CHAPTER ONE. " marriage plans"
The society won't let me show the world whom I really am.sometimes I sit and wonder till when will I have to hide whom I am truly,who will be the brave human to be our voice .when I say our I mean me and many other girls out there like me .Funny how I have to respect and do what the society expects me to do ,but the society won't even respect whom I have feelings for . I hear them tell my mother that it is time I got out of her homestead, truly some experience it in real life but others will experience it through reading .I am about to become a victim of early and forced marriage.
The single thought of sleeping with a man leave alone getting married won't stop ringering in my head,it's giving me sleepless nights, headaches, it's making me high on sobber minds.. The woman I expected to stand up and say it's upto me if I want to get married or not,has responded to the elders of our land "find her a man"this just pissed me off. I know the answer was because she doesn't want to be treated as an outcast or disappoint the society,bring shame to her family but she could have stood on her grounds for me and I wouldn't have ashamed her. I mean we could have fought the battle for me and the other young girls with them young dreams and valid..
I always have spent time listening to my grandma's stories whatever she used to tell me is now happening am about to live them .I hear those in authority are fighting against F .G .M,funny how we are still being circumsied and those leaders from our land still attend like it's a good thing.i hear that they have found me a husband and by the second moon,they will have driven three cows to my mother's homestead as my dowry .
Yes I have been a village girl all I have known maybe is only the knowledge from my grandmother and my "friend" from the royals . The hierarchy will always be there ,we will always be divided according to our status but just like Constitution in democratic countries ,the society will always be first and dictate how we should live . According to our people the daughter of a widow can only be given one cow as a dowry because the two are meant for sacrifice, the blood is for aoth taking and the skin is for elders . The second moon is almost, I see young girls whom are regarded to as young mothers come to our homestead , standing by the window I wonder what they want...Then my mother welcomes them,they exchange few words in our language that I don't make to hear them clearly,then I hear footsteps approaching to where I sleep..
It's my mother I wonder what she wants this time now,she looks at me with the face of"I can't do anything"then tells me to follow her. I follow her as my presence is requested by those young women.They then introduce themselves and starts summoning me what am expected to do and not to do and then finally tells me that the old woman of the blade requires my meat before marriage and she would perform some rituals. I shake my head to show agreement and hide my feelings because at the end of the day who even cares?Did they also not experience the same thing? Am I special than them? then leave the room.
The news are all over the only daughter of the widow is getting married in seven days...on my bed in my feelings my eyes all blurred I hear someone knock on my wooden window, it's late in the night I wonder who it could be, I first argue with my instincts before finally deciding to open the window.I quickly rush from my sleeping matt on the floor and head towards the direction of the window.i I slowly open the window so as not to disract my mum and the neighbours sleep.Its my "friend "from the royals, I open and she sees her way through into the house .But today it's not as usual no those warm tight hugs ,smiles and kisses from her .she is frowned like an wooden buffalo..
The news of me getting married is a nightmare to her this is something her brain knows but then her heart won't accept. she thinks am a traitor and comfortable with the marriage ,.she starts packing my clothes in a polythene paper , "cate!what are you doing putting my clothes in that paper?".she keeps quite till she is through then asks me to follow her.I now get it she wants me to run away with her,it's a good plan but I can't. "No Cate I can't my mother will die from stress,those people will say that she helped me escape .Then what will happen to her when your parents realizes we went off together ?"I am sorry but you have to leave my room I want to get married.pissed off she jumps out of my window and runs to her home shedding. I try holding my tears back but I guess am not all that strong the pressure is way too much now.
I know I don't want to be married at this age but for the sake on my mum I will do so to please her ,she is all I got since my grandmother accepted the calling of our ancestors and my father on the other hand abandoned us on finding out that my mother had fibroids so she couldn't give birth unless, she went to the people who had adopted the western form of health who were referred to as the "snakes" for an operation. she has high blood pressure and my escape news would come as a calling by the ancestors and that's how I would loose my mother. I wasn't ready for that by any chance.
it's almost the second moon only few days left so that I honour my calling request of the old woman of the blade , I wonder why she wants my meat only to feed it to her popular one hundred years old serpent so that the serpent will bless me .This is what you call witch craft in the western adopted cultures countries and Christianity..funny how the society is against somethings which are natural but entertain the act of feeding the serpent with our meat.