Lifestyle

Borrowing from the words of a very prominent songstress, this year 2020, I lived, I loved, I did, I have done and it was more than I thought it would be. Everyone has a different story about this year and for many 2020 turned out a little (or alot) different from the script they had entering it.

I write with alot of scaring from the blows that 2020 has given me with the freshest being the loss of a brother, a friend and a team mate, JOHN DAVID SEMAKULA who we buried on 30th December. Oh! the sting of death. This year served me with a bitter pie to chew at but with lots of cherries here and there. I have had to cross some really dark tunnels along the streets of this year, alone most of the times but gladly there was always someone holding a light at the end of of the tunnel ready to embrace me each time I felt like I was losing it.

I had so many reasons to be tired, angry and furious to how this year curved out but I also have loads of reasons to be grateful and I choose to focus on those majorly. I will choose to mention just a few.

I LIVED

The year has come to an end and it would not be fair if I said I did not live. 2020 for some unknown reason took so many lives, including some of our very close people. I couldn’t be anymore grateful that I lived healthy for most of the 365 days this year. The gift of health is one that this year has shown us that it cannot be taken for granted

Big Audacious Goals

For the first time in my very many years here on earth I dared to dream and be intentional about it unlike other years where I would just muffle some words at the 00:00 hour of the new year and then pick up from where we stopped. 2020 saw me develop a vision board which was partly because of the decision that I took in the wake of the year to pursue a leadership course. This course stretched me to the core but I achieved 90% of everything I had set out to do leaving the 10% to things I had no control over, especially the travels that I had planned. Oh! did I mention I completed the course successfully? Yes I did.

Proud Author

I set a very high bar for myself in literally everything in life. My friends who knew that I could write had always encouraged me to write a book and I often laughed so hard at them for even daring to flatter me to write a book. I felt so ‘unworthy’ to write a book, it always felt like I was still very raw in this sphere. As the universe would have it, when I chose to do the leadership course, one of the year long assignments was to write a book. I cannot say it was the easiest things I have done, but I will say it is most definitely one of the most fulfilling things to have done. I am still a work in progress but I am more than glad that I am somewhere.

I celebrated

I am blessed to be a part of quite a number of circles and I can comfortably say that I am lucky to have quite a number of friends. Despite the rough turbulences of 2020 we celebrated. We laughed, we danced, celebrated life, achievements and life together. There was sure a fun face to 2020 I can a test.

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10214421942182410&id=1834305694

I loved and I was loved

2020 was a year when I received alot of love from family and friends in all kinds of ways. Directly and indirectly. The feeling of being loved genuinely is one that no human language can correctly describe. None the less it was a year in which I probably loved the hardest. Many were kind enough to accept the love and of course some rejected it in a number of ways but I still loved. Love is a beautiful thing for sure

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

I was favored

The favor of the Lord has not been short this 2020 I praise God. With the Corona Virus disrupting the economy, we saw so many workplaces downsize, many people lost their jobs which made life completely hard. I was lucky not only to maintain my job(s) but also get so many other opportunities to work. It was hard, long at times and very tasking but I wouldn’t ask for any better.

• 

The punches and blows

2020 oh! 2020 gave me a fair share of some hard pills to swallow. My heart was broken into a million pieces at several points along this journey with the freshest being the loss of my friend on 29th December just after my mother had broken a leg the day before. I have been so furious at the way this year decided to go down. It blurred all the good things that were (are) happening around me but I am thankful for them all. After all it is said that iron sharpens iron. Atleast I did not have to go the fire all by myself. I had (have) people around me holding out my hand either physically or in prayer each time my legs wobble.

All I can say is 2020 is a year that I was excited to come into, did not exactly enjoy living through but glad that is ending. As the new year 2021 comes along, I will be hopeful for a good year but will not hold out any expectations as such. I will just enter it and see what there is in store for me.

To everyone that was a part of my 2020, I am so glad that you were with me. Let us do this gain in the new year.

Happy 2021, full of nothing but God’s love and favor.

Dear 2020

We stepped into your mane very hopeful, enthusiastic, joyful and ready for a ride. No not an all smooth one but one that was filled with better challenges and experiences that we had never had before. We developed a catch phrase to make this relation-ship even more exciting. We baptized you twene twene, and you felt like no other year before. You cooperated really well and despite the fact that there was a looming highly infectious virus in the far west continents, it did not feel such a threat and we knew we had this twene twene thing figured out. It was not until the third month that you gave up the fight and decided to bow to this infectious virus that we came to understand was named Corona Virus a.k.a COVID19. We are told it came by plane through Dubai and it took just a few weeks before everything could change.

Everything for a moment went stand still. The country was locked down and we were told to stay in our houses lest this monster finds you loitering and grabs you. Of course, we obeyed because one we had no idea what this thing was and seeing how it had devoured our fellow humans in other countries, on one risked. Only the essential of essentials were left to risk to operate. Only basic need service providers could surface and only for a short time. Nothing was spared not even schools or churches. The government boosted of having everything in control as long as everyone stayed indoors as much as possible, washed their hands with water and soap or sanitized and covered half their face with a mask that is the nose and mouth.

