Dear Felicia

 

“The only difference between myself, and other people who suffer from bipolar, is that my grandeur is not a delusion” – Emperor Shana Genever

 

Dear Felicia

 

The last month has been an absolute rollercoaster. I say this, fully aware of the danger-zone I enter of corny clichés and ou-mens gesprekkies. I do not live in fear of your spilt milk, aunty Merle. Spilled semen is far more daunting.

But like the broken condoms of my youth, I bring a dire conclusion that may rub you up the wrong way.

So I shall offer a disclaimer first, before telling you this series of unfortunate events.

Yes, Ek le mennie jiek-its.

Cos my flaring blister clump is aggravated by the one medication I can take to silence my mind.

I am Bipolar, and that isn’t a joke about 7nde Laan.

And as last week I stood in JafMed in Ottery for my new prescription, and an update on my herpes meds too…

Realising that I was now on chronic pills for both ends of my body, and to be honest, both sides of my personality [my head and my poes], the Muslim-farmstall hybrid retarded cousin that works the counter at the pharmacy gave me a look that said “Haha, if you have an STD and Bipolar… Does that make you the true definition of a Mal-Naai?”

 

Yes. It certainly does, Tariq.

 

Now please ring up my Xanex, and this Fruity-bubbalicious.

 

 

But, Felicia, I have not even touched on what has had me in and out of therapy since my last letter to you.

[You know, the one about the boyfriend, the love boat and the diarrhoea- I will address this, hold on]

 

And in the true spirit of obsessive compulsive disorder, which also lurks in the chambers of my mind…

And to answer the questions in your mind, about where I have been, where I am going….

And why the fuck I keep calling you Felicia…..

 

 

First, I have to offer you the usual:

 

Context:

Now Felicia, please bear in mind that my offering this time is of a different nature. You may have to digest the many points and tangents piece by piece. I am going to be long-winded, more so than usual.

But I feel I owe you an explanation.

I owe a lot of my healing to you.

…

I hid in the bathroom, muffling my receiver.

“Hi, I’d like an appointment with Dr. George. Yes, Wednesday is fine. No, I am on a new medical aid. Yes, Bipolar…”

The door squeaked and I kept quiet, obviously confusing Fagmieda the medical secretary. But she was used to talking to taaties.

“Sorry, I lost reception… Which is funny because, you know… you’re a receptionist”.

“Sorry?”

“Sorry. Never mind“, I was talking a klom nervous kak.

I was in the bathroom at the office.

You know you’re embarrassed when you operate under the guise of taking a professional kak.

 

Okay, let’s back track.

 

1. I cannot perfect the art of public bowel movements, like the popular girls did at high school. I vividly remember the “Do you popo? Im not bung to say I popo” conversations I had to endure, from the bitches who were cool about everything. Too hip to be virgins.

2. I was diagnosed with Bipolar and OCD in 2008. This is years before post-natal depression kicked in, but definitely related.

I have mused about my time in Crescent Clinic, and the life thereafter of potential-less suitors I endured in my bouts of medicated/Un-medicated bliss[ters].

And was put back on my medication when on a particular evening in 2011, my dad caught me addressing myself in the mirror: Honourable Shana. I do not recognise you.

 Sidney was 1.

I was lonely.

 

Then, I met Lyle.

And the rollercoaster experienced turbulence, Felicia.

I Iost my mind.

I lost myself.

 

Somebody wanted me.

I did not want Sidney.

 

I fell pregnant with Syria-Rose at the end of 2013.

 

This meant two things:

1. I had purposefully impregnated myself less than six months after having an abortion.

I laid for many nights dreaming of sitting in Mitchell’s Plain’s MOU, spread eagle in the morgue, getting the life sucked out of me.

When I woke up in cold sweats, I didn’t blame my bipolar. I blamed my conscience.

It has taken me years to enjoy eating biltong again without gagging at the smell.

 

“Mommy, I need to tell you something. Please don’t laugh”.

My mother lifted the eyebrow of judgement.

“Mommy… it’s happening again. The window is talking to me and it wants me to throw Rose out of it.”

 

 

2. I had to stop taking my bipolar medicine.

When Rose was born, and I was left alone with her in the three months of maternity leave, I had relapsed to the point of supergluing all our upstairs windows shut.

Lyle and I had broken up for the last time, when he gave me a hiding at her baptism and I had made my last excuse through swollen lips.

[He also stole Bob Martins from Hyper, which was the actual last straw that broke my back, before he did.]

And then, I started blogging.

 

And we met, Felicia.

 

And I had someone to listen to me.

A friend.

 

Someone to help me remove the screwdriver from my heart.

And we took a break from each other when I couldn’t bear to see the sun come up on a day that Lyle didn’t exist.

 

And in the midst of all of the silent commotion, and trying to be a mother, woven together… I left you Felicia… And found the love of my life.

And Herpes…

[But mainly, the love of my life…]

 

And this, brings us to the present day.
This is where our story actually begins.

And Felicia, I am here to tell you that is where our journey together must end.

……………….

 

 

“Shana Genever, you are cordially invited to join me aboard the blah blah boat for a Valentine’s Day Couple’s Cruise…Do you accept my invitation?”

 

Is die bra befok?

 

I couldn’t find my land legs when that message came through.

 

If only he knew last year I spent the day with Diarrhoea, nursing a broken heart and rectum. Now he wanted to throw me in the deep-end, off the love boat.

“Okay…”

We got onto the vessel at 9pm, arms intertwined.

I felt my chastity belt loosen beneath my belly button.

The sermon from the Passion concert the night before resonated in my conscience…

And in silence, I recollected every single romantic gesture a man has ever executed… That took about seven seconds… of coming up empty.

“Die is n man van die here…. Die is n man van die here…..” I repeated in my head… Suddenly realising that my inner voice sounded a hell of a lot like my mother…

 

[Which was contraception enough]

 

And I went through the motion [Yes, of the ocean] in awe of seeing a man pull out all the stops with no expectation.

Pity he didn’t try though, those bands would have made me dance.

I was ready to sneak down into the captain’s toilet and bend over the basin.

There was hoekal turbulence…

And then he looked at me and said the words that made me know that this wasn’t like anything I had ever experienced before.

“Shana…”

I sipped the non-alcoholic champagne, looking through the window. Why was I shy for a man that I had known for six years?

We were friends. We weren’t supposed to be smiling this much.

With a very messy launching pad, we were on dangerous ground [or waters, shut the fuck up].

But it never felt wrong.

“Would you be the Rose Dewitt Bukater to my Jack Dawson?”

“Huh?” I destroyed the corny moment, as expected of course.

 

Oh. I get it. Boat reference. Fuck.

“Would you stand at the helm of this vessel called us and navigate this ocean of life with me?”

 

I could have drowned in my own cum.

The next week I found out I had herpes and phoned him at work to cry, but in essence, still a lovely little moment.

 

When trying to be absolutely edgy it is counterproductive to be absolutely in love. I learnt this the other day staring into the very brown eyes of my other 1/4. [I am now split into four, not two.., that’s what you get for having multiple children out of gridlock… or something].

“Shana, I love you so much I want to take clouds out of the sky for you… “

My immediate reaction precipitated out from my parted lips… “You a bunny ma se poes”.

… Like Celine Dion scripted my life, with the help of her father, or uncle-husband or whatever the fuck we are pretending that relationship wasn’t.

I burst out laughing.

This fucking man is ready to contribute to global warming if it pleases me. When did I get here?

It is a good place to be.

……

 

I sat on my knees in my room, looking at my children.

I couldn’t stop crying.

But when I saw Doctor George, and he medicated the fuck out of me, I gained a new perspective on what I needed to do to take the next step in my Life.

I needed to Let Go.

The Hoe is a time-capsule, and I have had to say goodbye to her, to Lyle, to the bad memories. I have to take my meds, raise my kids, and I have to look forward.

But Felicia, writing to you, I am looking back.

 

And I have figured it out.

 

 

Felicia, the last thing that has to go is you.

This is my new life now, and if I don’t give it the chance it deserves, or the privacy it is owed, I fear it may not go as God intended.

 

I need to let you go.

 

And you also need to grow.

You’re the aunty that no one eats from. The old lady drinking with the owner at Atmosphere.

[I remember thinking that these women are the same age as my mother. I firmly believe if the people in the club feel weird lighting their entjies in front of you, out of respect, you probably shouldn’t be there.  Atmosphere came with many perks, however. My little group from Pelican Heights was well known, and I was thin and young and desirable. [We will not discuss the one occasion my mom dropped me in front of the doors, and shouted ‘take care of my baby’ as she drove off– or after the foam party when I walked into Narrans, not knowing that I had foam on my boots, and wondering why Sulaiman kept giving me the ‘haai shame’ side eye over the counter]. But like Atmosphere, and my teens, and my days of Jintu, everything must come to an end].

 

And now Felicia, this is where we stand.

FOMO and all.

It’s not you, it’s me.

I am just not the same anymore.

…………..

 

Dad: “…Nou wiet Riyaahd jy’t herpes?’

Me: “Yes daddy, he knows”.

Mom: “En die Bipolar goed?”

Me: “Yes mommy.

 

Silence. They stare at each other.

Dad: “Jy bieter nie met die man trou nie, hy klink befok”.

 ….

 

So, Felicia….

Bye.

 

 ………

You ladies better get your PHDs

Get off the internet, your life is waiting for you.

 

You are better.

You are stronger.

 

Shana

 

[I want you all to know that you have been my rock, my family and my support system through this entire journey. Being ‘The Hoe’ has become bigger than I ever imagined, and before my ego is dependent on the attention I have received from my journey, and my need to help women, I feel the need to retract. I am no longer in my dark space. I want to look forward, and find new avenues that focus on women who are.

And I want my work to include Jesus.

This is why I can no longer use the platform of my old life, I have been renewed, mentally , spiritually and physically, and it is time to pay it forward.

Am I still going to write?

Yes.

