Tell me that thought didn’t occur to you, the
typically traditional Nigerian you, when you
saw pictures of what to over half the
population could be described as a mansion. I
mean it puts into context what rich is or at least
what rich can get you and just as firmly it puts into context what being a woman can be,
beyond being someone’s woman.
I was walking down a London high street
yesterday, when I spotted a black woman
wrapped in a long black and white tweed
jacket and almost knee- high black boots. Something about her short jerry curled hair
reminded me of someone whose storyline
sparked angst in my head and I broke out in
hives of protest, shooting a sudden question at
my companion; ‘why do women follow a man
just to live in another country? Why do young girls follow a man to get phones, hair
extensions, clothes, shoes, bags, a diamond
engagement ring, cars, accommodation, and
placement for jobs… even an identity? Why do
they think they can’t get it, whatever their ‘it’ is,
on their own?’ It’s saddening because it says to me that those
women don’t realize their power. They suffer in
the wrangle holds of compromise for lack of
self knowledge; exchanging their best lives-
the one they can have on their terms- for
somebody’s season of youthful debauchery at best or mid life crisis at worst. They don’t
believe they can have it on their own, they
don’t believe in themselves and the loss of that
childlike faith is not worth the glam of the
nonexistent fab lane they seek to get on.
What is funny is that the wide gulf will thin out over time between say, a student who gets
through school as the ‘reigning babe’ because
of a rich man who buys her the ‘big girl’ look
and the student who patiently waits and with
hard work gets there maybe a decade later at
what I would call the right time. By then the former would be living in the shadow of her
glory days which only fizzle in and out as the
subject of occasional gossip, if anyone cares to
remember at all.
One question that has chased women who
have attempted to get more back into the shadows of learned helplessness is the lie that
you have to choose between the happiness of
fulfillment and the happiness of being
someone’s woman. That there are no other
options, you can only eat your cake or eat your
cake, you can’t cut your cake in half and have one now and the other later.
It is that fear that begets the question; ‘who will
marry me when I pursue my own life and
realize my potential?’. My answer is, it is likely
someone who knows their power as well,
someone who deserves you. And not just you as in female but you as you’ve come to know
yourself to be- woman and powerful.
So the real question then isn’t ‘who will marry
Linda Ikeji?’. The real question is ‘who will
Linda Ikeji marry?’.

My Grand Pikin needs a need sugar Mommy. Dem never born my pikin sha So make i book Space for the boy

My Father! She will make a good step wife

Kk