My Top 11 Love Songs

When one of my friends looked at my playlist on Youtube, she said I had the wrong skin colour because of  my choice. I disagree because I believe music transcends all barriers, including skin colour. I heard someone say he went to a nightclub in China and saw Chinese guys  bobbing to Mandoza's Nkalakatha. Such is the power of music.

These are the songs that make my heart melt like butter on a hot knife. In case you feel amorous one day, consider listening to them ;)

 

*    In no particular order:

1. When the night comes  - Joe Cocker

2.  Still – Liquideep

3. I know I’ll never love this way again – Dionne Warwick

4. Book of Love – Peter Gabriel

5. In These Arms – Bon Jovi

6. When you’re gone – Bryan Adams and Mel B

7. All for one – Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart, Sting

8. Whisper in the dark – Dionne Warwick 

9. Feel so close – Calvin Harris

10. Adorn – Miguel

11. The best you ever had - John Legend

Raising my daughter

Having a daughter is so much fun, what with plaiting hair, tying ribbons, buying pretty, pink little things and all. But one day we are going to have more serious issues to discuss than what ribbon colours to put on her head.

The current dating landscape has changed very drastically and raising a daughter has become quite a daunting task.It is actually quite scary to think of things I shall have to deal with in a few years.There is a host of things to worry about when you become a parent, such as unwanted teen pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections, in particular HIV,which more and more teenagers are beginning to be infected with. Also concerning is the possibility that your daughter might make poor choices regarding the men she dates, which might result in her being miserable for the rest of her life. I’m going to really be involved, without being a smothering mother, in my daughter’s life from an early age so that she learns to trust me with everything happening in her life.

I don’t plan to raise my daughter the way I was raised. The first time I discussed boys with my mother was at 25, when she asked why I hadn’t brought the man I was about to marry in about a week’s time to meet her and my father. It never crossed my mind she would want to meet him because boyfriend discussions, as an unwritten rule, were always off limits. If I have other marital concerns now, it would be hard to run to her because we never discussed boys, we can’t start by discussing husbands because they come from boys. We skipped a crucial stage. I won’t say she made a mistake, I’ll just say she employed a strategy that won’t work for me or the environment that we live in today.

My strategy is to be my daughter’s best friend, the first person she turns to for makeup tips, poor child, and when boys start making passes at her. We will sit down together over ice cream or tea and cake and discuss why she should choose one boy over the other.  I want to be her go-to girl when she experiences her first heartbreak so that we can figure out things together. It might be difficult to do because as a working mother, time might be a constraint, but the same way I advocate for date between couples is the same way I will advocate for dates between parents and their children. There’s too much focus on husband/wife relations and children are neglected somewhere along the way.  I remember our debating sessions in high school with schools like Marist Brothers and Bernard Mzeki College. A popular topic to debate on was Juvenile delinquency is due to parental negligence. I recently read an article about a Swazi mother that was arrested for “dereliction of duties” after her 14-year-old daughter was impregnated by a 24-year-old man.  I don’t think that it’s fair to hold a mother wholly responsible if her daughter turns out badly, because she will obviously make her own choices as a young human being. I would, however, want to stand up proudly and tell myself and the world that I did my best to steer my daughter in the right direction. If I detect that some topics make her uncomfortable, I will rope in my sisters or friends to help, and I will also help with their own daughters. As they say, it takes a village to raise a child.

My first glimpse of what sex involved was during biology lessons in high school, but that was just the process of procreation being described, not the actual act.  My daughter’s teachers at school, her friends, the Internet, or mass media are not going to be the first resources my daughter has for sex education, so help me God. The first time I heard anyone talk expansively about sex, the practicals, was when I was old enough to attend my first kitchen party. That’s not going to happen to my daughter, because at that stage it’s usually too late and I feel that’s not exactly the right environment for one to have her first lessons on sex. A novice is bombarded from all directions by various women from various backgrounds and might be too overwhelmed to understand anything. And some of these parties are drunken orgies, decorated by male strippers, where not everything should be taken seriously. The ones that have church women involved aren’t usually so lurid, but some of the blessed mothers are almost virginal in their approach to sex and obtaining much from them would be like drawing water out of a stone.