But as Shana.

And when I do decide to give Shana her debut, I hope all of you are there to listen to her.

If not and my journey has ended with you right here, I still want to extend my utmost gratitude, for your shares, and likes and all your love.

I hope my story shows you that you are never too deep in the dark to see the light.

I love you.

 

Intermission: Internal Mission

The look in my father’s eyes when he drove away from the home he built for his family almost 25 years ago was enough to silence me for several days.

And silence is not my forte.

The last time I couldn’t speak, the man I committed my heart to was murdered. And no words seemed good enough.

My throat refused to tolerate mediocre, polite expression.

I have changed in the last two months.

Some of these changes were conscious. Some merely evolution. But all were unavoidable if I was going to look forward, and no longer wish that 5 September 2015 had taken me with it when it left.

I have no intention of making you laugh.

I don’t really want you to feel anything.

I wasn’t even going to blog, but Guy Fawkes is a significant day for me. At least it was. As my entire life feels as if I should refer to it in past tense while I explore limbo.

In November 2012, I stayed in a little cottage in Lakeside. It was around the time of my mental honeymoon, and I remember being outside, hanging the washing, looking at Lyle through our bedroom window.

The fireworks on Muizenberg beach were visible overhead.

He looked up from whatever he was doing and saw me staring at him.

He smiled at me, and made his way through the kitchen to the front yard.

“So, are we getting married or what?”

I didn’t even take him seriously till he showed me the blue, tanzanite ring from Sterns.

I laughed and hit him.

“Are you versin?”

I had immediately forgiven every single thing he had done up until that moment.

“I was going to ask you at the beach but you looked kak reg through the window”.

He really understood me very well.

“You asking me to marry you in the yard? I’m wearing a tracksuit, Lyle”.

I remember this conversation verbatim.

We had argued earlier that day and he disappeared for an hour with my bankcard. I knew he was at Toad on the Road, though. Standard bank kept notifying me of his whereabouts.

“You still kwaad?”

I wasn’t.

“I don’t smaak for the beach. Light a enchie”.

And that pakkie Princeton accompanied us from the yard, watching the fireworks, to the crackling in the fridge… to the first time we made love as fiancés.

I didn’t know that in three years, the fireworks would be over.

….

The dreams are the most difficult part of this transition.

A few weeks ago I had an evening without the kids and took the time to reflect with a glass of wine, in the dark. I must have fallen asleep around ten.

I was back at Muizenberg High School, sitting in the quad.

My phone rang, and it was Lyle’s mother.

“Shana, they lied to us. Lyle isn’t dead. You need to get here and kiss him so he can wake up”.

I jumped up and when I looked up I was in Strandfontein, in the road next to his, but someone had built walls at every intersection.

I spent hours, in real time, trying to jump the wall to give Lyle the kiss of life.

I remember wondering if he would like my uniform.

When I woke up, for the first four seconds, I laughed, because I thought I had dreamt that everyone thought he was dead, and I was relieved that he wasn’t.

And then.

I didn’t get up that day.

Sidney came into the room a few times and I couldn’t speak to him.

I didn’t cry though.

I have felt hollow since the unceremonious Whatsapp from his mother, and I still hate Friday nights, because I have to wake up on Saturday mornings.

“Os moet pak Shana”, my mother was standing at my door with black-bags in hand.

I opened the one side of my big brown cupboard and reached over to the side that wouldn’t unlock.

I haven’t looked in this cupboard in two months.

This isn’t coincidental.

I dragged my hand across the wooden bottom of the cupboard, and grabbed blindly at the hoodies and beanies I stole from Lyle over the last few years.

I only noticed a few minutes in that I was holding my breath.

I stretched my hand a little bit further; expecting to grab a jersey and my fingers hits something hard and glassy.

In the last month of his life, Lyle showed up outside my garage and said he wanted to give me something.

“I want nothing from you, Lyle”.

He put his hand in his pocket and took out an I-pod.

The screen was cracked.

He was embarrassed.

I liked that he was embarrassed.

[I am embarrassed at writing this, at my desk. This is the first time I have cried in Milnerton].

“I know it’s old and stuff, but I put the Cranberries on it. You can listen on the bus or something”….

I declined thrice before taking it.

I closed the garage door before he left.

I pulled the I-pod from my cupboard.

[…”We’re not broken just bent…” on repeat in my ears at my desk, I had to take a break from writing this to you guys.]

I wanted to add the last email he sent me two days before he passed away, but that would mean I would have to read it again.

I hardly look directly at my screen when I type his name.

The cracked I-pod was a lovely metaphor.

I stuffed the black bag with everything I wanted to take with from my old life.

A black bag filled with things I never wanted from Lyle, is now the only black bag I packed to take with me.

[TBC]

To my readers: I haven’t written in a long time because I haven’t had anything worth saying.

I promised you that I wouldn’t speak about Lyle, but I overestimated my resilience. I am going to take a break for a while.

Indefinitely.

I want to come back to you with the same passion I felt when I started this a year ago.

I have forgotten my motivation.

I have forgotten a bit of myself, really.

And right now I cannot even try to plan a weekly 2000 words.

I don’t even know how I am going to speak to my kids today.

I don’t even know how I am going to survive the fireworks tonight.

Sin-girl Pair-hunting: Because you’re a heathen. And need a man.

“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.” 
― Albert Einstein

I am not Just a hoe.

I am just a hoe, with babies.

However, my babies seem to have gotten lost in my rants about my shenanigans as a not-so-chaste female.

My chastity belt slightly impaired in my teens, I have belted my lack of chastity for the sake of education, for the sake of venting… for the sake of clicks on my ‘trashy blog’.

But this is not the only reason.

The scenario is a staple in the minds of all single mothers.

I will bet my Sassa on it.

Those of us, who had a baby young, mainly due to discovering our vaginas in standard 6, will be able to admit to you [in a few more years] that we have all pictured ourselves at the edge of the kitchen table, staring at our adult children in awe.

Awe not.

In this fantasy, I am about ‘40 something’ years old.

And I am rich enough to have a really long motherfucking table.

I have purposefully held off on relationships for at least two decades… so I don’t look verniel by resentment and the perpetual checking of my partner’s Whatsapp.

[In my version… my hair has grown back… my vagina has refurbished its self to a prepubescent state… and I have lost approximately 20 kilos.]

Nothing smells like kak.

Nothing smells like mamok.

There is no porridge on my skirt.

And as I look at my kids, I have a tear in my eye as I realize that the years have passed and I have made it through.

And I say the words I have waited to say since I told my friends I couldn’t go with to gala because I had ‘responsibilities’….

 “I had you guys so young, but you were the best thing to ever happen to me…”

………………“Now foetcheck”.

Mama is out, bitch.

And so, we will recapture my youth and awkwardly jol at age inappropriate venues in Ottery industrial, while I rediscover the dangers of alcohol and dagga.

…and watever passes for MDMA’s in 2026.

And I will call up my home-girls and laugh as they tell me “Sorry babe, I can’t make it… the kids are going crazy”.

Bitch, fuck yo kids.

I was pregnant during the 2010 world cup.

I missed the drinking, the sex in Long Street. The exciting danger of human-trafficking on our doorstep.

Now, it is my time.

I feel it.

It is here.

 Wie Waka-Waka nou?

Naaiers.

As I sat down to pee last week Thursday, I was still half asleep when Sidney jumped from his bed and ran to the bathroom and jumped on me… mid stream, pushing me back and my urethra forward.

At this glorious moment my relief ricocheted off the bowl and ally-hooped onto my underwear, my leg… and my bathroom mat.

Golden memories.

And thus the metaphor for what happens to your life after you carry a baby in your womb.

Urine trouble.

…

‘Mama why is this so dirty?”

I felt my face drop to the floor of the man who was fixing my modem.

[..”Lewe Jesus lat die klong sy bek hou”…]

As we sat in the admittedly dusty double garage turned office of my IT guy, I immediately understood why while I was growing up, my mother randomly hit me in my bek whenever I spoke. I am raising a vile, outspoken critical asshole.

Dead lord I am raising a mini-me.

“Mama…..”

Inhale.

“Yes, baby? Just play on mommy’s phone baby…” He wasn’t buying into the diversion.

“But mama, this is so dirty.”

Okay.. . Maybe I can play this down.

“…What is dirty my boy? The table? “

Sidney’s look of concern at my blatant disregard for the obvious made me know we were at the point of no return.

The home-owner and I could no longer pretend we were momentarily deaf.

We looked at Sidney.

“The whole house is dirty mama”…. He lifted his hands to bring his point home.

“The whole house. Everything”.

Now I sit here like a naai, sans ma se poes modem… nat gepiss.

But my kids [this week especially] have put a damper on many relationships for me.

I.T and otherwise.

When the sheriff of the court stopped here the other day to deliver a summons from some or other institution I am never going to pay, he looked me up and down, but in a lekker way.

A black man with a white accent and a work vehicle.

I felt like I was on Generations.

He handed me the 500-page document about my slow-payer ass.

“Hey there.”

“Hi “ I said… keeping me harre-gat like my top of the barrel competitors.

He gave me a half-smile… Half ‘I could eat you’ look.

“How do I contact you?”

Fuck it. After a few exchanges I gave him my celly.

Hit me up, nigger. [Last time I said that, it was taken too literally… ]

“When are you available?”

I could have said anything.

This was my opportunity to be smooth.

I mean ma.. I have options. One Nigerian broe from Tinder wanted to take me for coffee or something.

I was living the life.

I pretended to mentally scan my schedule.

But before I could employ one of my usually witty, sexy retorts, I blurted: “Well, I have two kids and a full time job. I am never free. So I will have to let you know.”

And he really did try hard to hold his smile.

Before he pulled out…

… from my drive way.

This broe was 100% willing to naai me even though I am blacklisted and Edgars might send him to arrest me next. 

But children and a full time job was just too much….

Till we meet again my friend.

It has been a long day without your phone call.

