Breaking the Ice.
Compliments of the new year, the first snow and the curse of chasing Perfection.
Growing up in Zimbabwe, I was convinced that there were no flies in South Africa and the US. At my tender age, it was just impossible to imagine that reality.
See, back in the day, South Africa was the America of Africa. It was the heaven that every Zimbabwean wanted to escape to. I had family abroad there who would send us groceries and nice clothes that smelt like expensive perfume now and again without ever missing Christmas time. How could a country so beautiful and majestic, plagued with fancy assorted biscuits and Cremora powdered milk have flies like our ever-getting-better Zimbabwe: I’d think to myself. Flies love the dirt and stinky smells and because no one was escaping to Zimbabwe as much as Zimbabweans migrated to South Africa and the United States, or abroad in general, surely flies would only love it in my country.
As I write this, Connecticut is covered in snow; from trees and rooftops to cars, pavements and roads. If you ask me, I’d say it's a beautiful sight to behold. Before coming to the US, I knew South Africa to be the only Zimbabwean neighbouring country in Africa that got snow. Consequently, my young self believed that snow was synonymous with the prosperity of a nation. Europe had snow as they had nicer infrastructure, a stable economy, better healthcare, better politics et al. America too. To my young mind, though ignorant of direct proportionality concepts and causality of issues, there was a clear correlation as to why Hollywood movies had food fights and, our local dramas had homeless kids begging for food. It was the curse of the snow.
While my infant musings were nothing short of fallacies lacking exposure of how the other side was, my adult self finds value in them. It is a lesson that Trevor Noah comically states in his classic memoir; Born A Crime.
“It's a powerful experience, shitting,” he says. “There's something magical about it, profound even. I think God made humans shit in the way we do because it brings us back down to earth and gives us humility. I don't care who you are, we all shit the same. Beyonce shits. The pope shits. The Queen of England shits. When we shit we forget our airs and our graces, we forget how famous or how rich we are. All of that goes away. You are never more yourself than when you're taking a shit. You have that moment where you realize, 'This is me. This is who I am.”
To some extent, I believe, he was speaking to what I term, The Pretty girls don’t shit phenomenon: when we see a very pretty girl, some of the closed-door normalities like farting, burping and the classic example—shitting, feels unnatural and far from them. Momentarily we may not even think to imagine them engaged in those normalities. Why?
Well, just like my perception of South Africa and America as a young boy, when things or people are perfect on the outside, we tend to separate them from their immediate realities and choose, subconsciously, to hold them on a high pedestal. It is in this way that we envy celebrities but immediately feel disgusted by our desire to be like them whenever we find that they have done undesirable things. We desire their perfection but forget to see them as any other average person, born of imperfections. We’re even more shocked that Jay Z cheated on Beyonce than we would be when the same is true of our friends. It is in the same way that we may feel like the Reverends in our churches are without blemish thus, judge them harshly than any other human forgetting we are all prone to err.
What was the curse of the snow is now metaphorically the curse of perfection. My mind refused to perceive South Africa or the US as countries with their blemishes because of the perfection they exhibited or whore better than my country could. For the longest time, I had always known my country to be the sick man akin to the Ottoman Empire which was also known to be the sick man of Europe in World War 1 of 1914. (Yes, I remember my high school history.)
As the New Year begins, we set out, with vigorous motivation and zeal towards our goals and New Year's resolutions. We see the finished products of what we are aiming at— the sexier, slimmer and more muscular body, the perfect diet, a healthier savings account, that new hobby or quitting social media addictions just to mention but a few. In the process we compare ourselves to what is perfect, be it that guy on Instagram who has been at it for years behind the scenes, or that health nutritionist whose diet just flows naturally. We judge ourselves against high standards. We see celebrities with money and think they’re perfect and something is wrong with us. In whatever field we’re in and wherever we aim to be, we see people who are already where we want to be and we judge ourselves against them. Simply put, we assume them to be South Africa without flies or America with the snow. We forget what Trevor Noah speaks of, that everyone is just the same when it comes to first principles.
What my young mind failed to grasp was that flies exist everywhere and that makes all countries similar when it comes to the existence of flies, well, given the weather conditions is permissible for the flies to thrive there. Secondly, although South Africa and America appeared better or better in many metrics of social comparison, they both had their struggles. They were not perfect. They were the same. Perfection is utopia. It is a word that cannot overly be used to describe man. And as I and you embark on this new year, it is wise to recount these thoughts at heart. As we aim to take over and take up space, to kill it in whatever we are to be embarking on, remembering that our heroes shit too can save us from our destructive selves that judge us harshly.
So my compliments of the new year are words I speak to myself as I continue to embark on this writing journey. I don’t have to be perfect. The books I read may sound perfect but they were shit at some point. Don’t seek to be perfect, envision the best possible writing you can do and write terribly up to that assumed perfection. As I continue to work on my first draft for my debut novel, chase after subscription numbers on my weekly publication and aim to publish something every week, I find these words necessary particularly as the year begins.
Best of wishes to all those who are embarking on new goals and aiming at new heights this year. May this be the year it all happens for you. Above all, may this be the year perfection is not chased after more than the beauty of what we’re embarking on.
The night is young. Journey onwards dear reader. I will too, and most of my journey updates will be in this publication. A staff to carry for your journey that I give to you is this; that we all shit the same and yours is not the only shit that stinks.
Apologies for any graphic grossing out caused.
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Until next Monday:
Peace✌🏾 and love 💓.
Aluta Continua✊🏾
What I’m reading:
The Reason for God by Timothy Keller
Favourite song/album of the week:
Happiness by Sarz ft Asake & Gunna