophers, my favourite role models...what did they say when they turned thirty? Did they sit down and reflect over life? or did they embark on a road trip like my friend Atutu? Did they cry over past mistakes or did they dance for joy at the thought of the future? And so, I reached into my bag and read a book...my book of quotations...you see, I write down things I love to hear again...from movies, books, magazines, tv...even from conversations overheard...I write them down.

Anyway, so I look into this book...and I found a few things that I'd love to share....and perhaps by sharing them it would be easier to write down my own thoughts on my life...

You bear God within you, poor wretch and know it not- Epictetus

Many people asked me what I wished for today...and my wish was as complicated as it was simple. I wish to become a better person than I was yesterday. All I want in life, is to develope as a human being and I guess be the best I can be...as "armylike" as that sounds. I wish this, because I know for sure that the only person I can ever change is me. The only person I can ever affect to do anything good in life, is me...and so...thats about it.

"In desperate love, its always like this isn't it? In desperate love, we always invent the characters of our partners demanding that they be what we need of them and then feeling devasted when they refuse to perform the role we created in the first place"

Yes, sometimes we all wish for people to love us just as much as we love them...we hang on to false hopes and most of the time, we hang on to pure bullshit. As desperate as we are to love them, and make them happy, it just does not work that way. Many times, the kind of love we want does not exist in the world of the other person...so while you are giving a 100% of your soul, even 5% of that person's soul might never get to you. A very tough lesson to learn, but once learnt, I promise living and loving is so much easier.

"Fate always gives you two choices, the one you should take and the one you do"

So what do I really know for sure? Well the one thing I am sure of, is you can only know yourself. At nights, when you are all alone, in your head, no one can ever get in there...no one ever knows your fears or worries...your past that fades in and out of dreams...no one can ever get in there...so at the end of the day...you are all alone with who you are. That is why, you can only be accountable for your actions in life. Your choices are the ones you shall live with...and you owe no man for them. You can never apologise for who you are or choose to be. People will love you, hate you, or manage you, but thats just the way it is. Quit apologising for your choices...you alone will have to live with them and not Mama Sikira from across the street. As a woman, I have been faced with too many choices in life and none that will ever satisfy everybody I know.

"It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than live an imitation of somebody's life with perfection"

And so, this is my prayer for myself today: Please God help me be strong in the direction I have chosen. Let me persevere, let me go through what I have to go through, but let me get there....let me get there...

I am thirty today.