REMEMBER KIDS: Not chaste= Not chised.

In any event, I took to Tinder to see what exactly I was missing out on.

And oh boy, have I missed being asked if I’m horny.

“Sorry babe, all my naked pics are on my ex’s memory card. Don’t think he will be releasing those to me any time soon. “

Men truly are fabulous.

And then, a good friend who happens to have a vagina in-boxed me a drunken: “Where you?’

I responded… and amidst the misspelling attributed to what I can only assume was a mouth full of Captain Morgan, I deciphered a distinctive…

“I dare you to come to Stargayzer.. I’m in love with you…”

Breathe.

Trauma.

You know what happened last time you engaged in intercuntinental activities.

The other two parties voted you out, and you watched from survivor-island while they utilized the immunity idol… [Inside joke. (haha) for my tot-laat-toe readers. If you’re new here… you should read the other posts too. Don’t half ass this relationship]

I reluctantly declined, and decided to tackle the devil I know: Piel.

“Hey Shana. Thanks for the match. How you?”

[Who the poes says thanks for the match? But I was willing to accept]

“I am good, thanks. What do you do for a living?

[Nog lang dinge praatie. Do you have money?]

“I am a music producer”.

Now, this could go two ways.

Either you being paid by Sony, or you a naai that works for TFG and goes home and plays with fruity-loops.

“I make beats. But just for me. Not getting paid yet though but just getting my stuff out there.”

Sigh.

“Oh okay, cool. And what’s your day job?”

I may have just been ‘Bye Felicia’d’ by a bra that doesn’t know the definition of the word ‘job’.

But wait…

[27 hours later].

“Hey. How you Shana?”

“Fine thanks. How you doing?”

“Just busy man. Sorry for only responding now. You have whatsapp?”

“I do, yeah. 06128……..”

Sometime later: “Shana, did you get my whatsapp message?”

“Hey sorry, yes I did. My son had my phone”.

“Oh.”

“Yeah the kids are going crazy here…

Hello?…

Hello?…..

… Now Foetcheck.”

I don’t have a PHD

“Hello?………”

I am just Shana

I am just fertile

I am just a Hoe… With babies

Chapter Two: Different strokes, for different medical aids.

“You can’t put a price tag on love. But if you could, I’d wait for it to go on sale.” — Hussein Nishah

Shana, ko huistoe. Ek dink jou pa kry n stroke”.

The call came as I sat down at my desk around 6pm, my boss looking at me through his glass wall.

A stone’s throw away.

“Mommy, what do you mean?”

I knew exactly what she meant.

“Jou pa trek skief. “

I tried not to giggle, and avoided the urge to ask “since when is daddy gay?’…

My family isn’t very sensitive.

I jumped up and shouted across the office…

“I’m leaving. My dad is having a stroke”.

Post traumatic stress had me biet.

That means I was stressed about what to post during this trauma.. .

But there was no time for social me, dear.

I saw my boss mouth, “What more can happen to this girl?”

My bru. Jy mean.

I ran down the stairs and jumped into my car to anxiously… sit in traffic.

 You’d think after the 2015 I’ve had, I would have installed a siren and emergency light by now.

“fok.fok.fok.fok.fok.fok.”

I called my sister:

“Sonya, daddy is having a stroke. He’s gonna die”.

“You need to calm down, Shana”.

 Okay.

I called the crèche.

 

“Hey teacher, are the kids…….”

“Hey Shana, they with your mommy”.

 

Silence.

“What?”

Mid-stroke, my parents had made the joint decision to first fetch my children…

The logic, I believe was in the event of my father’s death or more inconveniently… his admittance to hospital… nobody had luss to still go back to Strandfontein and fetch the lighties.

 

My sister arrived at the hospital first.

Before my mommy and daddy.

By the time I had gotten there, my father was Jacob-Straight-up in the waiting room, my mother was in the car feeding my children, and my sister was lamming next to my daddy, chatting on Whatsapp.

[DO YOU MOTHERFUCKERS THINK THIS IS A GAME?]

“What’s happening?” [I decided against asking if they were all jus]

“Niksie, haai… hoeko is jy soe dramatic?”

I could feel that familiar poes-tingling that I get from baby-daddies and admin workers.

I went to my mother in the car:

“Mommy, what is going on? How could you fetch the kids first?”

 

And just like that, we went from zero to 120… “HOEKOM MOET JY ALTYD N FOKKEN SCENE MAAK?  [angry whisper] Ek try my fokken bes met jou fokken kinnesjy fokken…” I closed the car door.

I decided to rather go to my dad… before we were banned from another emergency unit, as a team.

“Ek is oraait my darling.”

I wanted to punch my father and induce something.

“Daddy… the people at work are gonna stop believing me. Are you having a stroke?”

The nurses had sent him back to the waiting room with a blood pressure of 214 over 90.

Pretty sure mine was higher.

They admitted my dad, and I sorted the kids, and dropped them off at family so that I could be at his side.

The doctors took him in for a CT scan and he remained somewhat conscious for the most part.

We sat in the waiting room, discussing how I couldn’t deal with death right now, and a woman who I had noticed in the corner since I arrived, and her ever so slightly ‘Milly Perkins’ sister approached my sister, my mother and I.

The universe had sent someone to help me put life into perspective.

“Hi there. I hope your dad is okay hey? God bless your family. I am waiting for my son’s results. He just slept and slept all weekend. We dunno what is wrong”.

Her son won’t wake up.

All the results for the tests came back clear.

There is no reason for him to be asleep.

But she continued, just in case I didn’t feel self absorbed enough.

And her eyes welled up.

“Sorry I seem so emotional… I don’t like September. Last year September I lost my daughter to cancer.”

And as we responded with awkward tears, she left.

“Mrs Genever… You can come through to your husband”.

 

My mother returned some minutes later… Looking almost shy…

“Die doctor wil met os almal saam praat”.

 

My father was diagnosed with Acute Nephritis back in 2005.

As a diabetic, he was not allowed to eat anything remotely fun or drink cool-drinks.

At the end of last year, he had a kidney transplant and was deemed ‘diabetes free’.

And for a man who had been deprived of all things delicious, he found himself on the wrong side  of temptation when we left him alone at home last week.

He sneakily drank a two litre Coca-Cola and by the time my mom had gotten home, the amount of sugar he had consumed had put him into a diabetic coma.

My mother assumed he was having a stroke, and instead of rushing him to hospital… packed  a lunchbox of supper for my children, and fetched them at school.

My father proceeded to have an out of body experience and walk himself down the stairs, to the car.

At this point, convinced he was about to die, he said “Phone vir Shana”..

I assume their conversation went something like this:

“Serie os moet ry. “

“Hou op vir my fokken aan jaa..”

 

My father was admitted for observation.

The next day I took the morning off to fetch him once he was discharged.

I walked in to work at 11am.

Seeing as how I am the only coloured in the building [and possibly the entire upper Milnerton, Table View and surrounds], tardiness and general stereotypes of our race hinder my growth in the company.

[I hear you, and let me emphasize that there are no coloureds in Milnerton. No, no… they only stay innie Militant. Vastly different.]

However, what we lack in BEE compliance, my boss makes up for in being a genuinely kind-hearted person.

“Morning sir. I mailed you, but thanks again for yesterday. My dad’s doing okay.”

“Great to hear, Shana! So was it a stroke?’

I hung my head in shame…

“No sir it wasn’t… he just overdosed on coke”.

……………

With any new beginnings, resolutions are inevitable.

I myself have found the last few weeks a daunting mess, and I have re-evaluated my stance on many a personal issue.

I have set myself certain goals, rules and of course limits.

But even on my strongest day, my resolution, “be less of a naai”, failed miserably, about ten seconds down my newsfeed.

“Anonymous post’, the admin declares… and in the same vein… “No negative comments”.

Brilliant.

A platform where no differing opinions will be allowed.

The definition of academic.

Let’s dive right in, shall we?:

“i like poking my husband in the bum, it makes him feel shy. it started out as me just being silly, but now i do it all the time, to the point where i feel like i didnt greet him properly if i didnt do that-worst part is, after im done poking him with my finger then i smell it, like i breath it in like its magic——-it pisses him off but i cant stop its become a habit now-it smells spicy sometimes, but i cant stop :-)/:-( help maybe”. (sic)

Sick indeed.

And this is the exact way all my ‘women’s group experiences have ended up.

Total strangers divulging their obsession with penetrating the anus of their husband, and inhaling it.

[Yes, male readers… this is what really goes down in our discussions.

Chances are if I see you in the road, I know… I know everything.]

Now, as someone with legitimate issues, I get frustrated when I am approached, directly or via social media with the type of person who feels the need to share made-up problems about ‘whether or not her sex life requires her husband to change his diet’.

But I bring this up because I think this type of attention seeking highlights exactly what is wrong with women, and why we need to stop watching Rom-Coms.

I entered most of these ladies groups for the same reasons, though.

I think that in your late 20’s, every girl who hasn’t forcibly hanged on tooth and nail to every high school friendship in the past ten years, finds herself at a crossroads where she really wants a ‘squad’.

I am 100% victim to this yearning.

I want to go to braais and suppers with people who love me, just the way I am.

I want to Skype conference call my girls, when something ridiculously fantastic happens to me.

I want to do monthly lunches with my ladies.

But then, someone oversteps a boundary and tells me about her significant other’s anus and its addictive tingle it leaves on her forefingers [Or God forbid, four fingers] and I am immediately grateful that people do not gravitate towards me.

The perks of not being a hol-smeller.

But, these ‘close’ relationships, from my observations inside and out are terribly superficial.

I am wholly convinced that we are taught as women to behave a certain way, even with our ‘girlfriends’ and wait all our lives to be old enough and disheveled enough to emulate our very own ‘Sex in the City’ remakes.