Here’s what happened at the bridal shower that was hosted for me. My five aunts, one after the other, lectured me on my spiritual life and relations with my in-laws, and that was it. I fell short of rolling my eyes and snapping my fingers diva style and saying, “Hallooo! In case it hadn’t crossed your minds, I’m not marrying this man so that I can go and play with his relatives!”Other younger women grew tired of the sermons and said it was time to discuss sex. Like bats out of hell, my aunts gathered their plates of rice and bottles of soft drinks and flew out of the room. I don’t get why sex is such a scary subject when we are all an offshoot of it.

I want my daughter to know that, under the right circumstances,sex is a beautiful act which she shouldn’t be embarrassed about. I don’t want her to feel it’s a dirty and evil act that will see her go to Gehenna for. What happened to me during my pre-marital counseling will not happen to my child, not if I can help it. My husband and I had our counseling delivered to us by a manic nun at the main Roman Catholic Cathedral located at the corner of 4^th Street and Herbert Chitepo Avenue in Harare. This Sister started off by informing us that she was a pro-lifer. For that reason she condemned the use of contraceptives as it was as bad as murdering fetuses. Then she got into an invective about how we, women, went through life thinking men slept us because they loved us, when in actual fact we were being used. As she said this, she made movements simulating sex (which I wondered where she had seen. Movies perhaps?). She contorted her face and spoke like a deranged man, “I love you, let’s have sex”.  It was actually a very scary and confusing experience for me. Awkward too, because my husband-to-be was sitting right next to me.

The angry nun said we were only to have sex for procreation. The venomous way in which she denounced sex made me hesitate to point out that there were verses in the bible that actually supported sex between married couples.

 I’m sure she would have descended on me like a tonne of bricks. We were with this hysterical nun in the last month preceding our wedding and she went out of her way to portray how revolting   sex was, even in marriage. I would always leave the counseling room with my tail between my legs and head hung in shame for even allowing it to cross my mind that marriage had anything to do with sex.

I think sexual illiteracy is just as debilitating and damaging as any other form of illiteracy. Kids today jump into bed before they are emotionally prepared for the consequences, and as a mother, it would break my heart to see my daughter suffer because of poor decisions she made, particularly if I didn’t give her proper guidance. It’s wrong for parents to fly off the handle and say, “You shouldn’t have done that!”when their daughters fall pregnant, have abortions or contract some sexually transmitted infection when they didn’t guide them on what to do in the first place. I will tell my daughter that moving from a relationship that has gone sour is a lot easier if you haven’t exchanged too many bodily fluids. However, the fact that you have done so should never tie you down to a person you don’t like anymore. I will also be open about mistakes I made in my life, so that she knows I’m talking about things that I really know about.

I had a very strict upbringing, whose benefits I only saw much later in life. I will also be strict and draw lines that shouldn’t be crossed, but all rules will be discussed, not just enforced. I don’t believe that children should just be seen and not heard. When I was a teenager without a cellphone, boys would call on our home number and my father was notorious for wanting to be the one to pick the phone, as if he ever received many calls. If a boy asked to speak to me without greeting him first, he would ask to be greeted first. After that the poor boy would then ask to speak to me, and my father would say, “About what?”

My father knew what time we would usually disappear from the house to see boyfriends. He would choose that time to carry his cup of tea and stand outside by the gate for ages. The poor boy would walk “up the road and down the road, up the road again”, to quote Chaka Demus and Pliers in their song, Tracy, waiting for his girl to come out. I remember peeping from the bedroom window and seeing my boyfriend, after seeing my father, walk past the house with a serious look on his face as if he had nothing whatsoever to do with anyone in our house. I have four sisters, so with five girls in our house, a lot of shoes lost their soles on our road.

Now, I’m not going to play cat-and-mouse with my daughter’s boyfriends. I know I would never win that war if I antagonize my daughter. My father tried, but he definitely didn’t win, because as he became stricter, we became more devious in our effort to protect our relationships which, in retrospect, deserved to be stopped. My father was not entirely wrong, trying to protect us from the little bad wolves. I feel sorry for him. He must have been terrified of what would happen to his daughters if he didn’t get involved by drinking his tea standing at the gate like a prison warder. His heart must have been burning with love for his daughters and worry about those boys’ intentions. All he needed to do was talk to us.

