I’m not your kind of diary-friendly person. But I should start writing my diary. Yes what is there to lose? There is so much to write about. You know maybe literary agents could find some magical thing and give you a call. “How about you writing an outline of say about twenty pages and the hundred thousand dollars would be on its way to your account.” Nice, wouldn’t you say?
Now, the diary should start in the morning when you get up whining and cursing everything. Why is that most of us act it’s maybe the worst day of our life every morning we get out of bed. In fact getting out of bed demands real nerves. So the first line would be, “I woke up at about six fifteen. It takes me another twenty five minutes to get off the bed. Why? I’ll tell you why. I was in the middle of this dream where I was a millionaire and I was practically kicking everyone around. And people obeyed and respected you. Well they acted like they respect you. It is later that you ask “Were those dudes play acting and making fun of me?
Then I wash up fast and go to the kitchen. Many times I cook my own breakfast if you really have to know. Note that I’m good at it and know my way around the kitchen. But then you don’t need to be any smarter than the average weirdo in the streets to cook a couple of eggs. Make sure the skillet doesn’t stick and that does it. At least you make sure you don’ go to the office empty stomach.
Now while we’re at it there is still this tendency to think that kitchens are for women. Yes the only thing men have to do is roll up their sleeves sit at the dinner table and comment…
Years back there was this comical incident. This married guy used to go to the kitchen often. In fact the plan agreed with his better half is that on Sundays he reigns over the kitchen the whole day from breakfast to dinner. And he publicly boasts in his own home he has become a five star chef. Of course he seems to have odd culinary creations to his credit. Of course only his wife and two teenage children feed on those creations. He has this way of starting to make some pasta dish and ending with porridge! Isn’t that a genius of a man! Ha!
One Sunday his wives parents come from the countryside. Now usually his wife took the greatest care so that no one form her relatives knows this secret of hubby-in-the-kitchen of hers. That unfortunate Sunday midmorning she was out to buy certain things and hubby was in the kitchen preparing lunch. The program for the day was purely traditional lunch with Siga Wot… sort of ‘meat stew;’ (not very helpful, is it?) When he hears the knock on the door he rushes out all with his apron. Also as he opens the door the world literally flipped, His wife’s parents where so shocked they must have thought the came to the wrong house.
What the hell is their daughter’s husband, the very man thought to be the ‘iron fence’ protecting their loved child with an apron and the scent of the Siga Wot? Hubby later said he wasn’t simply shocked but literally terrified so bad that for a minute or so he lost command on his vocal nerves. They hug the strangest of hugs (jelly hugs!), so he says, and he shows then into the house. Once they sit the problem was he couldn’t sit with them. No way! Or else the Siga Wot would go into violent spasms, surge over the edges of the pot and flood the kitchen’s floor! That’s not going to happen when he has sacrificed his morning to make “the best” as he boasted to his wife. He excuses himself and rushes into the kitchen leaving the visibly shocked and confused parents mute and unresponsive. But all was to change when a smiling jovial wife burdened under the weight of her groceries comes. She later says in all her life that was the most… shock she experienced.
Her parents so it seems were very conservative and left no space for the ifs and buts of city life. When they kissed and hugged their daughter the usual smile of happy parents wasn’t there. There was not much talk however much their daughter tried to save the day. The hubby-in-the-kitchen never came as an agenda. Then it was lunch time and their daughter set up the dishes and what. They stretched their hands without any comment and the injera and hubby’s Siga Wot was set on the table. The man of the house joins them of course without the apron. His wife puts the injera on everyone’s plates and opens the …which holds the Siga Wot and this time her daddy stops her. He asks;
“Who cooked the Siga Wot?” Though there was nothing to hide this was the question hubby dreaded. Their daughter tries to go into some preliminaries and still daddy cuts her short and with the strangest of voices he says, “I asked you, who cooked the Siga Wot!”
“It was me,” hubby answers and daddy was the real daddy every cell on him threatening to burst. “Take it away!”
“But dad…”
“I said take it away. His daughter does so. The day was already spoiled and her parents who planned to stay overnight refuse to stay any longer and go to spend the night in another relative’s house. Since it has been sometime since this happened I can’t tell you what happened later.
Anyways how did I go into all this hubby-in-the-kitchen talk! Yes, I was talking about preparing my breakfast but look where we ended up. Maybe leaving the diary thing for another time is better.
Maybe, just maybe the hubby in the kitchen scenario would most probably solve many of household problems. Well the better half should be the one to handle the in-laws. “If you don’t like the Siga Wot my husband makes it means you don’t like me too.”
How about that? I mean such a no-nonsense declaration (because it’s a declaration, isn’t it!) might win one parent over and the next time hubby with the apron opens the front door the hugs would probably be firmer. Hey, would you care for delicious Siga Wot hubby made? Case closed!
Ephrem Endale Contributer
The Ethiopian Herald June 9/2024