We proudly state first world problems to each other for:

1. The social standing it brings[ that we too participate in womanly things]
2. Fishing for compliments and acceptance.

Observe:

• OMP my eyebrows haven’t been done please don’t judge me
• My nails is still blue from last week. But now everyone have this colour on now I look like I copied them… make me jusssss.
• I woke up like this… Don’t judge

Your “true friend” can know you penetrate your hubby, but not that you need bread money … and this to me is not friendship of any kind…

And this makes me cringe, as I more often than not find myself participating in the same kind of relationships with bitches.. but have recently actively decided to not be so common…..

But….

A very particular stance of mine has changed of late, and I find it big enough to share.

And I feel weird about this, though as my readers have gone along on my journey of self discovery, where else would I admit something this personal… If not to a couple of thousand people I have never met?

I would like to get married.

Not immediately, but there is a definite possibility that if I find someone tolerable enough that doesn’t want to fornicate with all my childhood friends, I am open to a pair-bond.

So, I took to Tinder to see what exactly I was missing out on.

And oh boy, have I missed being asked if I’m horny.

“Sorry babe, all my naked pics are on my ex’s memory card. Don’t think he will be releasing those to me any time soon. “

Men truly are fabulous.

And then, last night a good friend who happens to have a vagina in-boxed me a drunken: “Where you?’

I responded… and amidst the misspelling attributed to what I can only assume was a mouth full of Captain Morgan, I deciphered a distinctive…

“I dare you to come to Stargayzer.. I’m in love with you…”

[To be continued]                                 

 

I don’t have a PHD

Nobody even realizes that applications are now, open.

[Apply within.  Get it? Cos I’m spicy]

I am just Shana

I am just fertile

I am just a Hoe… With Babies

The mourning after was a hard pill to swallow. [This post is late: I call this post, mortem]

“U humiliated him!! Insulted him cursed him with ur kak posts  about him. Now u want sit back & tjunk? Lyle was neva who u made him out 2 be. &yes I’m sad bout his death but happy that u Shana must now xplain 2 his daughter who her father really was. R u going 2 tell her that he was a broke ass poes driving laaties to schl & back? Like u did in ur posts & on ur blogs”.

If you are reading this, and you are not a basic-bitch who ceased all formal education in grade 9, allow me to edit this affront at the English language.

Herewith, for your reading pleasure, the translation from the widely spoken language, “Domnesia”.

“You humiliated him, insulted him with your bullshit posts and now you feel that you have the right to cry about his death? Lyle was not who you portrayed him as. I may be saddened by his death, but I find solace in the fact that you will have to tell your daughter about who her dad really was. I read all your posts and I really wish I was more involved in your life……….

Breathe.

This is the message from Andrea Somethingpoes as I logged on to my work laptop.

Great. More hate mail.

I suppose it is poetic jusness… I really do hate males.

She continued with righteous indignation:

“U not a mothers poes…”

Her eloquence immediately convinced me that she must be one of his conquests.

I, Andrea, am a Mercedes.

And I am titanium.

I certainly hope that I am not a mother’s poes. I have aspired to so much lately, it would be a shame to be defeated just yet.

I assume the phrasing meant that this was a compliment? She was saying that In fact was not the poes of a mother. Have I so far misinterpreted her intention?

And then, she said something my brain rejected…

“if he raped u id say u fuckn deserved hoe”.

This is the thought pattern that I dreaded after my tribute post to Lyle.

And I feel the need to clarify that at no point should women who have been following my work feel that they should forgive their abuser, on the off chance that they die in a tragic homicide that gets covered by every news agency in the country.

Do not model your decisions based on my life.

I live in the matrix.

And this Andrea mait reeks of stupidity.

“Cry all u want it wont make it beta I hope u liv with guilt the rest of u r life…”

I added the ellipse; I felt that sentence needed something, besides general punctuation and spelling.

Guilt is a relative term

And besides all of Lyle’s relatives making me feel guilty, what I mean is that in life it is very easy to romanticize situations, and take things out of context.

And I would like to address the last week and a half for what it was.

A blur.

A realization.

The closing of a chapter.

 

First, back to our sponsor:

….”Hardest thing 2 do writing the story of his brutal murder????? Y not say the hardest thing 2 do is admitting just the other day  u asked why dont u vrek lyle?  Well now lyle is vrek u got ur wish naaier”…

“Puttin up pics of u lyle wont change how u bad mouthd him and treated him”

“U deserv 2 be stoned bitch

U deserv 2 be stoned bitch”

 

So nice, she said it twice.

Andrea Somethingpoes thinks that I deserved to be stoned.

But Andrea, I don’t smoke boem.

You should probably ask by Soraya, being stoned is more her forte.

I have mentioned my aversion to narcotics many times, so her suggestion somewhat baffles me. Odd.

What most people don’t seem to understand is that many levels of self can exist in one person, at the same time.

I can be happy, sad, angry and relieved by the same event.

I have never promoted indulgence. Alas, it is the human condition.

The pleasure-pain that comes with being in the middle of tragedy is the equivalent of an orgasm.

A grieving widow, mother or close friend can rest assured that for an indefinite amount of time, the community will gather around her and hug her; presumably, I have now learnt… that she has been a model woman, and kept her mouth shut.

And when I woke up on Monday morning with a severe throat infection that stopped me from opening my mouth, the irony wasn’t lost on me.

I couldn’t vertel the hordes of mourners exactly how I felt about their kak tributes on YouTube.

Fuck you Nicolene/Nunu/Neanderthal I know you naaid Lyle on Pavillion when we were dating.

It certainly wasn’t a long relationship without you my friend.

I know he used to sell you to his brasse and split the money with you.

The tribute song was to Paul Walker, not street walker.

I have endured so much fake I could mamok it without even contracting my chest muscles.

I have endured cruelty from people who used to laugh them in their poes at my one-liners, and even saw me get hidings.

I have endured rudeness from every false naai at St. Phillip’s Catholic Church in Strandfontein that vuil kyked me at the tribute mass.

Quote me, motherfuckers.

Allow me to extend a superbly manicured middle finger.

I bring you Frank, and sense…and merniette.

And also with you.

Even the priest who only socializes with the Strandfontein elite catholic families acknowledged the entire congregation, except me.

May you burn in self-righteous hell along with many other religious needers.

Leaders.

Whatever.

So, as most of you are dying to know, what was the aftermath of September 5^th 2015? I like to call this movie:

“Fokol wedding and a double funeral”.

Soundtrack: The shady after-mass.

 

The day of his death I went to his home and greeted the family. His uncle found this to be the perfect opportunity to walk down memory lane.

“You gave my nephew a hard life” he said with a straight face.

Yes, I am sorry I told the police he abused me. I should’ve shut up.

I hugged his mistress who had joined him at the family home…Seeing as how he raised Lyle,  the apple doesn’t fall far from the OG.

I drifted through the masses of aunties and his cousins who always ignored him.

The St. Phillip’s rent-a-mourners’ ignored my attempt at small talk.

But we spoke about this…

I survived that first weekend…

Then, Monday.

Lyle loved when I sang. It was the one thing that didn’t end in violins.

Wait, what?

Regardless.. I inquired whether I could sing at the send off.

His family assumed I was trying to be disrespectful [I do put the FUN in  Funeral], and proceeded to decline every contribution I suggested.

When Thursday came around, I had gotten the picture.

I willfully announced to the powers that be that I would not be attending.

A selfish endeavour, somewhat.

I had no desire to see Lyle’s dead body.

I had no desire to see the rows and rows of side-chicks and Andrea Somethingpoes who felt entitled to vertel me kak.

Their Pews. [See what I did there?]

I had seen him stiff more times than I needed in my lifespan. They could have his cadaver. Fun for the whole family.

Lyle is no longer in his body.

Lyle is now a soul.

I dream about him every night.

This is my punishment.

I cried for Lyle for years…

I have very few tears left, and I will reserve them for when my children accomplish great things.

 

And right now, I cannot afford to break down.

 

When I break down, I become incapable of providing for my son and my daughter.. Lyle’s daughter..

The daughter I AM STILL providing for ALONE.

ALONE

ALONE

ALONE

 

I work two jobs.

16 hours a day.

Plus being a mother: those hours are 24/7

I liberated myself from an abusive relationship.

So when I ignore your abuse, I am not threatened, I am not offended…

I am being selective.

Your negativity is not beneficial..

It is not unique.

And I wonder why you have so much free time that you can dedicate such a large chunk of it to me.

People do not become Saints when they die.

No matter how much better it makes you feel to say that they do.

Can you imagine the Jews at Hitler’s funeral?

“Haai, he was nogal oraait man, shamepies.. At least he gave out gold stars”.

So this is the last post about you.

And this is the last post about Lyle.

And if that means that you no longer read my work… Don’t let the unfollow button hit you on the ass.

But if you truly are a fan of my writing, and thoughts, I sincerely appreciate that you take the time to read my stuff each week [Every two weeks at least man, fok don’t go on]

And yes, the last time I made a sanctimonious speech, the universe knocked my ass so far back to Kansas I lost my fucking breathe for a minute.

But Lyle never wanted me on my knees.

[Well, not for anyone else.. Am I right? .. too soon?]

Our relationship was hard to understand.

But I realized that I treated him the way I did, because of the way he treated me.

I was reacting.

I thought I would have at least another 50 years.

But the universe had different plans.

And now, so do I.

I am turning the page…

Chapter Two.                                          

A tribute to Lyle Joshua Eyden

“It was the best of times. It was the worst of times”- A tale of two shitty people.

Our last conversation replays in my head, unceremoniously.

I never thought he would die, regardless of the many times I enquired by him when he was actually going to kill himself.

Most of our conversations were dirty. Pickled with profanities that would make a sailor cringe.

But he loved me, and I loved him.

The irony that he was stabbed in the heart has not been lost on me.

Now, bear in mind… The screwdriver that took the life of Lyle Eyden went into his chest, and may as well have penetrated mine. I felt those repeated jabs as I read the message from his mother, even more unceremoniously on my Whatsapp.