I will request to meet the boys that my daughter will date, with hopes that if they meet me they will respect my daughter. I won’t deny that it will also be for screening purposes.  I will sit them down and have a serious talk about their intentions with my offspring. If a boy is taking my child out, I will want to know where they are going and I will tell them what time my daughter should be home. When she’s still a teenager, I will not mince my words about how I view premarital sex, but at a certain age I will have to ease up and leave my daughter to decide when she’s ready.

I hear a lot of people whose mothers passed away wish they were still around so that they could discuss serious issues with them. Sadly the ones that are living don’t seem to be doing much in their children’s lives. I don’t ever want to do things in half measure, so while I’m still hanging around, I will be active in my daughter’s life. When it comes to sex, I’m not going to be quiet about it and mutter, “I won’t talk about it. That’s not how I was raised.” We can’t afford to regard sex as a taboo subject anymore. It’s tantamount to throwing our children to the wolves while naïvely thinking we are protecting them. I’m aware it won’t be easy to start talking about the birds and the bees with my child, but it can and will be done. The fact that I didn’t get that kind of talk from my own parents doesn’t mean I should perpetuate a culture of keeping mum over important subjects. My daughter isn’t going to be found trudging in the dark on matters relating to sex. Certainly not on my watch.

Family is for keeps

The curtain on the Oscar Pistorius trial, and his life as he and everybody knew it, has finally come down. He was sentenced to a maximum of five years in prison for the shooting death of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp. Speculation is rife that he will be out in about 10 months. What a tragic thing to happen to happen to a young man that was so full of promise, inspired a lot of people, and made South Africa and Africa proud. I feel extremely sad for Reeva’s family, but I also feel very sorry for Oscar himself, as well as his family. Who in the world has been following the trial doesn’t know Uncle Arnold, Carl and Aimee Pistorius. There were brothers-in-law, aunts and more uncles supporting him in court. His brother, Carl, also continued coming to court in his wheelchair after a car accident.

The trial evidently took an emotional toll on Oscar’s whole family. I’m sure they couldn’t wait for the verdict so that they could go back to their lives, which will never be the same. From the day Oscar gunned down Reeva, that family hasn’t known peace. They have consistently come to court for all his appearances, thereby losing a lot of productive time. They must all have good bosses. Either that or they are their own bosses.

When I was a court reporter, I used to witness the same kind of scenarios in court, a menacing-looking thug on trial for heinous crimes would appear in court and his poor mother would break down in tears. A weeping girlfriend would blow kisses and the thug would return the gesture with a soft look on his hardened features and mumble, “Don’t cry, my love”. Moments like these always left me spellbound.  Someone raped or killed somebody out there, and people still cry for that person and miss him, wishing he was out there walking our streets?”Sometimes I would try to interview the offender’s family and their invariable answer was usually, “He’s innocent. He’s a Christian.”  I guess everybody has a soft side to them that makes it hard for their loved ones to believe they could ever put one foot wrong.

My very first court story involved some young men from Soweto who murdered a teenager for his debit card.One of the young men was only 18 and had to drop out of Grade 12 to go to prison. His sister would bring a different brand of cigarettes every time she came to court, and I figured they were not for him to smoke but to buy favours or for protection inside. I remember thinking, “Oh so they are still worried their little brother will be sodomised even after he killed someone?” I suppose I would also go and weep in court if someone close to me was to be found on the wrong side of the law. You can’t automatically forget all the good times you had or the good deeds that person performed after they commit a crime.

I guess that’s among the prices we have to pay for having some people in our lives. What a wonderful life it would be if everybody carried themselves responsibly to protect their loved ones from the pain of seeing bad things happen to them. People just chose to live on the razor's edge because they feel their life is their own show to run, but when things come a cropper, others are left to pick up the pieces. If bail money is wanted, it’s the innocent that have to run around to keep the offending family member out of jail. You can’t just wash your hands of them and say, “You made your bed, now lie in it.” That would be like going to hospital to see a person who just had a heart attack and whisper, “You know, if only you had jogged and eaten less KFC, you wouldn't be in this mess.”

