Man Talk: Dear women, this is why he doesn’t need to hear about your past exploits
A couple.
High-value men, please forgive me. I have failed you. I went to the back end of the city, Mirema Drive huko Roysambu, over Easter weekend.
I didn’t even want to. Deal flani iliivana so I had fuel in the car, and I thought every ratchet had gone to Naivasha for the shyly marketed Safari Rally.
What happened is that someone called and asked, “Uko wapi?” and that question has only one right answer: “Unanitaka wapi?” Walinitaka Rosyambu so I went.
The internet warned me that Roysambu is that place even the devil fears to tread, but I will always dream the impossible dream.
We were at this gigantean club that would fit the whole of Nairobi in it, and the next table was full of men who just looked like they were married, sitting with pretty 20-somethings who were definitely not their wives.
I know because we drove away with one later that night but that is not the story here.
You see, we got discussing whether one should have one-night stands. I don’t believe in intimacy before marriage the same way you should believe that a man from western Kenya will leave his wife for you. He won't but that doesn't mean you should leave him; just like me not believing in fornication does not stop me. Delulu is the solulu.
Besides, nowadays apparently modernism dictates that we can't even sex-shame someone. Maybe I am a kienyeji, but I believe we have become too liberal. And it’s also borne of the modern impulse to “live fully in your truth” — the notion that shame is a mindset, so say all your secrets! It’s your truth! In this self-actualised, semi-therapised brave new world, sex is seemingly at its most accessible.
Vast swathes of young people log into dating apps and meet in bars for rudimentary hookups and next morning walks of shame…I mean, sneak-outs. I look around and I can come up with an Excel sheet of the dissatisfied daughters of the revolution, a counterweight of women who are spitting out the Kool-Aid and waking up to smell the morning coffee that casual relations are a con, and they have been had.
I have grown up right in the smack of the generation which encouraged if not teased women to explore their sexuality, to become free spirits, kuoga na kurudi soko.
It was almost presented to them as a feminist manifesto—a woman on top, in the boardroom, and bedroom. That call to arms opened up a Pandora’s box, in the past, maybe our parents' generation would wait before having sex, but now we have it, and then decide if we are a good fit. (May I take this opportunity to apologise to Sharon, that day I was going through something. Sikuwangi hivyo.)
It's the nature of intimacy to stir deep emotions within us, emotions that are unwelcome when one is trying to keep it casual. No matter how hard we giggle and cuddle and talk about, “Na hii serikali itatumaliza,” you can still feel the spell breaking.
Heck, you could trace your hands on his chest like a poorly written romance novel but all of you know this is play-acting. There is no intimacy—it’s just been a game. And the circus has left town.
Ladies, I know what they told you: that a woman can be exploratory like a man—but I am here to tell you they can’t. You can’t. The majority of the women I have talked to confirmed the same. Women desire connection. Cups that need to be refilled.
That’s why no matter how much one tries to pretend otherwise, sex will always leave you feeling empty unless one is certain that you are loved, that this scene is part of a bigger film, that you are loved for the entirety of you, and not just for your body.
That is why you will never hear a man say, “You used me!” because men don’t have the same inclinations toward sex.
In everyday interactions, and our culture, we are constantly sold on this free world, especially in the media with the bodice-ripping 50 Shades of Grey and Adulting and Bridgerton—pushing the narrative that sex is a bump on the road. It isn’t.
Sex can leave you with a brittle façade incapable of real intimacy. Sex is a shortcut; it bypasses your common-sense circuit. Anyone who tells you that casual sex is good for a woman is lying to you; that’s why they feel the need to continue promoting it.
You are not rebellious, free, or independent. What do you need all that experience for? You will learn on the job.
Here’s another truth ladies: never tell your man your body count. It’s useless information, like knowing that an ostrich’s eye is bigger than its brain. Okay, maybe not for the ostrich’s predators. You see, once your man knows your body count, it will taint everything, especially if your queue has tens of men from Kilimani, and a quarter of Pipeline.
Dear reader, I am not sex-shaming, hizi ni facts. He will wonder who the men are, if you had better sex with them, and why none of them stayed with you. WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU? Are you commitment-avoidant?
Therefore, he is not the love of your life, but just another name on your list. I mean, if you’ve slept with all those guys, why stop at him? That is the advertisement for when he will leave you. Wallahi. The numbers don’t lie, so why should I?