 

“Shana, I just thought I should tell you, Lyle was killed this morning”.

 

My only response was…

 “No”.

Rose was giggling somewhere in the background, and when it dawned on me that at some point I would have to have another “Why don’t I have a daddy?” conversation again…. With my second child…..my brain shut down all functions…

I saw myself in the past.

I saw myself in the future.

“…Because, Rose… Your father loved you. He was just a damaged soul….”

Now, I know what you are thinking… Why is this bitch hurt? She always said the meanest things.

And this is accurate, though my words were not so much as mean as they were true.

Lyle hit me.

He hurt me.

He cheated on me and lied and humiliated me.

 

But, when it was good… It was magnificent.

And I never wanted him to die.

At least, not the way he did.

He died terrified.

He died alone.

And I know, as he laid there bleeding, in the bushes… he died thinking of Rosie.

And he died thinking of me.

….

“Hi Shana”

“Hi Lyle. I am at work at the moment I cannot really speak.”

“I just wanted to say Boney died”.

“Oh no, I am sorry”.

“Yeah it’s kak heavy… the mense in the village is just dying…”

I really couldn’t speak at work. And I didn’t want to.

“You had a lekker bra on when you came to my house ne?”

And I remember for the first time in a year, I blushed.

“Shut up Lyle. Your Girlfriend was there”.

“Ja I know, I am just saying man. But please rather don’t look so lekker again. Reminds me of the old times”.

I laughed.

To Lyle, I looked lekker in a swirlkous and pyjamas. He was always ready to jump me in the backseat.. Something I both loved and despised.

 

“But ya… just know that I wanna try and be friends again man. Let’s do supper.”

I declined.

 

I had no interest in reconciliation.

Not for the next few years.

I had it all planned out in my head.

We would be cordial, but he would watch me be okay without him. Then, when the kids were teens… he would have gotten his life in order and enough time would have passed for us to try again, without the awkwardness of the past looming over our heads.

He knew it wasn’t over.

I knew it wasn’t over.

I did not leave Lyle because I had stopped loving him.

I left Lyle because we were a bad, bad combination.

I am very strong, and made a decision with my head…

And have since been stabbed in the heart many, many times.

….

“I received your restraining order now… they just delivered it”

“Yup”.

“Yor. Okay.”

“Okay … bye”

“Bye”.

Our last conversation.

The last thing I said to him, was a sarcastic “bye”, so that he could go away.

 

There are actually 6 stages of grief…

They forgot to mention ‘regret’.

 

I scrolled through my Facebook today, to see the messages of condolences.

I could not get myself to answer any. Most were just “What happened”.. which is not so much a condolence, but more a pry.

And I battled with whether to put the story on my crime site.

I did, because we all want to know how deaths happened.

Who am I to stop anyone’s fix of trauma-porn?

I also did it because had anyone else died, I would have felt that the community needed to be educated and aware.

And I have never been a hypocrite.

So through my tears I typed out a very poorly written article.

Still, better on paper. Because the happenings of the morning of September 5^th 2015 taste bitter in my mouth.

But the fake condolences are not the people in my inbox or on my wall…

The ones that bother me are the people posting his picture, saying how they miss him. . . When they never really liked him in the first place.

Now, before you speak… understand that how I felt about Lyle was never a secret. We had no lies, and he always knew where he stood with me, and vice versa.

But, I am talking about the ‘friends’ who avoided him… Never really wanted him to join in on the fun… saw him as a burden…. And now are reaping the social points for ‘knowing the deceased’.

You are the worst kind of person…

And he knew you were fake.

His memory deserves better than your bullshit.

 

Lyle Eyden died on the anniversary of the night we conceived Syria.

Lyle Eyden died on his dad’s birthday.

Lyle Eyden died at the age of 25.

These facts are irrelevant, because I want to tell you about how Lyle Eyden lived.

He lived fearlessly.

Lyle didn’t care what you thought of him.

He was the king of his own world.

Sometimes he took it too far. . . But he had to… He never felt good enough for the friends and family that refused to help him fix himself.

He asked them for jobs, they said no.

He asked for money, they rolled their eyes.

He asked to be included in camping trips and parties… they smiled politely, but made sure they avoided it.

 

Lyle Eyden loved his daughter.

He fought for her.

Physically.

Legally.

And this is the only version of the story she will be told.

It is the only version she needs to know.

At 3am on September 5^th 2015, Syria-Rose woke up crying and vomiting.

She had never been so upset.

She said “Dada”.

I like to think that he came to say Goodbye.

I went to his home today, and felt the last four years of love and animosity.

I stood at the vigil with his daughter, staring at all the side-chicks who think I never knew.

I smoked cigarettes today for the first time in a long time.

And I just absorbed it all.

My mind accepted that Lyle was gone..

….and all the voice in my head said was “Why did you leave me Lyle? What the fuck am I supposed to do now? What am I going to tell Syria?…

 

Baby, are you at least okay?

Has your soul found the peace it deserves?

Do you forgive me?

 

I am hoping that tonight when I go to sleep, he will give me the answers I so desperately need.

He was the love of my life.

We were the worst of enemies.

It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.

 

And today… I finally understand what pain is.

 

I was going to see him at court on Monday.

I will still be going in…

I have to tell them that he is dead.

 

He is dead.

He is dead.

He is dead.

 

No.

 

 

I don’t have a PHD

Nobody. Nobody ever again.

 

I am just Shana

I am just Fertile

I am just a Hoe… With Babies

Shot through the heart. And you’re to blame.

We gave love… A bad name.

May your soul rest in eternal peace, Mr Eyden.

Till we meet again.

Part two: The sick will. . . go to work. [Secondary name: I don’t care if you don’t like my blog.. I know you read it].

“Our health always seems much more valuable after we lose it.“- Oswald

…The same is true about our virginity, and our minds…..

***

In continuation of the sordid facts of my existence. In the last week I was thrown down with “stress related ailments” that had my tenured physician squinting at his charts.

“When was your last period?”

The default question he is required by law to ask, before treating a Jintu.

My default answer, naturally is “Doctor, please don’t take me for a poes.”

My Wednesday and Thursday past were spent in my bed, wondering why I had no-one to administer vitamin P and make me all better. [I am lead to believe that this is the solution to all life’s problems? Or every online dating site I am registered to has been lying to me. . . Next, you are probably going to tell me that the promise that there are men in my area who are waiting to fuck me, so why masturbate?… is a marketing ploy. Ironically, I will have none of it.]

Regardless, I laid there, incapacitated… bek open for air while life went on all around me.

And I thought about how I would present this much anticipated ‘part two’…

But alas, dear reader… I approach you with no fire- works..

I have not the time.. Nor the budget.

A few weeks ago I had a supper planned with a [self-proclaimed] fan of my blog who I had only seen twice before, somewhat briefly.

My editor joined.

A logistical issue at the time, but my editor has since become one of my closest friends. My ‘fan’ didn’t know this though, and to her knowledge, she was meeting my boss…

She got into my car, and said to my superior…

“Awe, are you the poes that made us late?”

Now, my boss at the time [who has since resigned, in what I would like to believe was an unrelated incident] is of the variety of coloured woman who has acquired no physical injury to her mouth.

She certainly did not fall on it.

And the tension that followed and subsequently built up on the ride to Claremont’s Salushi’s was enough to be cut with a knife.

It is this particular knife that I was afraid of.

I drove with caution, gently humming Kumbaya.

“Oh my poes, your hair look so kak…Why do your hair look so kak? That is plastic kak”,

This was repeated numerous times about my new accessory weave. I felt the entire M5 cringe for me.

“You don’t have to like it you know…” I tried to seem okay with the attack on my appearance. Why wouldn’t I be okay with being told how kak I looked after enduring three gang fights and a possible third baby from Lukmaan-Badboy to get it. [Seriously, read part one].

Now, before I continue; women like this are the type of woman [and person] that I have tried to rid from my life since my awakening.

Anyone who is in the business of putting you down is taking up valuable space in your life. And they are wasting this space, and turning it toxic.

Since I left my abusive boyfriend, I will not tolerate anyone who thinks that the constant berating of who I am and the choices I make, no matter how ridiculous are subject to being insulted.

A real friend only builds.

 

“I think it looks nice”, my boss lied.

But the hair conversation was not the straw that made me break the seal on my packet of Camel black.

She turned to my boss at the restaurant and started a series of questions so vile, that I cringe as type words I am not even responsible for.

“How old are you?

“23”

“Oh my poes you a lighty. Shana how can a lighty be your boss? That’s embarrassing. What does that say about you?”

“We all have different journeys, you know..”  My boss attempting to be cordial. But the psycho destroyed our southern comfort.

“Oh please. We all have an infinite amount of lives we could be living. She made the kak choices that put her where she is today. I will never take orders from a  lighty.”.

Breathe, Shana.

“Now why do you have so a kwaai job? Shana don’t you feel like a poes?”

We were losing our patience for this kin, as a team. Unspoken at the time, but a obviously shared phenomenon.

 

“Yay, I am speaking to you…”, she hit my menu down, out of my hands.

Silence…

Waiter enters stage left…

We look at our menus as she turns to my boss….

 

“Yay lighty what you eating?”

 

The rest is all a blur, but when my other friend ended work and joined us, the drive home was not PG.

I now have one less fan. Ironically, I feel cooler.

In any event, this was not the end of the shit-parade I call “August”.

When the phone call came I was at my desk, working for the salary that deems me too rich for Sassa, but too poor to afford anything besides my travelling money and the cheap entjies promo girls sell at Pizza Shack that comes with that kak lighter some naai super-glued into a casing.

Do I seem angry? I don’t mean to.

“Hi Shana”

“What do you want Lyle?”

“Did you get the letter?… Well it doesn’t matter… you will”.

“What letter, Lyle”.

“From the court. I am taking you to court”.

Silence.

Sigh.

“Why are you taking me to court?…”

“I can’t afford this maintenance kak. I work me in my poes to waste my money on you.”

