Those who have read Birthday Breakup and Other Stories think of the opening story, Martha, as a good one.
And I was thinking about the story and where it came from.
As writers, one of our unique gifts is the ability of our memories to compartmentalize some anecdotes, stories, phrases, words, and ideas, that we think can be assets in our writing down the line. I see this with almost everyone, but writers can remember very specific things, to see that X-factor in any ordinary story, and work this into their own stories.
The seed for the story Martha was planted in my mind more than ten years ago while having newsroom gossip. Journalists, owing to their access to information about VIPs usually have the best gossip. We were bantering about some big shot when my then-boss told us of something that had happened to him and his mistress a few years back. The story wasn’t even about Martha, but the foolishness ya wanaume.
But for me, that woman who became Martha intrigued me. I was young and didn’t quite understand the sponsor and m-baba culture and how it works.
However, over the years, I would interact with more women who live like Martha. And I came to group them into threes.
Category A, is usually very brilliant, even in school, and extremely very resourceful to the m-baba. Like they have beauty and brains. So, when they sleep their way to the top, there is an element of merit, in two ways. One, they are academically qualified or competent in their field, so their sleeping merely catalyzes their rise to the top. On their own, they would still do it, but why not use their femininity where it matters.
Thus, these women get appointments, and promotions, and move like bosses in town. Also, it takes a lot of competence to extract resources from a mature man. I have seen younger women throw shade at +35 men. And I understand their frustration with these men. These men have been in the streets long enough to know where to put their money and what value they get back. So, category A women know the right knobs to touch, to get that apartment, to get that job, that promotion, or heck, even that billion-dollar tender.
Category B, are those who miscalculate. They are bright enough, but they either overestimate their place in the man’s life, or underestimate the man’s intelligence, and they work themselves into a bad situation. There used to be one of the fiercest, morbidly radical feminists on Twitter a while back. She played both sides. Feminist where it served her interest, and feminine, where it worked. One day, she got involved with some government bigshot, got a kid for him, and tried to wrestle the man from his wife, failed, took him to court for child support and such, and the man played rough, then akajua hajui.
Happens a lot. A girl gets pregnant for some big shot, thinking that she has secured a future, and then the big shot runs. The girl is left wondering how could she have miscalculated.
Category C, are those who assume that they will always be young and hot. Don’t invest in their education, their financial literacy, and anything that can secure them a future. They are either lazy or illiterate. Thus, they spend their youthful days in yachts, holidaying with the who is who, traveling the world, then when replaced with younger women, they fall off the radar. Whereas, some can still get some beta to marry them, and settle down, or other orbiters who want to have them around, they still pine for the good old days, and miscalculate so badly, overlooking the boring betas, who can be an alternative.
Martha was a mix of categories A and B.
Playing the league of a mistress to the big shot is like these men in wash-wash. Some transition into politics or property, clean their man like an Italian godfather who wants to go clean. Some get addicted to the high life of the fast lane and forget that they won’t last there long enough before the law catches with them, or they get shot in turf wars, or the taps they draw money from dry up. Or their political benefactor is kicked out.
Some try to invest, with varied success.
But like the wash-wash types, the ability to read the room and exit when you can, or cash in at the earliest helps a lot.
The bad thing about in your late 30s and 40s, you will know all these characters, and see them make their mistakes in real time, and whether they will self-correct or not, doesn’t matter.
You can’t hate the game.
The world will always have its Marthas.
And rich men come in three shades.
The cold, calculating ones, Machiavelli who follow that dark triad. Few women can pin this one down, and they would need the Delilah type of cunningness to squeeze anything from them. The cold-calculating rich folk are the type that repossesses their gifts and assets from the women once the women go rogue. And if she tries to play dirty, the man will pull a proper stinker on her. Killing is an option.
Then, there are the wise, empathetic ones, who will invest in a woman they love properly. Wiser women usually know how to keep this one. Either they marry them, or accept their position as mistress, and don’t cause him any trouble. However, most women dating at the top, prefer the wildness of the rich, wild type. And soon discard the wise and empathetic boyfriends. Unfortunately, empathetic men tend to be the least forgiving once you cross them.
And then, there are rich and foolish men, who even mortgage their empires away. Know these guys who lose their entire wealth to a second, wilder wife, who runs the kids and first wife out of town?
Anyway, what is your experience with these things?
The Deal 