Category: Recountals

I feel like getting out there. Ah ah, not to meet new people, but to simply just explore. It has been sitting on my mind lately. I even made a folder in my Notes app for the places I would love to visit.

I want to start with Kisumu County and its environs.

This weekend I was supposed to hang out with this cute face. Bummer! It won’t be happening due to valid reasons.

But while we were planning where we’d hang out, I jumped on TikTok and started checking out places in Kisumu. And demwit demwit demwit! Kisumu is actually sooo beautiful. Leave alone the lake and Dunga Beach, please. Kisumu is a beauty and I am not exaggerating.

So technically my FYP registered. And so did my nudge to just get outside and explore.

I know I want to start doing these cute solo trips and solo dates, but before I get there… first I want to start with tiny, cute baby steps. I need a buddy.

And who’d have thought? This is also hard. I mean, finding a buddy. A hangout buddy? A buddy to hang out with. Okay, you get my point.

I genuinely do not know how to do small talk. I respond awkwardly to celebrity gossip because I usually have no idea what to say, okay. I basically couldn’t care less what your favorite influencer is on… give me some real stuff. I wanna know why most of your attempts at relationships usually end at 72 hours into the talking stage.

I’d also love a buddy who’s entirely comfortable with silence. One with whom we could just sit and stare into nothingness and there won’t be any shred of awkwardness or any weird attempts to fill the silence.

But also one who wouldn’t mind my bubbly side, because I have a wild bubbly side that comes out occasionally.

I really want to be outside for real. I am so ready to be outside now. I want to sit somewhere in Malibu Bay, sip a cute cocktail, watch people as they go about their fun. Judge them gracefully in my mind. Admire couples. Tell random strangers that they are genuinely gorgeous and then sit and journal while at Bingo, in the midst of beauty and chaos, on a table made from a boat. I wanna wear my cute crop tops and weirdly baggy pants to Takawiri. I wanna take shots at Hideout. I wanna read a book at some cute resort in Rusinga Island by the lake as I watch the sunset. I wanna carry my gadgets and work in a hidden gem somewhere in Siaya.

I just really want to add beautiful shades of bright colors to my life. I want my last stretch of my twenties to be pure bliss. I’m talking rainbows and glossy because I’ve earned this shit, okay. I’ve done the work.

What I’m trying to say is, I think my spark is back. I even took a selfie yesterday.

Anyway, a friend of mine who happens to be the guy behind my tattoos recently told me that I should get out of my comfort zone and expand my writing. He suggested politics. I told him I couldn’t, even if I tried, because I don’t even have the lingo.

And that’s the thing. I do not write for anything else besides the fulfilment I get from writing. Basically these are simply journals I choose to share with everyone else because I want to come back when I’m 90 and toothless and see what my 25 yearold self was on.

I’ve written about most things I’ve encountered. When I was working at that toxic workplace, I wrote about it. I go back and read my stuff and it’s a wholesome reminder in my gratitude journey. I wrote when I was struggling with a whack self-concept. I wrote about emotional regulation so much until my nervous system clocked it. I wrote about self-validation and now I am in a place where I just don’t care about external validation. My writings hold me accountable.

“But you could just write the stuff you put out in your personal diary.” Yes, you’re right. I know, I promise. But I do a bunch of diary entries… and I also enjoy sharing bits and parts of myself in the form of words with the world. Guys, this is my form of aesthetics. Like how y’all take amazingly beautiful pictures and cute videos of your day-to-day lives? Yes this is my way.

So to my tattoo guy, I don’t write for the metrics, hun. I write for fulfilment. I write to connect with my kindred spirits. I write because this is the only way I get to trauma dump without feeling any form of guilt. I write because writing has healed me. I write because, just like I relate to other people’s beautiful words, I find so much peace and solace in knowing that one or two people get to relate to my words. I respect politics. I just wouldn’t know how to write soulfully about politics. I am not writing here on my space for money… I know where I go to write when I want my writing to pay me.

