Last updated on July 25th, 2026 at 02:04 pm
I am not adept at crocheting; I’d been blindly doing it, not really understanding the flow, yet creating stitches. I even made a few coasters then packed all the tools I purchased into a bag and zipped it up. I decided to get more serious with it recently. I relearnt how to make a slip knot and a chain, then learnt how to make a slip stitch, single crochet, half double crochet and a double crochet. Though intimidated, I feel a quiet joy at having taken a crucial step.
I wonder how many more things I have to learn. The discomfort of learning makes me want to dump the whole thing and run. But I want to be able to make sweaters, scarves, beanies and blankets.
I have many open tabs like that. After learning to drive, without a car of my own, I have been left in this suspended place where I can’t say that I’m a good enough driver. Crochet was also an open tab. Learning French also seems like it might be an open tab, left unfinished. Open tabs get forgotten and end up being closed after not receiving attention for a long time. Sometimes open tabs receive due attention. Bike riding is also an open tab, as is sewing, and bead making and many other bits. There are not many skills that I can consider myself to have mastery of.
As I sit to edit yet another work for my website, I ask myself what the purpose is. Why am I striving to upload my third book? Why do I retain this website that I’ve now had for three years? No one reads blogs again, so why bother? I have zero readers, so why do I bother? Why do I concern myself with the website’s appearance and uploading good stuff? Maybe I don’t want my website to be another open tab. I don’t think I am going to become a full-time blogger; I don’t know what I am going to become full-time.
Why so many open tabs? I guess it’s because I try. I love to love things and know a bit of many things. I doubt I am seeking mastery in any of them as such. But there is a level of dexterity and ease that I believe should be attained in each of these things. Why so many open tabs? Because hobbies, or any skill at all, are a privilege in a third-world country? Because free time is now a privilege? Because our attention span is now nonexistent? Because having money is more important?
The other day, I was in a low mood and didn’t know why. I am happy to report that after writing and working on the next upload for my website, I had a significant mood boost that transferred into the next day. I’d love to get my work out to interested readers; it’s a deep desire, a wish, a prayer even. Is my website an archive for when that may happen? Without anyone seeing or applauding my work, do I consider my efforts to be warranted? Is it enough not to leave my website as another open tab? Is hope enough? Am I doing this for hope?
Of course, there has to be something that I am really good at among all these skills. Maybe it’s writing, pouring out my thoughts. But no one even gets to really see my work or follow it. Am I complaining?
Now, I’m feeling full because I’ve taken on challenges and busied myself with them. If you can call learning to crochet a challenge, there you go. As I sit editing a book that was written two years ago, I wonder what motivates me. I’m certainly proud of myself for that feat, but I can’t help but wonder where it all leads to, the dedication without a reward in sight. Maybe the momentary reward helps.
I just remembered that growing up, our mothers used to call our fathers “sir.” They called them daddy and used the pronoun of respect for them as if referring to an older person. And I’m grateful for the women who tried and initiated other less superior ways to refer to their husbands. As young teenagers, it was a concern for us (as marriage should be for young girls). I was just going to respect him or use endearments in the presence of strangers and his family, and in our privacy, I would refer to him as my mate.
Today, I’m grateful for the women who tried. Because when we try, we don’t understand the potential ripple effects at that moment. We may never do. But trying permits us to be, to express, even as it gives others permission. Trying allows us to live for ourselves (first) rather than others. I wonder what message was being passed across psychologically by insisting that we address our husbands, our partners, with so much respect.
Just as I am grateful for the women who considered the practice weird, I am grateful for the women who considered the whole marriage thing even weirder. The women who tried.
I think I’m on a mini vacation. Like the calm before the storm, or is it a mini storm? Is it ever truly calm? Is life ever fully calm? Or do the storms get milder comparatively enough for us to take a breather? I should soak up this season and hope it doesn’t get tumultuous anytime soon.
Outside of the outcome, maybe we try because trying is a privilege. The ability to make an attempt, to conceive these things at all, is a huge privilege, so much so that not trying seems like a missed opportunity. The level of dexterity probably doesn’t matter as much as the fact that an attempt was made. Maybe open tabs are trails, the evidence of a human trying to live. For now, I need to raise Nigerian nairas to renew my website.
This was written on the 4th of August, 2025. I am here editing and publishing it on Saturday, July 25, 2026. How times flies. A reminder of how ephemeral life is, how fleeting emotions can be, how impermanent conditions are. Still, I am reminded of how I felt while I wrote this.
