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Mantalk: Why men can’t stop chasing youth
What you need to know:
- Everyone wants to prove that they belong in the big leagues. Still got it.
- They want to be hip. Hip? The cool cats don’t even call it hip anymore.
- They say you are no longer based. Someone’s daughter said this is just typical manhood, that I was a typical man.
I’ve been indulging myself of late, buying toys (not those ones), playing with myself (not like that), and generally being insufferable. Motivation gurus will tell you, you should say no more often, but I have been saying yes to everything. My reasoning is the same kind that leads men to buy toys (those ones) and play with themselves (like that) under the premise, What’s the worst that could happen?
Which is how I found myself at a “millennial hangout” in Ruiru, and I understand why nothing great comes from Ruiru. The name itself conjures up an ushago-stuck-up vibe, like you are missing out on something. Nairobi bends the wrong way, and the bad wind that comes from it wafts all the way through treacherous Thika Rd and is deposited in Ruiru. To be clear, the people were great, if you can call ‘great’ long lines to the bathroom, food, and vendors. This was a high school funkie with aging students!
And speaking of elderly women, my friends won’t invite me to parties where they go and do secret, sinful things because they think I’ll write about it, and perhaps you are wondering, Why do you have friends who do secret, sinful things? Irrelevant. The better question is, Why shouldn’t I write about it? I am just trying to eke out a living.
Which leads to this story. So juzi, at a small gathering, after I left that ill-fated Ruiru disasterclass, I slithered my way to upmarket Nairobi, where they know how to treat their patrons. Wash wash boys/forex bros/Ni God businessmen patronise where I was, so it is safe not to say where I was. I am sure you understand, and even if you don’t, you do. We were catching up with the Mwangis/Otienos/Kipchumbas, the usual thing people do to ensure they are not left too far behind. We only talk about the good in these gatherings: Who just got promoted where, who is onto her third car, whose woman has made an honest man out of them, and who we thought could never make it but alas! Mungu si Kipruto, because look who made it?
I am more interested in those who didn’t make it, wale dream yao bado ni ya kutoka block. I blame it on my writer’s instinct for craving misfortune, but really, I am just nosy. NANI alienda WAPI? You don’t need to specify who Nani is, someone else will fill in the ‘Nani’ part and tell you all about it. I lock in and note the stories down, shake my head, and tsk-tsk-tsk with the refrain, Aki life! We quickly brush them to the edges of our mind where the recesses of Wantam chants still stand. We promise ourselves to call the Nanis and check-up—but it’s all lies. The thing is, we might want to, but life gets in the way of life, and things happen sometimes. Things get in the way of best intentions. Out of sight, out of mind, as they say.
By this time, our table is bristling with life. The rain is falling in sleets, and someone makes a joke to go and check her car lest it be swallowed by Lake Sakaja. We laugh—Ha! Ha! Ha! No doubt aided by the beers and wine that are flowing like we are in Cana of Galilee, or State House, or both. More old acquaintances join the table, round and rotund, wearing unwillingly, or perhaps hopelessly, the evidence of a loving wife’s ugali-nyama-avocado-sukuma and Saturday night chapati waru dishes. My married friends tell me that when I get a good wife—or a bad wife, some say it doesn’t matter—that I will lose this skinny body of mine. That there is a fat man inside me, all he needs is a good—or bad—wife to call him out. Who knew the DNA theory can be deconstructed by a good (or bad) wife?
The irony wasn’t lost on me when a burly figure hobbled in, and buttoned himself to one of our female friends, code name Mzae. Mzae could easily pass for our elderly uncle with some loose cash (and morals). I gave Mzae a cool 45, maybe 43 if he loses that Man Utd scarf. If you gave him 50 years, it wouldn’t seem unfair. He'd wasted his entire life. Such people were very dear to those of us who'd wasted only a few years. He had that old people thing, where they say a joke and expect you to laugh. He wasn’t funny. How do women get through the night?
Anyway, my friend leaned and slid the words into my ear, “You know, 20 years from now, that will be us.”
Tufiakwa! God forbid! “I would never wear a Man Utd scarf in public!” I made it clear.
That’s not what I mean, he said. The hell it’s not. Of course, that’s what he meant. What else could he mean?
All through the night, we’ve been occasionally evading, but never fully outrunning the general dissatisfaction that has signposted on our crossroads. Men don’t like getting old. As a professional career man, I can tell you that, for free no less. It’s why we date very young women. It is a sort of vampire love – she needs his authority, he needs her youth. Because a good life needs jeopardy. Getting older is brutal on a man. Greatness exits the body faster than the mind. By the time you have made enough money to have some of it as “disposable”, you are generally foul-mouthed, sourpuss, and petty. Once you have learned all you can about sex, your pelvis is gone, and your hip movement is restricted to basic mode. It’s a gradual departure, then instant. In the middle of your prime.
Once, long ago, when I used to think like a man about these things, I swore never to be that kind of man. But that’s neither here nor there. Besides, I was unsullied in those days. In any case, manhood is a constantly evolving disease. Once you treat one bacterium, another virus flares up. Aegrescit medendo. The cure is worse than the disease.
Where am I going with this? I swear I had a point. Let me go through my notes. Yeah, okay, let me mansplain it to you. I think I wanted to say millennial men are suffering from nostalgia. In a bid to remind themselves of their virility, they will do crazy things – get an earring, get liposuction, or wear waist trainers. Everyone wants to be young, except the young who dream of being old, only to find out that being young is where it’s at. Everyone wants to prove that they belong in the big leagues. Still got it. They want to be hip. Hip? The cool cats don’t even call it hip anymore. They say you are no longer based. Someone’s daughter said this is just typical manhood, that I was a typical man. And what's wrong with that? I've been aiming at typical masculinity all my life.
Look, the life of man is a race to the grave. And there is no moneyback guarantee. The true test of manhood is whether you can accept where you are. Unless you are in Ruiru, which then the true test of manhood is accepting where you are and moving out of Ruiru.