This is my soulful space. My authentic space. So I won’t niche down. I will write about every fascinating encounter I bump into. I will write about my traumas. I will write about my weirdly awesome friends. I will write about my healing journey. I will write about the things that still trigger me. I will write about my happy experiences, not leaving out the sad ones. I will write about my love life. I will write about the things that broke. I will write about this random human who rang our doorbell in the middle of the night. I will write about a random Tuesday afternoon that felt different. I will write about every small town I visit.

And if politics ever stirs my soul, I’ll make sure to write about it too.

I mean, I will write about everything that stirs me in that moment.

Meanwhile, I hope I find a buddy soon. If I don’t, I hope I find the courage to go on the cute solo dates and trips on my own soon enough.

My twin flame with dreads eventually reached out by the way. See the magic of writing authentically?


Well about my style of writing refer to – https://missinjairu.wordpress.com/2023/07/10/childhood-dream/

Cheers loves.

A part of me felt maybe I shouldn’t write about this, but between working I decided, no, if I don’t write about it, I’m gonna regret it for a full year up until September 11th again.

10th September, the year is 2019. I am feeling restless. Frustrated. Everything feels bleak.

My friend Winny (brown eyes) visits me at this law firm I was working at. Well, at that time she preferred taking a million fleet of stairs to using the elevator. We got into the office, and we start talking about everything. But I kept telling her how worried I was about my sister.

But even at that point, that evening, I knew without a doubt that my sister was going to beat her illness and she’d come out strong, like she always did.

Winny was doing something in school, and I also wanted to go and confirm whether I was on the graduation list for that year. We got there and yeeess I was… and back in the day graduations were such a big deal guys… but I didn’t have any form of excitement in me. Something in my mind told me to call mom so that she would let Chela know that I’d made it to the graduation list at least, but I was too beaten. Too exhausted. So I didn’t.

That evening I left work to where I was staying with Marion, feeling like all the weight of the world was on my shoulders. I thought probably, it was the job. Maybe I didn’t like lawyers, or the pay… I didn’t want to admit to myself that something just felt off… and I had a weird feeling about my sister making it.

Before that, I’d get insane dreams of coffins and stuff like that. Premonitions they call it.

The night of 10th September 2019, Tuesday was eerie. I think Marion made a meal of ugali and eggs. I can’t remember whether I ate. But I recall her reassuring me that Chela was going to be fine. I listened.

At around 8:00 pm, I called mom. “Mom mnaendeleaje?” Like always she reassured me, that they were going to be fine. In the background, I could hear my sister struggling. Like she was in utter pain. I asked mom what that was about and she told me, she was having insane headaches, probably from the blood thinning. My heart sunk. First of all, because I know how uncomfortable headaches are, second of all, the sounds she was making tormented me. Knowing that she was in intense pain like that.

I went to bed, said a small prayer to God about Chela, and clung on faith that she was going to come out on the other side strong and full of life, just like she always did.
I managed to sleep. I woke up the next day to a very confusing morning.

The morning of 11th September 2019, Wednesday, was so heavy. Every cloth felt odd… dirty. Uncomfortable. I was all over the place. I woke up early but I got to work late.

At Kakamega Law Courts, while the drama and chaos that mostly ensued in courts took place, I texted my mom, “hey mom, mko aje I might be paid kesho, so I’ll come over to see you guys.” I was in the dark. I was clueless.

A friend of mine from home at that time texted me around the same time asking “Hey Val, Chela yuko aje?” I told her, she’s under medication and she’s going to be fine. I’m sure from her end she pitied me because, she got the news before I did.

I hurried back to the registry because we were missing something. While the person on the other end of the counter was attending to the file I had, I got a text from cousin Terry, “I am sorry Val, I know it’s really painful losing a sister.” My mind blanks out. The text reads blurry now. I know I never responded back to that.

Quickly I excuse myself and ping my sister Doreen. Laughing, I’m like “heeey ni nini hii Terry ananitext.” I think that was just absolute shock. I couldn’t process. My sister starts talking, and I could tell she was between sobs.