I sniggered at the irony as I sat at my desk at 6am, with Tonsilitis.

His child was an ailment.

She was hurting his finances.

This naai had Tonsi-lighties.

 

“Lyle, you only give me R800. So far that has only been in theory. You have paid me short every month”.

“Ya but you know what I earn”.

“So maybe you should be better?”

“Yay, don’t take me for a poes. You mos don’t need my money if you can afford that kaffer hair”.

Silence.

I  had reached an impasse. Either I was going to get mad, or I was just going to take it in my stride. And for the first time in my ‘relationship’ with this cretin, I was able to adult.

“… I have not received the letter Lyle, but I will keep an eye out”.

“Okay. Kwaai. Say your burk must buy the kak”… He was poking me.

He won…

“I am sorry I let you cum in me”.

Silence.

I wasn’t finished… “Would you prefer I start paying you maintenance?”

I am not an adult… I had given us all false hope in that split second.

I should have split from this fock-up the second he put his piel in another kin for dessert.

A banana split, actually.

With a sprinkle of nuts.

Yes I mean he’s crazy.

Yes I also mean he sprinkled his nuts everywhere.

How do you not get how this works?

That day I had an internal breakdown.

After hacking off my weave with a knife, I pondered why I have allowed outside forces [get it? Cos he raped me and he isn’t in jail] to dictate [haha, dick tyd… I can’t stop] my emotions.

And I came to the realisation that I was always different.

I was loud and outspoken…

And at some point, I realised that this made mediocre motherfuckers dislike me. 

So, as a survival mechanism, I adapted so well that I avoided conflict by being so nice and adaptable, that instead of standing out and dominating, I became irrelevant and neutral…

And scared..

And shy..

It is why I no longer sing…

It is why I no longer act…

It is the reason I have endured such kak people in my life for years, in fear of isolation.

Naaiers that use me for emotional support, then  don’t invite me to their weddings because i’m too coloured.

“…My hubby can’t read your blog cos he doesn’t like harsh language. You understand why I can’t share it right? I am so proud of you though….”

Bitch Swerve. 

People who make excuses for me when before they introduce me to their other friends.

People who speak immediately after I do in public, to soften or interpret what I have said so that it is more palatable.

And if you are like me, you know exactly what I am talking about and how this feels…

Even my family treats me differently.

They roll their eyes when they see me speak to other adults, laughing to each other as I ‘keep me big’.

They come from overseas with a gift for everyone except me and my children… Throwing us the miscellaneous Jelly Babies  from the bottom of the bag… And I avert eye contact when my uncle asks.. “How can you give them my Jelly beans? “... because I am polite and am to avoid conflict.

When I go out in groups.. people say “Ag, that’s such a Shana thing to say…” as if to make my observations moot, or ridiculous.

And I have silenced myself, because in all honesty, I was taught that because I am smart, I shouldn’t make other people feel inferior..

So i lose all fights on purpose..

And this, is why for the first 23 years of my life, I did not excel.

But we aren’t in Kansas anymore, Motherfuckers. 

***

So, the day I sat at the doctors surgery, he looked at me confused.

“Why are you so stressed? you are only 26″…

I gave him the sanctimonious breakdown …

Then, had a sanctimonious breakdown…..

“And why did Victoria hospital not send me back the results from your appointment?… The growth in your stomach needs to be biopsied”….

[TBT]

I don’t have a PHD

… But I will…. I will.

I am just Shana

I am just Fertile

I am just a Hoe… With Babies.

My life is a Comedy; Is dit karma, die?

“My Karma ran over your Dogma”- Anonymous

——

“Oh my god Shana, the worst thing happened to me the other night”.

I didn’t feel threatened at all. We had only been colleagues for 5 months, and we weren’t even employed by the same company, just worked on the same floor.

I was 98% sure that solid boundaries had been set.

I ventured forth.

“What happened?”

I lit my Malboro switch, filling my lungs with grape.

“So I got totally hammered last night bro…”

After a few awkward seconds, I finally adjusted.

When speaking to a whitey, certain things sometimes ended up misunderstood.

Hammered. Oh thank God, she meant drunk.

Different to nailed, of course.

And only coloureds screw drivers.

I was all in.

“… Like blackout drunk bro. So I got to my car hey and drove home. I dunno how the fuck I even got home bro….”

Pause.

I assumed this behavior required some sort of verbal accolade.

 

“… Oh my word haha… alcohol”..

I faded into my entjie…

“So I wake up the next morning right… and I have no goddamn idea how I got there. I pull in my car and think okay, I need to shower. . . I undress only to see I shit myself”. 

I didn’t know Milnerton had crickets.

“….I fucking SHIT. MY. Self”…

I no longer wanted to be bro…

 

I was her Mal-bro.

Her expectant facial expression left me more uncomfortable than that time I was g-rape.

She was obviously Menthol.

I have never known how to act around women.

…And this week my desperate lack of girlfriends finally had me looking introspectively, questioning what exactly it is that repels women from my mere presence.

I’m nice [Cordial at most]

I don’t smell weird… [Do I?]

I drive a 4×4 and shave my head, but in my defence… it’s 2015, and I identify as a naai. [Surely this is acceptable behavior in a world where Bruce Gender can chop and change his Jennertalia with reckless abandon? Pretty sure this is the real manslaughter she should be charged with.. ]

Relax, I am not Homophobic.

Im Syp-jou-sexual.

If he can take a piel, you can take a joke. 

I suppose I have been questioning my lack of companionship in every regard.

And more specifically, my innate desire to still be accepted, regardless of my great hatred for the entire human species.

Now, I do not dwell on the negative; as much as I use it for expression, but the past month has been a trying one. Leaving me feeling quite forsaken.

But I would never force a kin I don’t know to endure my faulty bowel stories.

No matter how hard I had been hammered.

But I will divulge my sordid minutiae, as I sure did go on quite the self-righteous tangent of late.

And I realized that I can tell my avid readers about how I super-glued my labia into a knot, and receive a heap of responses about how inspirational I am… and I can tell the same audience that people are dying of hunger… immediately rendering all of my readers illiterate.

So, I will give you what you want.

Every embarrassing thing that I have encountered in August.

You should probably fix yourself a hot beverage before continuing.

 

In summary, this month I gained 5 kilograms, got a weave at the Town Centre, then shaved my head in an attempt to find myself…

[Who am I? Why am I in the town Centre?]

… and in the midst of a personal restructuring, I was accused of sexual harassment.

I met a self-proclaimed fan of my blog who turned out to be a sociopath, I was deleted off Facebook by an old acquaintance because I can only assume my jokes about her engagement to a man she had only been dating for two months had surfaced her deep-seated emotional turmoil, I was served [the legal kind, not the lyrical fun stuff] and I walked out of Victoria Hospital because I wasn’t being treated like a queen…

*

When I shared the twerking video in a group chat with my journalists, I was sure it would start a lively debate. I had shared many videos, links, anecdotes and general concerns on this public platform… though I hardly mistook it for Tinder.

This day in particular my intern didn’t find my actions so innocent.

I now know what mortification feels like.

That evening, I received a Facebook invitation from him at 10pm. I ignored it, of course… as well as the inappropriate inbox that distinguished our difference in age.

“Thank you for the video. It was king funny”.

The use of the word ‘King’ as an adjective. I made a note to fire him, and went to bed.

By the time I arrived for my 6am shift, the last thing on my mind was my Facebook track record, and I went about my morning doing what I studied for many years; being a holborsel.

By 7.45, I admit I wondered where my precious Dobby was. I had already figured out his first assignment, and completely forgotten about his Faux pas.

He rang the doorbell at 8:15

His shift starts at 8.

“Good morning *Anonymous*, you are late”.

He saw me, but decided not to acknowledge my presence. He was on the phone. He took a left turn to the male toilets.

That familiar burning in my chest sizzled, affecting my throat, though spreading in a circumnavigational pattern right down to my now Kerrie-poes.

I sat down at my desk and continued my morning duties.

At 8:30 I saw His-Grace enter the workroom floor.

“Anonymous, I have sent you work, you are late… can ….”

He motioned to me, as if with hypnosis, hou-ing my bek for me…

“Listen, do you have a minute?”

I suppose I did. Because he sat down opposite me, taking charge.

And then he said the words that threw my usually genius-brain into what I can only describe as a ‘poepstorm’.

“Listen, I just want you to know that I love my girlfriend very much”.

He knocked me off my figurative chair. I couldn’t figure the tief.

And there I lay, bones in the light.

 

“Sorry?”, hoor vir genius-brain.

“Yes, you heard me..” [die naai]… “ I am sorry if I gave you the wrong impression, but I would like it if our relationship remained 100% professional”.

Now, before we continue, bear in mind that the only sentences I have uttered to this king poes is “I have sent you work, please hand in one article per hour”, so I was taken aback when he insinuated that he was bear in my mind.

“What?… Look, I am not sure what you mean.. but I sent you work that I really need done. We can talk about this later.”

And I swear to Jesus, he looked at me and took another phone call.

When he was done, I politely suggested he start work, to which he replied “Ya, wait I am just finishing something on Facebook gou”.

And that, ladies and gentleman, is the story of how I lost my virginity.

[As I cannot divulge the proceedings that followed, I can say that no one was fired. I can also say that, to answer your question, he assumed that because he was the only male in my Skype group, the video was OBVIOUSLY directed at him, therefore meaning that my signature chising move is sharing links in public, in the hopes of catching a fish…

His exact words to the mediator?

“I know it was directed at me… It made me feel uncomfortable”.

I am basically the office’s weird uncle.

He didn’t even feel flattered at the thought of me chising him.

Even the improbable prospect of my romantic attention caused a young man insurmountable stress].

Well, they do call me Mrs. Personality… Just, I forget why.

Because I’m so lovely?

I think those are the lyrics, anyway.

 

But, before this obvious insult to who I am as a package and the type of predator I represent, my confidence had already reached an all time low.

