One Family

I have always spoken about family as being something which was very important to me, however this has always been half true. In my youth I didn't really like my nuclear family because they were so African and traditional while I was just...different. They all thought I was a little weird, even spending about a year thinking I was on drugs because I was so secretive and reclusive - and mean me for letting them think that. 

This distance slowly closed over the past decade but I must say that it still exist. I'm still closer to cousins than I am to my siblings and my relationship with my mother, while very dear to me, is still very much at arms length. I suppose for me I've always imagined that this was fine because inevitably I'm going to marry someone and create a nuclear family of my own - so I might as well act like someone who has other priorities.

And so, it is no surprise that one of the longest standing blogs (and drives) that I've had in life has been the drive for a wife, which I'll get to in a moment, but this was obviously the wrong push. As part of the unity I've come to realise that I could never make a strong partner bond, that leads into a family setting, without a stronger bond with my primary and extended family. 

That said one of the main focus areas, mandated by the desire for legacy, is the fact that I need to be closer with all of my family members. My siblings and mother being an obvious start - I'm going to talk to them more, see them more, be more concerned and involved in their lives. I've always imagined that they were strong and focused enough to do their own thing, which really they are - after all, I am the weakest of the lot. But it's been wrong of me to segment myself in a way which excludes them from parts of my life as well as deprives them of shared experiences as a family. 

Over and above that I know that I must get closer to the family that my father started after my parents divorced. I've always had nil feeling about them - painting them with the same brush as I had my father; faint disappointment. Truth be told, at the moment that I write this my assumption is that they are all living in some state of failure - which is totally a bias on my part. The assumption I've always had is that my mother raised us to be winners while my father raised his other kids to be failures (like him). It's a sad thing to admit - but that is honestly how I've always felt. I would love for this stupid assumption to be wrong - I'd love for my half siblings to be so much more successful than "us" - because it's actually really arrogant and stupid of me to have always assumed that we were better  (a sentiment shared by my siblings as well). 

I don't know where in the world they are, I assume Zim, but I could be wrong. However in the next year or more I shall endeavor to find them and bridge that gap. We fall under one line, we share one family name - it is only right that we are One. My desire is that their children and mine shall never know that there was a time when we were separate - our family shall be ONE family. Our future generations shall know only success and unity. 

And so I come to the one family aspect which I have focused a lot on, especially in the past decade, the wife. If you had asked me 5 years ago if my dating life was successful I would have said definitely yes. Why? Because I was getting all of the random attention that I desired in life. If you had asked me the same question a year ago I would have said "maybe". Why? Because I was dealing with the disappointment of another relationship failure and the real possibility that the failures were on my part. 

This is no longer a possibility - I can tell you with blatant honesty that my dating life has been a colossal failure. I had the wrong focus, chased the wrong women and pushed away the right ones - I did almost everything wrong, except of course, I did learn. I grew my knowledge of women way past what is required, to the point where now I'm actually very cynical about relationships because I have seen just how badly they could potentially go. 

I was recently reading an article that was talking about people's ratings (how they are valued on a scale of 1 - 10) and how a man should always marry down - in the average of the relationship. This means, that since men are judged on status and women on looks, a guy who is a 5 when he meets a girl who is a 7 can only marry her if he knows that his status will rise to an 8 at some point in their relationship otherwise their relationship will fail because inevitably she will think that she's wasting her time with a low rated guy. 

I recently spent time looking at every person I have ever had a relationship with, romantic, sexual or otherwise and the sad thing was that very few of them were actually more than my personal rating of myself. In fact the average rating for my entire relationship life is about a 5 - which means that for all of my life I have, in general, hooked up with average women who make me comfortable. Rarely have I dated someone who pushes me to want to raise my status so that when we marry she is marrying up. This is perhaps my biggest failing in dating life because it means that my partners have supported mediocrity in me which is counter to the ONE goal of legacy. 

In an honest and critical review of everyone I've been involved with, there is no single person who actually meets the criteria (as set out below) for my ideal wife. It's sad to note because the criteria are actually not very steep (for someone who will support the ONE goal). 

For me the ideal wife shall be a person who:

• Inspires me to be a better man in her actions and words
• Supports a religion that believes in ONE God and the tolerance of all people. I cannot be with someone whose religion requires me (or my children) to follow her religion only
• Shows loyalty and respect to our shared family - this also includes the ability to steer them into the right path if they are lost
• Values tradition and promotes culture in the home - if we are not from the same background she must teach me her language and culture and want to learn about mine
• Strong willed and ambitious, however not at the cost of family
• Is open-minded and witty  
• Is health and fitness inclined  
• Takes pride in her personal appearance and grooming. She should have great skin and take pride in her natural hair. While I don't mind extensions and augmentation this must not be her default - default must always be what God gave her
• Has strong presence - both physically (must be at above average height) and metaphysically (must be noticed and respected when she enters a room) 
• Does not have debilitating or life threatening illnesses
• Has never been married nor pregnant 
• Is unquestionably beautiful across all races/cultures

I have seen women like this but never pursued them, I guess partly because I was intimidated (instead of being inspired) and partly because I knew that I would have to change into a better man which was something I wasn't ready for. I am now - I want to find her for my own sake and the sake of the ONE  goal.