My heart stops for a while, she says “hujaskia kwani Val, Chela amepass.” I said “What?” Hung up and I sat down on the ground. On the fucking ground.

I could see stars. I forgot how to breathe. I could hear funny distant sounds inside my head. For a few minutes I couldn’t process a thing. I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t feel a thing. Then the gates opened. And I cried. I fucking cried. I remember people stopping by me looking all confused. A gracious lady handed me serviettes. Told me sorry then walked away.

In that moment, I didn’t care about looking cute. Or the world around me. My sister had died and so everything else did not make any sense. So I cried ugly.
Then I managed to call my friend Nita, I needed someone. Nita, heavily pregnant at that time, came just the way she was. Then I texted Kwame.

11th September 2019, Wednesday was such a long day. And life continues. I couldn’t fathom how everything else went on… I wanted to yell at everyone and tell them to just stop for a day because I’d just lost my darling sister. But life continues.
I went home. With Nita.

I got home, my dad and some other men were sat in our living room. Grief is so tangible, you can smell it. You can hear it. You can feel it even when people aren’t saying anything.
Immediately home started feeling different. I got in, greeted them with a weary tired smile. Afraid of facing my mom because besides mourning my sister, I was worried about my mother. I know exactly what Chela meant to my mom. Chela was/is my mom’s star.

I remember asking her “mom mbona ulinidanganya?” I can’t quite recall if she responded, but I also remember telling her “Usijali mom tutakua sawa.” But even as I was saying those words… I knew I was lying. Plainly.

I got into our room, and your sweet, clean scent was all over. It stayed around for so long. I still can’t sleep in that room alone up until now. I remember that one night, probably the last night I was home, and the last night we slept in that room together, when I woke up and found you seated, I looked at you worried, and you instead asked me if I was okay, you said “unaumwa Val, ebu lala” and that image of us stays with me. I randomly wake up at night and my mind goes back to that memory. You were the one in pain but even through it you were still concerned about me. And we woke up the next day and I was grateful you were alive and with me still. I have no idea why I carried that fear around. The fear of losing you. Did I have such little faith?

A lot of things changed. I worried about mom, I worried about how we were going to be. Who was going to get everything else in order because Chela was our pillar when it came to a whole lot of things if not everything.

Everything felt bleak.

People approach grief differently.

At one point a little over a year later my aunties were visiting, one of them said, “I wish it wasn’t Chela who had to die.” I felt it. I didn’t even find it offensive because I totally agreed with her because throughout the entire time I knew that too… I kept telling myself “I wish God had taken me instead.” And honestly, if we could trade lives, I’d have given her mine. She had so much to offer in this life then, than I could. She was everyone’s darling.
I miss you hun.

And I couldn’t understand why when I left you a birthday wish on the 1st of September in 2019 your response was “I am so grateful to have seen this day.”
And above everything else I hate that I missed your last call to me, and I only realized that you’d called after you were no more. I try to imagine a million different things you wanted to say.

For a long while home felt different, but after all those years we’re still adjusting to you not being around. Not a day goes by without me having you on my mind.
People at times make the obvious mistake and call me with your name. You should see their faces, they freak out. I usually smile and say “aaah ni sawa.” Unknowingly to them, that makes me so proud, the kind of mark that you left even to the outsiders. It’s only that most are getting to know me, most knew you as the last born.

I thought I was at a place where I could talk about you without breaking down until one day somewhere around Feb 15th this year, I brought you up to some amazing soul and I broke into ugly sobs. I said “yuck” because I promise it was ugly… you should have seen… or maybe you saw. I don’t know.

I miss you, I often imagine how different home would be if you were still around. All year round up to September 11th I have random thoughts about you and in my head I go like, around this time, Chela was still around…

Then after September 11, my thoughts go different. Sad almost.
It was so hard adapting to life without you hun. C’mon I’d known you my whole life. And like how Doreen said, it’s almost like deep down our hearts we all individually knew amongst us, all the 6 of us were gonna grow old together.

