Classic Catch 22

I’ve always effortlessly averted situations that threatened to evoke my vulnerability. My recent past experiences got me so damaged that I had put fortifications around me and they seemed sufficient. How they suddenly came tumbling down; I’m yet to comprehend.
 

And all it took was a hug! One magnetic embrace stirred my entire being! 

I’m spellbound. I see him and get goose bumps. I hear his voice and get chills down my spine. It’s been an eon since anyone tickled my fancy this bad. I love to hate this feeling; especially because of how impuissant it’s made me. It’s an emotional crisis.

 “But why Ella? Why him? Why the most enigmatic of them all?”

The overly insistent inner voice won’t let me be. Sadly, even I can’t find the answers to these pesky questions. Matter of fact, I would rather play dumb.

What I’m certain about though is I want this to linger; because when we hug; God, those stolen moments are hypnotic. I could stay in that embrace forever.  

Unhealthy as it may seem; scratch that; perilous as it’s already proven; it’s an “adventure” I’m willing to explore. I’m an adrenaline junkie after all, no?

I’m enslaved!

The Kiss

Me: Why the attitude?
Him: I wanted to kiss you goodnight last night but you rejected me.

Sunday was a lovely day. He suggested the movies and yes I wasn't that enthusiastic about it but was glad to be stepping out a tad after being cooked up in my little abode for the entire weekend.

Why skeptical about the date? I have a really terrible reminisce about 3D movies. My real first experience was a disaster ; putting it mildly. The anticipation that there could be a repeat dashed my spirit.

It was a beautiful evening a few years ago when one of my supposed suitors coerced me into a date. Considering I'm not big on outings, we settled for a movie. We were a few minutes late since it was a random plot. 47 Ronin was showing that day.

That fateful evening, I cursed my ancestry and gods for  depriving me of luxuries such as being exposed to these kind of things earlier in my life. Each time the characters in the movie got into a brawl, I felt like the punches, machetes and stones were targeting me. I stopped short of running out of my seat. The first punch got me ducking and shouting "mummy" on reflex. My date was laughing out so loud it was so freaking embarrassing. At some point I held onto him to dodge a spear. I on a number of occasions removed the 3D glasses and that's how I was able to endure the over two worst hours of my dating history! What a date!

Backtracking to Sunday, we got to the mall early. The next movie was in 50 minutes and as providence had it, it was in 2D. Sigh of relief!

To while away the time, my companion volunteered a tour of the mall. I had intimated earlier that I had never been there before. Armed with my favorite ice cream, we wandered. Checking out the massive mall was great lollygagging which doubled as a workout since we had to use the stairs to and from the highest floor. I don't do escalators nor elevators because the mere glance at those moving stairs gets me woozy and my phobia for enclosed spaces is acute. Crazy, right?

Fast forward a few minutes to Showtime, we got our popcorn and occupied seat D9 and D10 as per the tickets purchased earlier at the booking office. A sequel of The mummy starring Tom Cruise is one movie I would never have envisioned watching and let alone enjoying under normal circumstances. I loathe spooky movies. Surprisingly, I loved this particular one; so much so that I didn't realize when my companion stole my pack of the caramel popcorn. That's how captivated  I was. For once I didn't even have nightmares about the walking corpses later that night. It was perfect, save for the little discomfort caused by the AC. God I'm so stone age!

The ride home was the highlight of the evening. His stereo was blaring with Chris Brown and we both lip synced to almost all the tracks. On dropping me off, he tried to steal a kiss as we hugged goodbye and naturally, it was met with rebuff.

I glossed over the episode 'cause in my mind's eye, it was trivial. Evidently, I had misconstrued the situation. My rude awakening came soon enough when I checked in later. His response sent red flags. He was aloof and obviously this was strange considering we had just spent an awesome evening together.

 "What's going on? Are we good?" I asked.

It is then that I learnt that not letting him kiss me offended him and bruised his ego so bad we are fighting to-date.