A lot from that moment changed tremendously and drastically. For the first time people were united to fight one common enemy, COVID19. Parents, children, employers, employees all had to learn to cope and very fast to this confusing reality. Suddenly everyone was fighting to grab a seat on the technology table. Trading, church, entertainment all had to go online. Internet services providers minted the harvest as most of the remaining businesses grappled to stay afloat. Many employers suffered with the decision to have to let go of their staff indefinitely as downsizing was the only way they were going to weather this storm. As the months passed, the government realized that its people had to find a way of co exsiting with this monster and just maybe if its people were disciplined enough, they would survive. Many of the sectors that had been closed were open up, people we let out of their ‘safe heavens’, numbers of those being devoured by the virus lost count and many deaths were recorded.

The country had to prepare for elections that were to be due in 2021 and this monster was not about to stop it for any reason. People gathered in hundreds, sometimes following the SOPs but most times not, many were apprehended, sadly others lost their lives for being on the wrong side of the law or simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time or even in the right place at the wrong time. Blood was shed, blame was tossed here and there but life had to move forward and twene twene had to go. In the wake of all these adversities one could ignore the good that was floating around.

The biggest wave of marriages probably happened in this time. Allover a sudden it felt like everyone was on a flying horse to the altar. If everything should go wrong, atleast one thing should get right. Also, the fact that there was a cap on the number of people who could attend these functions, it sounded economically viable and everyone wanted to use this window before it closed.

I can imagine each of us here has a happy story however messed the year may have looked. What is your story?

There are too many things that make a woman that are sweet and sour. I will not go into all but I want to talk about that part of a woman that she has no power over, a natural phenomenon that women just always have to deal with. Menstruation.This is the time women shed the uterine wall each time fertilisation doesn’t occur. So it is that time when we paint the ‘walls’ red.
I remember this whole thing of menstruation was something so oblivious for me. Yes! something that was taught at school in science but when it got to the practicability it was very cliché. I did not know exactly what to do or expect pretty much when the time showed up although I was excited about crossing into adulthood.
So if I recall properly the first time my adulthood (menstrual periods) decided to show up I was at home thankfully. I felt some dampness ‘downstairs’ but it didn’t bother me a bit until I checked later in the bathroom. There I was staring at a huge gaping red mark and thinking to myself, what just happened to me? For a while I had carried sanitary towels but never had I got the chance to really use them. Now the time had come for me to use them. I cleaned up but much as I was happy that I had crossed that line, I was kind of embarrassed. I remember getting my soiled underwear and pushing it in the deepest part of my mattress.But of course my mother found it and she was not pleased at all about the whole thing. I got a very good lashing for it but a lecture thereafter. African mothers!!!!!!!!
She sat me down and told me all I needed to know about menstruation with the most emphasis being on my possibility of getting pregnant and also the need to be as clean as possible. And now that I have been around for a while now I realise not many girls get the chance to be told these things, probably things we take for granted or shift roles and in the end nothing happens. Parents shift the role to school, school are hoping parents are prepping their young girls and in the end nothing happens. Now the young girl is left to figure out this whole world all by herself. It feels like driving on an unknown terrain hoping you somehow manage to navigate it.
No one ever tells you that menstrual blood is one of the most intimate thing a woman can have. That if you do not have the proper sanitary towels, you can attract a collection of deadly infections. Should you opt to use a cloth instead of the pads that are thrown away after use, they should be properly washed and thoroughly dry before they can be used again. (Because let us face it, there are people who can not afford to maintain the financial burden that comes with buying a packet or packets of pads, depending on how heavy the flow is every month.) You will find parents who do not feel the need to buy these sanitary towels for their children. It is a luxury they say. Unfortunately even the fellow woman caretakers do very little to fight for these young girls. So if a girl is not bold enough to figure it some how, her confidence will be brutally crushed, skip school for that period or be the tabloid that fellow counterparts will talk about the whole time.
No one ever tells you that you need to shave as often as possible especially before the time your periods next show up, or that you ought to use comfortable nickers preferably cotton so that there is enough aeration going on down there. (So during this period pump the breaks on the thongs and g-strings, it is just a matter of days and you will be back). No one ever tells you that the least times to shower and change in a day are two times and if you have a heavier bleed then change the sanitary towel or cloth at least thrice a day, keep your vaginal area as clean as you possibly as you can cleaning it with enough water.(Avoid using soap) and properly dispose off the sanitary towel in places designated or burn them. They just cannot be left lying everywhere.
Maybe we are taking this thing so much for granted and right now there is a girl there who was once confident and is now confident no more because they stained their uniform and became the talk of the school, or there is a girl there trying to alter who they are just because they cannot stand the sight of blood and worse still a girl with a strange disease all arising from the fact that they could not keep the cleanest while nature was taking its course.
We need to empower our young girls to know now a little more about this world way before they reach it. We need to hand back the power to the parents (Both male and female). They need to know that it is their primary role to prep the young child on what to expect and how to handle this period; the materials they will use and how best they can use them hygienically. After all the parent will know how best they can afford the materials they propose to their children. No school will do that for your own child. So it is time to go back to the basics.

It’s a gloomy morning as the sun takes a vacation
As the rain slaps the floor your body coils for warmth
But the alarm that you have been snoozing won’t give up
As you try to make peace with your mind that won’t let you
Do not sleep too long

Squeezing your eyelids open to let in as little light as possible you try to start the day
Guess what!! The day began a while ago
Millions of shillings have been made far long as you dared to warm your bed.
Do not sleep too long

Serious clientele is long gone
And your muscles will remain as lazy as you set the day
But the bills will come
Ready or not they won’t fail to come.
Do not sleep too long

Too late it maybe for today but too early it is for tomorrow
Bend you knees and say a prayer of thanksgiving
And begin the day anyway…..
Do not sleep too long