Does the name you call your spouse reallymatter?

I was sitting with my neighbours today when an issue came up.  My neighbor Mathew wanted to address his wife, and he called her “mummy Happy” (happy is the name of their first kid) and she flared up, she said she tired of being referred to as “mummy happy” by her husband.  She says the worst is that he sometimes called her “you dey there” –meaning ‘are you there’- we all laughed, but I could I see how serious she was about it, she said she wanted to be called a pet name or at least her given name, but her husband absolutely refuses to call her any of those ‘ridiculous’ pet names.

In turn, we asked her what she called him and she said she had tried calling him ‘baby’ and he told her he was not a baby and would not be called one, she tried other names like honey, darling and other pet names, even names in their native language and he refused to answer to anyone of those names.  We all had a good laugh from it, but I could see that she was truly hurt because she felt he did not value her, seeing as other people had pet names.

Personally, I like to be called 'baby', not because I am one, but because it has a certain tenderness to it and a protective quality to it, and it makes me feel really loved. I love being called pet names a lot and feel it increases your intimacy level when you have that special name that you and you alone call your spouse, apparently not everyone agrees. I hate being called 'honey', maybe its because I hate honey, its actually a turn-off for me.

Do you think it matters though? let me know your thoughts.

Terrible Breakups

No matter how much we have heard or we hear about a break up or some forms of breakups, it still never ceases to amaze me at how human beings who are supposed to be the smartest living beings in the world act. A friend of mine was supposed to get married sometime in September of 2012, but the wedding never held.  I always wondered why, because he really seemed to be in love with his fiancee, he bought her a ring of over 2million naira, gave her a little  over1million naira to shop for her wedding dress and other wedding accessories , he constantly used her picture, the ring or a wedding gown as his DP.

Then suddenly she disappeared from his DP, the ring vanished and the gown also stopped appearing.  The set date for the wedding came and passed with no happenings, when I asked him about it he refused to talk about it and I later heard from a mutual friend of ours that he broke it off because that girl was from a certain state.  That’s it!  Moreover, guess how he broke it off; on the phone, yes, he just called her, told her he was no longer interested because of where she was from and then he dropped the phone.  The irony of it all is that he’s from the same state!  How heartless was that, I mean if a guy is going to break up with me just before my wedding, he should at least give me a concrete reason, something like;

       “I’m sorry Onyinye, you are too fat and I won’t be able to lift you up to take a picture on our       wedding day”.  That I would and can understand

Another male friend of mine of mine got jilted by another girl he was engaged to.  Why?  She realized he was catholic.  Seriously?  When he told me, I thought he was kidding, until he assured me he was not. Now that’s just wrong and cruel.  Did she not know he was catholic all this while?  Why then accept his proposal and the ring, knowing she couldn’t marry a catholic?

I think it’s all this packaged and chemical food we eat these days is affecting them, I keep hearing of really foolish reasons why people call off relationships, and I think it’s terribly sad.

I tried to rationalize why people do this, and the only excuse or tangible reason I could come up with was that the relationship was rushed and the spouses feeling constricted and suffocated just came up with these lame and inane excuses to get out of the relationship, but if that’s the case, why couldn’t they have come up with smarter excuses?  Perhaps again, it’s because of all the chemicals in food now.

However, could it just be all an act of cowardice that people now seek the easiest way to break off relationships? Or are these really genuine reasons that just seem really silly to us normal people?

Setting Standards in Relationships

Chatting with a friend of mine recently, the topic of marriage came up, as is most common with us single ladies.  She told me she was receiving a lot of grief at home to get married, seeing as she was the first daughter and her three younger sisters were already married.  Now this friend of mine is really beautiful both in and outside, and I asked her what was actually stopping her from getting married because she had a lot of suitors.  She told me she was yet to meet anyone who she felt was “the right one”.  This got us talking about setting standards in choosing a life partner.  Almost everyone around her, her parents inclusive feels she’s being too picky in choosing a life partner, the thing is, she feels she’s not, she has set a standard for choosing a future partner and to be honest, mine is even higher than hers, but there’s so much pressure now, and she’s had to lower her standards a bit just to accommodate her parents.

A couple of days ago, her parents told her to stop being a beggar with a choice.  Is that what we have become, Beggars without choices who grovel at any and everything thrown at them?  Even beggars nowadays have choices; I’ve seen beggars reject 5 and 10 naira because they feel they deserve more, not to talk of choosing a life partner.

Should we because we are single women accept anything that proposes to us in the name of getting married?  Should we further lower our already lowered standards just to accommodate the young men of this generation who do not even bother to aim high any longer, gone are the days when men actually went all out to impress a girl, now they all throw Isaiah 4:1 in our faces, although I keep telling them it won’t happen in my own time. 

So the question today is; should my friend stop being a beggar with choice and grab at anything that comes her way in the name of getting married?

Being Single

No matter how much we say it doesn’t hurt to be single, the truth is that it does. When you hear of a friend’s marriage, see a happy couple or read something sentimental, we sometimes wish…

Sitting at home tonight, I really wished I was married, I feel so alone and lonely even though there are people around me, a melancholic feeling which I can’t even explain fills me right now, and it just makes me wish…

A Belated Happy New Year

 I wish you all a belated merry Christmas and a happy new year.  I’ve been away for a while now.  I was in my village to attend my late grandfather’s funeral, and my late grandmother’s burial ceremony.  My grandfather died way before I was born and my grandmother died a couple of months ago, but according to the “omenala” of my people, my grandfather’s funeral had to be celebrated and not just have him buried before anyone else can be buried, so I am assuming my father did not have enough funds then to properly celebrate his father, so it had to be done before my grandmother could be buried. It was really fun for me and it was such an eye opener to the customs and traditions of my people, which I did not even think we had. I was able to meet a lot of my otherwise unknown relatives and get re-acquainted with some long lost ones.

On my way back from Enugu, I was robbed and my traveling bag was stolen, thank God I had no valuable in it though.  Despite  that, I really feel it’s going to be a great year for me and a lot of people. Say a big Amen if you believe that.  

I took lots and lots of pictures and videos, here are just a few picture:

There’s me drinking “nkwocha” with my brother

 Sorry i couldn't upload more pictures, terrible network. i wish everyone a beautiful year ahead