Guys, for crying out loud; you don't suddenly change zones. If you've let yourself act and treat a woman a certain way, don't hold her culpable if she gets accustomed to seeing you in that light. Yes you hate being friend zoned but assert yourselves. Let it be known how you want to feature in a woman's life to save us all this undesirable drama.

In my books, it's much better to lay all cards on the table and set boundaries from the get go. This way, misapprehensions are easily averted. I don't refute the fact that he's always been overly nice to me, attentive and caring. However, he had never manifested such interest in me to warrant such behavior.

Don't give me the "Ella, you should know how I feel about you by now" talk. No, I don't! You've never told me. I'm not from the "actions speak louder than words" school. Actions could be misconstrued.

Make your intentions explicitly known with an equal measure of both actions and words!

Candor

Traffic cop: Nakitto (while checking my driver’s license out), do you know why I pulled you over? He said while beckoning me out of the car.

Me: Yes (fidgeting to step out) Sir. Yes I have a clue. I overtook in a corner Sir.

Traffic cop: Why did you do that?

Me: (with the most sincere look) honestly Sir I don't know. It just happened. My head is in a thousand places today. I shouldn’t be on the road. But I have an emergency I must personally attend to.

Traffic cop: (after an awkward silence) you seem honest. Plus you’re humble. I'll forgive you this time. But buy me some water. You see how hot it is out here. At least for Twenty thousand shillings.

Me: Truth is I only have (while opening wallet) twenty thousand shillings on me. See?

Traffic cop: Alright Nakitto (while handing back the license to me). You can go. However, focus while on the road. You could get imprisoned. Keep the money for fuel; just in case.

Me: *shocked* Thank you very much Sir. I promise to be careful. God bless you.

And so effortlessly I survived a Ugx. 100,000 penalty!  Money I didn’t even have or in the least bit hoped to get in the 28 legal days from day of offense considering my January money drought seems to have endured through to February.

This may seem like such a triviality; however, I picked a valuable lesson that overly dusty and scorching hot afternoon. Best believe!

Oftentimes we opt for what in the here and now seems like the easy way out; extricate ourselves from situations by lying; naturally. 

Arguably, the truth presents some cons occasionally but in the long run are outweighed by the pros as it is eventually appreciated. After all, like the old adage goes; good things don’t come easy.

A bosom buddy of mine turned foe (for reasons unbeknownst to me) once told me “Ella, always speak the truth. That way, no one will ever have anything to hold against you since you’ll have nothing to hide”

I recently took these words to heart and learnt to flaunt my truth whenever required to. This way any trumped up stories will be as clear as day in the eyes of the intended consumers.

Some things are best left buried; you may think. However, time has a way of unexpectedly deracinating these little secrets.

Moreover, I could be benighted but it takes a lot of effort making up lies and keeping up with them. Eventually you slip-up and consequently lose all credibility.

Needless to say, truth is a single entity. It does not exist in bits and pieces of unrelated ideas or disconnected data as precisely put by Steven Lawson in his article; what is truth?

“Because truth is one body, it is always internally consistent. It never contradicts itself. Truth always speaks with one voice and is always in perfect agreement with itself. It is always in harmony with everything else it says, since each aspect of truth is congruent with the sum of its parts”

Candor is an infrequent virtue but prised.

Office romance; Uh-oh!

Envision this;

Suddenly a colleague confesses having had feelings for you for a while but always stopped short of sharing. 

For a jiffy you pooh-pooh his revelation, taunt and even ask him to not joke about things that intimate. What’s more, you assure him that if his goal was to pull a fast one on you, it was an epic fail. 

His rejoinder; 

“Hey, don’t mock my feelings; I implore you. You have no idea how hard it’s been for me to see, smell, laugh with and watch you swing your little self by my department and be unable to divulge how you make me feel. I can’t take it anymore. This is my truth.”

Oh boy, are you taken aback by this disclosure! 