I still get those moments of “gosh this girl really died.” Like I forget and imagine that you sojourned to a faraway land and you’ll get back eventually. Some evenings it gets to 4:00 pm… and I promise I can almost hear you shout “Val, come unichukulie hii handbag” like how you’d always say it.

I sit and fold holding my chin in my hands like how you would. I realized that. I don’t know how it came to be.

Most people refer to you as “the late.” I’ve never and I will never because to me you’ll forever be alive, in my mind and my heart and if/when God blesses me with mini me’s, I’m gonna tell them so much about you, I’ll make sure they have a clear picture of who you were.

I talk about you and I’ll never stop bringing you up.

I wish I made that call on that evening of 11th September, Tuesday 2019, just after I’d found out that I’d be graduating. At least you’d have gone with that, you know. The role you played in me being in uni was huge. And I owe it to you. Thank you for being there for me.

Thank you, Maureen Chelagat

Your gorgeous lovely smile still stays with me.
I adore you hun. Continue resting in peace.

On Thursday 12th 2019, in the morning, I woke up to my mom’s wails and I knew then it basically wasn’t just a sad wild creepy dream. It was reality and I had to come eye to eye with grief. Figuring how to adapt to life without you would follow later.

And so life went on. Just weirdly different. Always with a touch of sadness and emptiness. I said “aki jamani Chela.” Then I immersed myself into the darkness of grief, entirely.


PS: (My sister and I were candid, inseparable even… to anybody who says that my sister died while we were not okay with each other, may God forgive you.)

Cheers♥️

Today I’m hanging out with my friends. Which, in our case, means really listening to music  dissecting lyrics, criticizing, laughing.

Lately, they’ve taken a wild liking to dissing this “pawa” song. So today I paid attention. Mbosso actually says
“Nilifeli mtihani sekondari kuedaga shule,
lakini kufeli penzi lako sina hilo chaguo.”
Now I’m like… guys, I’m on my way to Tanzania. 😂

I love these souls.
Their dumb dad jokes.
Their brains working overtime.

But beyond my friends, I have siblings. Incredible souls.
We’re a mix of everything but one thing binds us, hair.
We all gave up and went the dreadlocks way. Even my late sister Chela had dreads.
(Okay, except Gloria who plaits. And I know she secretly hates dreads.)
No one convinced the other. We just did it.
Well… let me be fair, Doreen kind of pushed me,
so let me give her her flowers. 🌼

Doreen uses me. Yesterday she said,
“I’m in your life buana, and I’ll call you as many times as I want.
In fact, I’ll hang up and call you again na hautanipeleka mahali.”
I laughed.
That’s her way of saying, “I love you so much, Val, and I can’t live without you.”
She has a way with emotions.
Avoidant in love, like everyone I’m strangely drawn to.
And it blows her mind how mushy and romantic I am. She told me once “Na hiyo roho yako, African men hautoboi”

She’s been present in almost every stage of my life.
When I was breaking up with my first boyfriend,
she literally dragged me to his place and said,
“Val, for today I have allowed you. Stay here as long as you want.
But by the time you come back, you two better have made up.”
I was astonished. So dramatic and so motherly.

My nickname for her is Yellow.
She’s my love.

And Yellow, if you ever read this,
I hope you know how amazing you are.

Hun, you’re doing great.
You’ve done great with Brad and Joy.
You’re still doing genuinely great by them.

But I want you to really live.
Not just show up for everyone else.
Not just hold the world together.

Live for yourself, too.
Split some of that energy, save some for you.

Because you’ve done beautifully.
And no outside noise should ever make you question that.
You’re solid. You’re enough.

Yes, we can only do so much.
We’ll never control every outcome.
But the fact that you go all in?
That should be enough to grant you peace.

You are awesome. You are amazing.
And I love you.
I love you so much.

Okay, back to my friends.
One just asked me, “If you were God, what would you change?”
Without thinking, I said “I’d remove death.”
It sounded dumb even as I said it 🤣 but really  imagine.