So low, in fact, that one afternoon post-work, I made my way down to the notorious Town Centre, to a Somalian-staltjie, ironically abortion-clinic adjacent. Ironic because I too was covering up the truth, avoiding my roots and sewing everything closed….

I sat down, holding my plastic hair, and took numerous ‘before’ selfies.

I couldn’t help thinking that the girls at the clinic were probably so modernized that they were taking selfies too..

I suppose theirs could be called a ‘selfish’ though…

I digress…

I had a 30th birthday to attend, and I wasn’t going to go fat and hairless.

It was time to pick a struggle.

R500 and two excruciating hours later, I felt embarrassed as i meandered through the traffic, smelling like a new Barbie.. too afraid to light my cigarette and ignite my face.

The next day, I had a supper planned with a fan of my blog who I had only seen twice before, somewhat briefly.

My editor joined.

A logistical issue, but my editor has become one of my closest friends. My ‘fan’ didn’t know this though, and to her knowledge, she was meeting my boss…

She got into my car, and said to my superior…

“Awe, are you the poes that made us late?”

You are right, this didn’t end well….

Let me tell you what happened…

[TBT]

I don’t have a PHD

Nobody can possibly think I have the time to write 4000 words in one week? Jy sal wag, jou naai….

I am just Shana

I am just fertile

I am Just a Hoe, With Babies

 I want to ask you to click here and like my Facebook Page, but I know you just vark think of yourself. 

Special Edition: “A penny for your sports car?”

“This car is high enough for you not to be intimidated by the street people when you stop at the robots”- Top Billing [paraphrased]

Victor had been shot in the foot.

The academic would call it a self inflicted wound, in jest of course. But Victor’s lifestyle was a series of bad decisions, just with very little choice.

I saw him daily, outside my new office. A coloured man, holding the ‘Daily Voice’ in the crease of his elbow. He could have been my daddy. I called him uncle.

“Uncle, what happened to your foot. You shouldn’t be working”.  Like most of his generation, Victor’s choices were written on his face. Burnt into his skin with a ‘Zombie’. The irony wasn’t lost on him either.

“I can’t rest aunty, I must work”.

I was his junior by at least 20 years. But my money had given me authority.
“I’m Shana. How much do uncle make?”

My accent always humbles itself when I speak to an elder. To be submissive is respectful, a concept my community has mastered.

Hard for me to Ingest, of course.

His life had gone off course somewhere between the riots and the celebrations of the 90’s. His Methaqualone musk emanated from his half unbuttoned shirt.

I handed him a R50.

“Uncle must rest that foot. It’s vrek cold. Can I get you anything?”

“Just a jacket please. En n paar sweaters”.

I shouldn’t have been annoyed.

I walked through the revolving door at Milnerton mall and took the lift up to the office.  I thought about how cold June was. I thought about the Shoprite packet around his cast, to keep out the dirty rain that carried the dust and outside piss from Brooklyn, past KFC’s pavement where the chicken is cleaned, into the upper-middle class section where Victor sold the Daily Voice, quietly.

And I thought about his name.

Victor. Roman name meaning “victor, conqueror”.

The next morning had a similar chill.

My shift in the news room started at 6am, so on my drive in I always saw the night-people still packing up their boxes, pushing trolleys out of sight, for the working class to commute. My parking spot was kept only by my unconventional working hours.
Victor saw my headlights. He motioned towards me before I could pull out from my backseat the one jacket I was okay to part with. 

“Morning Uncle. I could only find this one. The Zip don’t work but I asked my friends to collect. I hope it’s…”
He interrupted me.

“Ja okay. Het jy niks daar vir n drinkie?”

*

The poor are quite the inconvenience.

In convenience stores; at the robot; playing outside in the rain when all you’re trying to do is enjoy a guilt free chai tea at “Food Lover’s Market”.

They aren’t food lovers though, not as much as they are food-needers.

The sheer audacity of parading their deficits.

The race to earn money is a tiring and invigorating one, and we parade our accolades as we are fully entitled to do. But when the churches fill up on Sundays, the ghosts of our charitable deeds are racked up in testimonies, embellished ever so slightly, because not so deep down, we know we haven’t done anything to alleviate the suffering of the people in arms reach of us.

And we use the default phrases to explain living on auto-pilot.

Auto-pilot: Because we are all flying high… solo.

So, so low.

“I work for my money… I don’t owe them anything”.

“Ag, they used to the cold man… Their children are built differently.”

One can only assume this refers to natural insulation, and because of our gross neglect of the street people in Cape Town’s unforgiving winter… the homeless have now evolved into amphibious hybrids.

Ironic, we have made the change to hybrid too.

In an attempt to save the planet, of course: but in a stylish way.

“Go green. So when the poor die, we can use them as compost”. 

My weekly distribution of clothes for the poor hardly excuses me from the social obligation I feel that most of us have when it comes to not allowing our earthly family to suffer. In a perfect world, we would all be equal, at least economically_ though I would settle for everyone feeling obligated to feed each other.

On one of these journeys, my friend and I ventured through Strandfontein Village, a middle class suburb at best. I happened upon an entire family, mother and children, sitting outside a well-known Pakistani outlet, waiting for the rain.

They were in no way bothered by the imminent darkness. I suppose a life in the shadows toughens the skin. Time was not a constraint.

I stopped the car, and trying hard not to offend the older woman, I asked her a question I already knew the answer to.

I didn’t want her to be mad that I assumed she was homeless.

A luxury I’m certain she didn’t even acknowledge.

Privileged 12 year old’s drop 50 cent coins in her hands, as her children watch.

People are careful not to touch her.

The question remains whether we think she doesn’t notice it, solely based in the fact that she is poor. Or do we not care what she notices, because she has no social standing?

A meme comes to mind, emphasizing the great willingness to perform fellatio on a stranger, but the sheer reluctance to touch a fellow human being’s hand, because they have no money. 

“Hi there aunty, I am looking for people to give clothes to. Do you know anywhere I can go?”

I saw her soul jump out at me. She restrained her excitement, failing.

“Ek sal dit waardeer mevrou. Die is my kinnes. Os bly maar net hier onder die car wash.”

Her respect made me feel dirty.

I was feeding my own Messiah complex. All I wanted to do was give her the clothes and run.

But I was already invested.

 

 “I can give you half of these bags, aunty. I don’t know if the stuff will fit all the children though”.

At that moment, one of her sons ran from the car wash shelter to my car.

“Antie is daar niks vir my nie.. Os kry baie koud antie”.

I was about to cry.

“How old are you my baby?”

Silence.

“Ek wietie, antie”.

My mind made a train of assumptions until I accepted reality.

Some days I wish that my brain had the safety measures in place, like other people from my social circle… but alas, I am not able to rationalize… I can only think rationally.

 

Ladies and gentleman, an inner monologue:

He did not know when his birthday was.

He is stupid.

He isn’t stupid. He is underprivileged.

His mother could at least educate him, lazy bitch.

Maybe she can’t read either.. I wonder if she also grew up on the street?

But why wouldn’t she tell him his birthday? Surely it is important.

Unless… How would they celebrate?

Oh god, street children cannot have birthdays because birthdays are synonymous to expensive celebrations.

Cake.

She cannot give her child a birthday cake.

She must be so heartbroken.

*

I drove further down Denneguer Avenue. My humanity sickened me as I felt an accomplished pride. I wished I had taken selfies throughout the experience.

To er is human.

To er on Instagram is divine.

 Er….. 

 I didn’t see any worthy candidates for my generosity, and drove to the nearby suburb of Bayview.

Another mother and child, a younger version of the woman I had just met, walked into what seemed like a church building.

Derelict and forgotten.

The church building too.

I stopped the car. 

“Hi there”. I now had a script for these occasions, my mouth repeated my “talk to the poor’ lines, verbatim. I was nervous. “I am looking for someone to give clothes to. Do you know any one?”

She showed me a different light.

“Uhm, this is now actually a church for the less-privilege chorlren”.

I blinked; her nose had grown an inch.

Behind her, three other children emerged.

“Okay.. Is there a priest here that I could chat to?”

“No man, sorry they not here … but you can leave the clothes here and I will give it to them”.

The children looked like her.

And the aristocrat inside of me was furious.

For a second….

I gave her the clothes, and I drove away.

The tears were now on my lap… 

I was ashamed at myself.

Through my many self righteous rants at other people, I had forgotten to point a finger at myself.

And as humbled as I sat there, in my driver’s seat of my 4×4, high enough to look down on the street people who approached, I was completely intimidated by their strength to stand there day after day and humiliate themselves for some loose change… 

I pictured myself and my two children, falling into the stereotype I could easily have succumb to.

A single mother who had made bad decisions, and now had to be punished everyday; in front of my kids.

Homeless. Cold. Hungry.

….. And if a stranger in a high car stopped me and asked if I knew where she could drop creature comforts that I deserved, solely on the fact that I am a human being…

With all my morals in tact..

To keep my kids warm…

Would I lie?

Would I steal?

Would I knock on that window?

I don’t have a PHD

Nobody even donates when I say I am collecting clothes for the poor. Out of five thousand friends, I have only had 9 responses.

I am just Shana

I am just Fertile

I am just a Hoe… with Babies

A letter to the Afro-eclectic female [Slave name: Coloured Girl/’Goose’/Kin/That Ding/ Nicole/Kim/Trevlynne]

….. Also including, but not restricted to: Jintu’s, Taxi queens, Motchies, Business Women, Bread-Winners, Entrepreneurs and the generally unemployed. 

For you see, faceless oppressor, we are made up of many.

I call this: “Issie Madam nou klaar? Kan ek die tafel dek?

(….. A Working Title) Haha get it? Cos we clean your house.

“… I trekked across the Karroo (it’s true… just to come to you) Not with a valiant, but with SAA, and what a kak flight I’m telling you. The pretty hostess was from Athlone too. She had that lekker Athlone attitude. I asked for water, she said ‘Kryp in jou moer’….” From the Cape Flats, with love- Marc Lottering. 