This is not just about crime. Some chose to be promiscuous, then fall pregnant without two cents to rub together, and their families are the ones that have to cater for their medical bills and upkeep of the baby after it is born. Others also contract illnesses through recklessness and then expect emotional and material support from their families. Others make lousy life decisions that end up costing everyone. Like Oscar. It was him, his guns, his friends, and his money. His world has come crumbling down, friends deserted him and threw him under the bus in court, and it’s now just him and his family.

Lesson learned: everything else is ephemeral, but family is for keeps, even though some people do not realize it.

Don't duck and dive, just say Sorry

Pic. by Ni Shu

For a word so small, wars have been fought, jobs have been lost, siblings have become estranged, and marriages have collapsed, among other avoidable unpleasant stuff. People just cannot bring themselves to say sorry.

If we look back at our lives, we will probably find a trail of damage to relationshipswhich could have simply been mended by saying sorry, and showing we meant it. After seeing we have offended someone, we would rather justify our actions or things we said to hurt the other person, blame them for being too sensitive, or give lengthy explanations that actually don’t mean anything to someone we’ve hurt.

I think it all boils down to abominable pride, ego, and rigidity, and sheer bad manners. We think that by apologising we’ve emerged losers out of the disagreement, and the person we’ve offended has won.Apologising has nothing to do with winning or losing, it is about doing the right thing, showing our worth as balanced human beings. Doing the right thing is not always easy, but it has to be done. We lose nothing from it. If anything, we gain respect by showing that we accept that we are not infallible, we make things right after making mistakes.

We don’t even have to wait to be told that we have offended someone. More often than not, we know immediately after making the offensive action or remark that we are out of line. An apology does not serve its purpose when the offended party has to fish for it. Then we start a long and meandering tale about how our actions were not meant to offend, we accuse the person we’ve hurt of being too sensitive because what we said was only a light-hearted joke, orwe accuse people of driving us into the offending actions. Instead of pacifying, we actually aggravate.  Then we say things like, “Maybe I shouldn’t have said that”, or “I withdraw my statement”. That doesn’t even begin to cut it. Sometimes all we have to say is “I was wrong. I’m sorry.” If the other person asks for an explanation, then we give it to them. Is ruining a good relationship or someone’s day,owing to our reluctance to say sorry, worth it? Do we feel better about ourselves when we refuse to say sorry even when we know we are wrong? Do we feel we’ve achieved something? Even though we might look like little heroes in our eyes, to everybody else we simply look like pig-headed fools.

I think the refusal to apologise is ingrained in our culture, at least in some families. If a parent wrongs his child, no matter how old, and the child expresses dismay, that child is accused of insubordination. A child like that might grow up thinking grown-ups should never apologise. The unbalanced ones probably look forward to having children of their own to demand apologies from, without ever giving any.

It is usually those that love us or that work closely with us that we won’t apologise to. When we bump strangers with our trollies at the supermarket, we gush with apologies, “Oh no! Are you OK? I’m really sorry I wasn’t looking!” Then when it comes to people we love, we would rather dig in our heels, stubborn as mules. Instead of saying sorry, we foam at the mouth and accuse people we’ve hurt of misunderstanding us. Shame on us, shame.

Can we then pat ourselves on the back and say well done to ourselves for refusing to acknowledge our mistakes? We should just learn to swallow our pride, it’s not fattening.

Failure,or reluctance, to apologise makes people ugly. Sometimes you look at someone who evidently knows they have offended someone but is too proud to say sorry, and you have this nagging feeling that somewhere inside their chest must be an old, black and shriveled little heart. For if they had a real one they would realize that hurting others is not cool. We should do as we would be done by.

For most, I guess saying sorry is like an art that has to be mastered before it can be executed. The same way some of the world’s greatest musicians were made in the privacy of their showers, maybe we should start by rehearsing apologies again and again until we can do it – properly. It would be a beautiful world if we could do that for ourselves and others.

We should inculcate a culture of apologizing in our children or younger people that look up to us by apologizing to them when we err. This will show them that we offend other people sometimes, but we have to concede that we were wrong and make amends.