I threw the question back.
He said,“I’d remove boundaries.”

I asked, “Like, country borders?”
He said, “No, life boundaries, laws, rules, what society calls appropriate or inappropriate.”

Me, “So technically… no constitutions?”
Him,“Exactly.”

I said, “But then people would just kill for nothing.”
And he looked me in the eye and said,
“I don’t see anything wrong with murder.
If anything, I understand serial killers.”

I stared at him, wondering if I’m safe. 😅

Anyway,Doreen.
Yellow.
My love.
I adore you.

A few minutes ago, while working out, I noticed something.
My locks jiggle now when I jump.
And I had to stop face the mirror while I jump, just to watch them move.

I got so ecstatic. Because we’ve come a long way.
There was a time they looked like tiny soggy spaghettis.
These ones have taught me self-esteem. Real, hard-earned self-esteem.
And God knows, I needed it.

I’ve never had a soulmate. Okay, I thought I had, but no Val, that wasn’t it.
But I’ve had a twin flame. My twin flame.

Ours was different.
Only me and him could understand it.
And to everyone who ever judged us, fuck you. With rage.

When I decided to get sisterlocks, he didn’t want it.
He laughed, “Aiy babe, tutakaa kama those matchy couples ‘my queen, my king’ nonsense.” He had dreads himself.
I laughed back.
I told him, “If I keep braiding, by 30 my hairline will only exist in memory.” He insisted I look good in my afro, and I told him he should take a walk in my shoe when I have the afro on, too hectic to maintain.

He argued. Then yielded.
He always did when it came to things I truly wanted. About me getting sisterlocks was was the only conversation where we had a long back and forth.

My twin flame was brilliantly weird. A genius.
Unfazed by material things, obsessed with computers and sneakers.
He hated Nairobi as much as I did, our plan was Watamu, to disappear and start over.

He adored my calmness. I adored his mystery.
And I’ll never forget him telling me,
“When I’m around you, nothing else makes sense. I just get so happy… and I don’t know how to feel about this because I want to learn to feel it on my own.”
I never knew what to say to that.

But then, life.
I went silent. Too long. I hate that I listened to outside noise.
When we reconnected, he said he understood why I pulled back.
That call lasted over an hour. At the end he whispered, “I hate that I need to go.”
And I smiled through tears.

Our chats? Always long. Like essays. He’s the only person who never made me feel “too much” for expressing myself.

But then July came.
He told me things were bad health-wise. That he’d written a dead man’s email.
If he didn’t make it… I’d get the message. I took a while before I processed that. When I did, it stung too much.

His words read like this  “I guess I got tired. I wrote a deadman’s switch program that if I stop checking in for 30 days it would assume am dead and send you an email with my goodbyes and everything.”

And then, our last fight. Huge. He disappeared.

Now, not a day passes without me wondering
Is he okay?
Is he angry?
Is he… (no, I can’t finish that thought).

So I pray. Every single day.


I need a sign. A smoke signal. Drum beats. Anything.
Something to unclench this jaw and ease the sickness of not knowing.

Hey, if you’re reading this… just let me know you’re well.
It’s unfair to leave me in this kind of worry.

And by the way, my 40-second plank doesn’t kill me anymore.
I’m moving the timer to one minute. Progress….

I love 9PM. The scent is genuinely amazing soft, masculine, comforting. It hurts that I had to part ways with it. I hate that I’d hate it now. If I smelled it on someone today, I could probably puke. And it’s not even about the fragrance itself… it’s beautiful, I promise. It’s the nostalgia that kills me.

Almost everything in my life right now feels nostalgic. Like I’ve smelled it before. Touched it before. Cried these tears before. As if I’m living an afterlife do you hear what I’m saying?

I’ve healed my wounds at least the ones within my control. But there’s one stubborn wound that lingers. An awesome soul told me, “time heals all wounds.” He’s repeated it to me twice this week. It makes perfect sense, until it doesn’t. Still, I’m sitting with it.

