Timi : a short story
Brushing the edges of her hair slowly, Timi smiles, she considers the process of making her hair neater an act of showing love to her hair. Timi walks to the nearest bus stop as fast as possible thinking of everything and nothing, boarding the Campus shuttle and instinctively checking her bag for change as the voice of the Driver shouting “enter with your change oo” plays in the background, thank goodness! she has change, no one wants to start the day arguing with a Danfo Driver.
What is the point of going to class early if you’ll end up sleeping most of the time? her body can’t seem to function without adequate sleep, it’s so embarrassing, “I hate early morning classes ” she mutters as she makes her way to the cafeteria for her late breakfast.
At the Cybercafe buying handouts, her friend Favour walks up to her, they talk about the last class, make jokes and banter, out of the blue, Favour chips in “this your flat chest” with a small laugh, Timi replies ”yes o, wahala for who no like flat chest” they burst into laughter, talk some more and say their goodbyes.
Today was hectic, she sighs as she opens the door, it’s 5:00 pm, fair enough for a Monday. Timi stands in front of the mirror to take off her outfit as she does daily, she remembers what Favour said, no one has ever commented on the size of her breasts, she replays the exchange and smiles at the suave way with which she handled that conversation, she hid her shock so well, she could almost deceive herself that she wasn’t surprised…. Who says that totally unprovoked? People are weird…
Projection, most of the insults/criticism you would get in life is based on projection, I stopped seeing insults as bad attributes you have but instead as the fears or insecurities people have that they share. You can’t give what you don’t have. Everyone has a little of everything, just expressed in different proportions e.g wickedness, kindness, love, etc.
When someone makes fun of your body, it is because they believe they need to meet certain beauty standards to be beautiful, when they see your body that doesn’t fit certain beauty standards, they are simply staring at their fears, they need to put you down to validate themselves. This thought applies to many things like body-shaming, slut-shaming, IQ-shaming, skill-shaming (cooking, cleaning, etc)…
Isn’t it sad that people get to suffer insults for bodies they had no control over?
It is well.
That’s all for now, please share, clap and don’t forget to share your thoughts with me in the comment section, tenx.
