Socially Savant

What you are about to read about is one of the greatest joys and my happiness. You will get to explore the happy side of me and through the men around me. I am writing about my everyday men and how they impact me daily and they are the most incredible thing to happen to me, clichéd as that sounds. Originally this was going to be about my black men and then as I sat down to write this I realised that there are multifaceted and multiracial men in my life. From all walks of life and they contribute on multiple layers directly into the person that I am. It was actually inspired by the consistent 10 year friendship that I have with a friend called Andre. This friend of mine has a way of directing me into anther train of thinking. He also has a way of just making me calm down. For the longest of times my mother thought we were dating. She was most likely thinking I am going to give her coloured grandkids. However Andre has been a representation to me that not all men in my life leav...

Festive season has come round with so many societal pressures and #lifegoals. And all the bragging levels have gone up a notch, which are always and forever getting harder to attain. With all the expenses and monies made ladies are pressurised to look and be a certain way. However our economic spaces are not conducive to such, but hey the elephant in the room is societal pressure. I was helping transcribe a focus group that was conducted with unemployed black South African women. It revealed that they have insomnia because they not sleeping at night, spending it worrying. The main reason they are anxious is that when they wake up; they think that their mothers are going to call them names. Words like: you are so useless are such crippling words. This I know because long before I loved and appreciated the relationship I hold with my mother, we used to butt heads. All day! Everyday! She didn’t understand me at all. I was reduced daily to shreds and I used to question God why was...

Image by: Gina Tepper  When you need to have the harsh conversation with yourself in the mirror”, please have it. For 3 weeks now I've been forcing myself to state it as it is: “He never chose me. Even when I tried my hardest. He didn't pick me.” I have had friends thank me for telling them this. However, I still do it often to release myself from the grip of heartache. I have been dating since age 16. Two very short relationships in High School but then age 21 I got hooked. When I say hooked I mean stuck. He could do no wrong. In my eyes this person was everything.  He could do no wrong, ever. As a matter of fact, I think at some point I asked him if he had used “Umuti” on me as a form of trapping me in a relationship. Alas we laughed at that question for years after.   I have been in his life for nearly a decade now and there is nothing that we do not discuss. However I had to do something for myself to begin the process of weaning him off. I must be hone...

The church never loved us. Mary, Martha, Ruth, Tryphina (mom) and Mbali (Me); all these women had to walk alone, they were never loved. How then are we ever going to be loved in present day church?  “The notion that feminism cannot be Christian or virtuous is harmful when you think about it” a very passionate Candice Morrow wrote to me.   Let’s get gender and biological facts out the way. We are not the same. We never will be. Men are men and women are women. Our battles are different and so are our bodies, emotions; and all the biologists and neurologist will account for it. I remember some time back being laughed at for saying I was a Christian feminist as if to say there was no place for that in the church. Let me tell you something. In my discussions with women, including my mom; the most useless and annoying man known to womankind has to be the Christian men. They will bible bash you into submission. You will sit and listen with amazement at how ridiculous the men...