Alas, humour is not my vehicle this week. 

“Number 4……”

“….Number 4. Number 4!”

I stood up and made my way through the passages of Mitchell’s Plain clinic.

We had all been sitting in a circle in the waiting area since 7 am, making small talk, vuilkyking each other. Smiling politely. Asking if we are at the right place. Pretending that it wasn’t extra cold that day.

“That nurse is so rude hey……” We said in unison, but whispered tones. We needed her.

We were given a tablet, and a number.

And then cordoned off.

For a second, I wanted to speak up. I wanted to say that I was not cattle. But this, after further thought was deemed untrue. Looking at the group of coloured girls surrounding me, I realized that sheep was all we had ever been.

“You will get a number and please don’t take long when we call you. If I must say your number more than three times you miss your turn.”

She was disgusted by us Jezebels.

“Put this tablet under your tongue. There is no turning back after this, so just decide now. This will break everything up and open the cervix… Okay Mammies?”.’

She laughed.

Mammies. The walking dead. 

“Number 4. Number 4!”

The tiles were slippery.

Number three walked past me from the room, holding a wad of Carlton towel against her crotch.

“It’s not so bad”…. 

Smile.

‘Hi. Lay down.”

Well hello to you too doctor. ( One of many exchanges that never happened).

“Open your legs”.

Okay. So no foreplay. Right up my alley. 

Needle. No apology.

“This is a syringe. Tell me if it gets too sore”.

I don’t think she meant emotionally.

It literally feels like a vacuum cleaner… But instead of just sucking out your baby, parts of your soul get caught in the pipe.

Sucking stops.

“Are we done, doctor?” I cry into to my right shoulder.

“Nope. Need a new syringe”.

*What an interesting ceiling design. The only whity I saw today is the doctor. What are people gonna say if they find out? I wonder if it was a boy…. *

I still don’t eat mince, or work with raw meat. I cannot stand the smell. 

Suck. Suck. Suck.

And it was over.

I was socially acceptable again.

Albeit, emptier. In a manner of speaking.

Ironically, the whole thing was very clinical.

Instead of leaving with my two gratis Panados, I waited for all the women to go in. a pact we made, that no one would have to sit there alone. 

A girl who was already 4 months along ran to the bathroom, with the silver bean bowl they give all the women who had a fully developed cadaver in their tombs. (Womb. Womb. Silly mistakes.)

All I heard was “clingk”. 

Number 14 screamed.

We all went through the abattoir and emerged, redeemed.

But one girl stood there, with a different look on her face.

I remember watching her breakdown, completely detached. I was even judging her for making such bad decisions.

And, because I am conditioned to be in a perpetual competition with every woman of colour I encounter, I remember smiling when the nurse jokingly asked a distressed woman/child/sister….

“Must we then put the baby back?”

…………

My soul died long before I started having sex.

I saw men as the enemy, the master, and the decision-maker by just looking at the relationships around me, growing up.

The first time I was forced by peer pressure to ride a penis at the back of a second hand vehicle, parked at pavilion through a gap at the back of my jeans…  I felt angry and obligated, and nothing.

I guess you can say I was dead on a rival.

Growing up as a coloured girl, I watched enviously how my mother executed an award-winning  tea-table. I saw the pride on my uncles’ faces when their wives almost rallied to do the dishes…

“Lat die mans-mense relax”.

God knows they were exhausted from shoveling cake into their mouths. The same shovel digging their extra-large graves.

“He died of sugar.” No, Samsoeniesa. Great attempt, but that’s not a real disease.   

And I stood there, in awe from my low vantage point.. Next to the other women, 30 years my senior.

I remember being irrationally angry, but as a 7 year old, I couldn’t pinpoint it.

I knew I didn’t want to swirl my hair with a million pins, or sleep with rollers because the next day was Christmas. I knew I didn’t want to wear lip gloss, because it made me no more attractive, and only aided in making me look like I was eating a hake parcel ‘agter die bak‘.

I knew my aunties were being smacked by men if they weren’t obedient. I knew my mother and many other women pretended that none of this was happening.

I knew my daddy’s brothers kept having kids with women who weren’t their wives, while their wives kept having miscarriages and stillbirths.

As a coloured woman, think back on what you knew before YOU were told that it is impolite to be perceptive. 

We are taught that there is pride in keeping a man no matter how he treats you, as long as it stays a secret.

That you better praise him for organising a separate entrance, because men are so temperamental (Cue adult female giggle to make us seem like we know about life).. 

And you better look good while doing it.

I remember that at my sister’s wedding my uncle got drunk and threw his wine glass at my aunt.

We all politely pretended not to see his son punch him, then take them both home as if nothing had happened.

Then, years later when Lyle hit me, we all spoke about it and told me how stupid I was.

“Hy issie eers jou mannie”.

I learned two things from comparing these experiences:

It was my stupidity that made men hurt me. They had no control over their actions.

This is okay if you’re married.

SSSSSSHHHHHHHH! 

“Shana, a man beat his two year old to death. Please cover the story”

“Okay”

Reading……………….

“Zoey Petersen’s father, Christopher Williams beat baby Zoey with a broomstick for six hours. Her mother, Elwina Petersen was in the next room. When he was done, he carried a battered Zoey to her mother, and said that she cannot take Zoey to hospital. The three slept in bed through the night. There is speculation that he had sex with the mother in the bed where Zoey lay, dying.

He allowed Elwina twenty hours after the fact, to take Zoey to the hospital.

Zoey had been reported to have had multiple injuries before the last attack. Williams regularly used Zoey as a punching bag. 

Elwina kept taking him back. 

She loved him.

He said he wouldn’t.

I mean, she had his baby… Why wouldn’t she make it work?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. And the comment below the story, that started thee biggest debate?

Typical of the coloured community, Never get involved. 

Okay.

So that’s how they know us.

Who piemped?

….

“It’s a boy”

I looked at Sidney-Jonah, freshly cut from my midsection.

I knew nothing. I wasn’t even sure how I fell pregnant. 

I felt dizzy. Half from anesthetic. Half from fear.

I closed my eyes. 

“Moetie nou ko slaapie. Vat jou kind. Jy het ge’lê”. 

He did no thrusting of course. The belief is that I laid down and immediately, through coloured intervention, I was merrie lyf.

There was nothing merry about my lyf from that point forward. 

My sex talk as a young girl consisted of 4 sentences.

“Moetie vir jou jas hou nie”

“OMG She’s old fashion..”

“Jy gat nooit n man kry as jy soe antrekkie”.

“He smaak you”

And that was it. The words of support I received from a fellow woman of colour.

No “It is okay my girl, we are strong”

“Is daddy coming?”

All daddy did was come. 

En al wat kom is daddy.

At three months pregnant, Sidney’s bio-illogical father, Huzaifah Laatoe (Feel free to Facebook him, Tell him he owes me damages) decided that having a baby with a Christian needed Astaghfirullah. 

Sex with me was his man-given-right, but any physical evidence was mine alone to bear.

Society pointed and laughed at my fall from Janaah, but luckily for him, he wasn’t co-pregnant.

I went through my pregnancy alone and when Sidney was six weeks old, in the July Winter I knocked on his door.

“That isn’t my lighty”.

“It is”.

“Please go”.

I can still feel him push me, and having to regain my balance outside the shut door, while making sure the rain didn’t wet us. 

I was a coloured girl, tainted by perception, in the rain.

Where could I turn to?

We have no support groups. We have no forums.

Os is te blerrie skaam vir die mense… 

We just have our friends who didn’t fall pregnant, smiling politely while they get dressed on a Friday night for Gala, asking “Are you sure I mustn’t stay with you?”

“Please don’t come to my 21’st.. My mom them think it will look ugly to the family.”

And We have no outlet.

So I chose to blog. To sit down and be real.

But you don’t wanna hear our stories, from our real voices. From our colourful accents or from our kroeskoppe.

And I dedicated this clean, stellar example of how multifaceted I am as a writer, and as a hot-not.

Ladies, Let them Understand….

I do not need to swear to execute a punchy blogpost. I do not need to make cheap jokes, to make my opinions and experiences more palatable.

I am your superior. 

I am an academic.

I am a coloured woman.

These things are not mutually exclusive. 

And there are many of us who come from scum. We come from people/women who did not know better. We come from communities where our first words are “poes, naai, moer”, and that is what we have heard before we have even ventured out of our homes.

But when we emerge and fight the battle of wanting to be part of the elite, or prove ourselves as coloured women who can compete with the best, we suddenly need to sound whiter, and crisper…. and not as rough…

You teach us in order to be great, we need to adjust/tweak/straighten.

Just us though.

Everyone else is okay.

And when we finally raise to a position of affluence, we are so diluted that we just emulate whatever is out there, sleep with the white boys and pioneer nothing.

And what do we end up with?

Mascots like Pam Andrews who played the token coloured girl on Backstage, Then publicly cheated on Paul Viv, and recorded a naked music video with no actual music. 

We have men who will listen to Eminem Explicit Tracks and have Lil Wayne explain why he refuses to treat his hoes like Ladies…

But will take the time to inbox a woman who executes the same language in her art.

We have coloured women messaging that female with the same hate… when the only thing offending them is how much they see themselves in the writing.

The only letters we publicly accept are about how much we enjoy viskoppe, and how we can’t find jobs.

We are mos the comic relief of the nation.

Sans front teeth.

Our accents are only good enough for ironic Robertson’s adverts… So Solly Philander can pretend we say things “Paark it net soe lekker oppie bordtjie..”

And we can ignore how we are no longer a united front.

It is just one big front that we are united.

Our Front has a real gap. 

Sans Passion.

So let me remind you, before I show you my true coloured…

I don’t have a PHD

Nobody even needs to read my blog if they expect it to be a bunch of pointless comedy and not actually matter.

I am just Shana

I am just Fertile

I am Just a Hoe… with babies.