My heart is healed. And yet, it’s exhausted.

I love who I’ve become. But I also hate some of the parts that came with becoming her. Everything exists in duality inside me right now. Warm, then cold. Strong, then tired.

And I can’t help but ask, why would someone draw pleasure from breaking another person’s soul? How is this logical. I break you into pieces, then give you hope, then keep toying with your emotions and when I see you growing stronger, it irritates me, so I double down just to crack you again? And after all that, I still say, “Let’s maintain a professional relationship”? Like… really? That’s exactly what I’ve been doing but you keep poking me. My God.

What is wrong with human beings really?

And what is this strange space… feeling healed and broken at the same time? Numb yet manifesting good things? Cold, but hopeful?

Out of everything else I’ll turn into, I don’t ever want to live as someone who inflicts this kind of torment on another soul. I deeply hope that 
no one will ever sit stuck in life trying to heal from the pain I inflicted in their souls.

It’s confusing, this duality. This warmth and coldness. This healing and exhaustion.

And through it all, I still hate that I love 9PM. The scent.

Cheers

Wueh!!
Last night, just after dinner, I heard wails. I tried to block the voices out because honestly, I didn’t want to hear about more losses. Haven’t we had enough this year?

I thought I had made peace with death, but the truth is… the events of late have been overwhelming.

Then today evening, my friend Lucas calls.
“Heeey Lukasi,” I say that nickname stuck ever since a trip he organized to Diani. A girl with a heavy coastal accent baptized him so.

He chuckles, “You sound so jovial.”
I say, “Mi hukua hivi kila siku.”
He goes, “I know. By the way, send me Natasha’s number.”

Innocently, I promise, “I’ll text it after this call. In fact, via SMS.”
He presses, “Are you sure?”
I laugh, “Yes.”

Then he drops the bomb,
“Val… Natasha is dead.”

I was in my parents’ bedroom looking for something, but suddenly found myself in the kitchen, my tone completely shifted.

And I’m still trying to process it.

My last months in Voi were chaotic, but in those rare magical moments, Natasha brought so much life my way.
Every time we hung out, we made sure it was insane fun.

The first time I ever spoke to her, she was rocking her short hair so effortlessly gorgeous. I told her, “If I knew I’d ever look this good with short hair, I’d never have done my hair.” That was my pick-up line into our friendship.

She loved life fiercely. She loved herself loudly. She’d often say
“I want to have so much fun, I wanna die fulfilled.”

We joked about growing old. She’d look in the mirror and tease, “Ata Val, si unaona kasura kameanza kukomaa?” and we’d burst out laughing.

She experimented with colors the last time I saw her, she had dyed her hair blue. Otherworldly. Beautiful.

She hated that I had relocated. We promised to meet in Kisumu. The plan was simple. She’d hop on a plane, we’d drink ourselves silly, and she’d head back to Voi.

Our last call was wild too she wanted me to put her on something I won’t even mention here (our wild souls understood each other).

Since then, I’ve been meaning to text her. Just to ask, “Are you really having fun?” But procrastination won. And today, I’m left scrolling through our messages most of them just saying,
“I miss you babe.”

This sucks. It really does.

Every time I lose someone, I find myself overcompensating with the people I still have. Hugging tighter. Checking in more. Overloving.

But so is life, in all its sacredness.
May her soul rest in eternal peace. 💙

My creativity has been on a bit of a go slow this week.

I’ve been graciously juggling a lot or maybe it’s just that nothing worth yapping about popped up.

The weekend is still young though, and you know I never gatekeep tea. If something juicy comes around, trust me, I’ll be right here in all my glory.

In the meantime, I just picked up “Things We Left Behind” by Lucy Score, and I already know it’s going to bang. Translation? My weekend is set to be epic.

So here’s your little reminder,live a little honey. Like I said last time, we only get to do this life thing once.

Have an awesome weekend ahead, you gorgeous stranger on the other end.

Cheers.