What ensues is a blank stare episode on your part; understandably. You try to downplay the situation by digressing with a "Meanwhile, what are your thoughts on Trump's first week in the white house? I think he's a worthy POTUS".

However, you kick the ballistics when he leans over and whispers; “I’m dead serious Ella. Sleep on it tonight, the night after and the night after. I can wait”

Your “uh-oh” moment comes soon enough when he sticks to his guns and keeps asking for a chance to show you he’s for real.

Ah! The male genus are such daredevils!

I’m one "hard" chic lately and always thought I was incapable of rousing such emotions in anyone, let alone a co-worker. With hindsight, I aint fussy enough after all.

Besides, did he have to opt to confess now? Now when I’m down in the dumps and oblivious to my current mind frame? He's privy to the fact that I’m swamped by an avalanche of odd emotions and goings-on. What an inopportune moment!

Surely I’m not culpable for being overly unreceptive. Totally comprehensible; right?

Still and all, I'm quite intrigued by the whole workplace romance phenomenon.  I’m certain you have a clue about its modus operandi, general pros (energizes workplace morale, motivates employees, encourages creativity and innovation, softens work-related personality conflicts, improves teamwork, communication/cooperation) and cons (threatens career advancements, complicates work relationships, creates Co-worker confusion, work performance declines, conflict of interest is inevitable) as summarized by Wikipedia and from personal experiences.

Arguably, I vaguely know that people involved in such an arrangement oftentimes play hard at keeping it under wraps.

Alarm bells!

See, I abhor half measures. If I must get myself into something, it's all or nothing. And when it comes to matters of the heart, ah! I’m very wary (once bitten twice shy). Who mentioned the heart? office romance is usually only but a fling; one may interject. Well, in my books, romance is synonymous with my heart. I don't know any different.  Hence if I'm in, it is completely. And by completely I mean exclusivity, PDA and everything in between. No masquerading.

On randomly sharing with some colleagues over lunch, office romance was described as obnoxious, taxing, dreary and not worth the hustle.

“Office relations can be overly explosive, messy, errant and so indulging if not tempting; however not the wisest of ideas” Andrew said. He totally echoed my thoughts!

"You should actually be flattered that a nice guy should feel this way about you and conjure up courage for a one on one confession" a hopeless romantic volunteered.

There's no harm in trying; we find love in hopeless places", Fahima added.

If he ain't a field agent akin to those working for CTU in 24 the series; I can perhaps give it a shot; a movie freak said prompting gales of laughter one girls' evening out.

Well, nay; regardless of the circumstances, it is not feasible on many fronts I say.

Enkindled

"The very first time that I saw your brown eyes

Your lips said "Hello" and I said "Hi”

I knew right then you were the one…”

I threw a glance in the direction of the sound, scouring the different work stations in a bid to identify the singer.

“But I was caught up in physical attraction.
 But to my satisfaction, baby you were more than just a face…”

Thunderstruck; I listened to the most harmonious a cappella I had ever heard. I was so amazed that for a jiffy I was transfixed.

“And if I ever (ever fall) in love again (again)
I will be sure that the lady is a friend
And if I ever (ever fall) in love so true (true)
I will be sure that the lady's just like you…”

At this point, I subconsciously ogled. What a voice!

When the second verse started, I couldn’t help but croon along. After all, this is one of my all-time favourite ballads and naturally I know the lyrics by heart.

And then he hit the high notes, and, boy oh boy, was I entranced! I had goose bumps all over and in an undertone exclaimed; holy moly!

I observed and listened in awe as he so naturally nailed the song to the very last lyrics. Even Shai would be dazzled!

Amidst all the angst of life most notably that linked to the numerous heartaches; I thought I was numb.

Moreover; my heart acceded to my appeal to take a sabbatical if we were to heal. Hence, we had reinforced our guard.

Nevertheless, this lad so effortlessly splintered all these defenses and aroused a myriad of emotions I had long tucked away. I was charmed to say the least.

He merely had to sing!

Oh for an encore!