Cisi Eze: I’m a Woman & I Need a Wife

In a wry twist, I need the person society wants me to be- a wife.

Wives are delightful! They literally do everything– wash, iron, cook, pray, etc. Life and its vicissitudes require I get one. I want to go home to clean sheets, warm food, zand great sex after a long day at work. According to society, only people with a warm, moist orifice betwixt their thighs are capable of doing all these.

The other people with extended, phallus-like appendages on the lower part of their anatomies can’t because… “superior”. What makes them superior? That part of their anatomy or… I’m seriously curious.
For starters, with a man, it would be conventional marriage. Conventional marriage, in my society, thwarts the concept of marriage equality. Conversely, with a woman, we would establish we are equal partners. After all, no one paid bride price. From reading Chinelo Okparanta’s Under the Udala Trees, I understood two partners in a marriage are like two wheels of a bicycle; they work together for the greater good. We would do whatever we can, based on our capabilities. No one would say, “You are a man, your job is to pay for …” I don’t understand why it’s a man’s duty to pay bills. With a woman, we would contribute according to individual financial strength. I heard some men, who are married to women that earn more, go on to foot most bills because… “I’m a man; I’m the head of the family.” Genius!

Patriarchy, via gender socialisation, has cast men as weak, almost invalid, grownups that feel entitled to women “kitchening” and doing “other things” in the Other Room. Beautiful, huh? I do not want an extra child I did not sign up for. I need to know I can travel and trust my partner- not our six-year-old daughter- to take care of our home. I want to know an adult is in charge. I don’t want my baby to become “small mummy” because my male partner is too manly to go into the kitchen and do chores in his own house. And what if I am home? It’s not my duty to cook. Because you don’t need ovaries to cook. Ha! A man cooks, he’s a chef. A woman cooks, it’s her duty. How… “pleasant”!

What is that thing they say about men not being emotional? Haha! Men are not emotional? When men fly into fits of rage and get lusty, they are not emotional, right? Okay, for the sake of this article, I’ll pretend men aren’t emotional. I’ll pretend society has not taught boys to repress their emotions. I need to be with someone that can be open with me; someone that would express their emotions by telling me how and what they feel. I can’t spend my happily-ever-after guessing my partner’s emotions.

Lest I forget, I heard that moaning during sex means a man is gay. Is that so? Wow! How do I tell my partner is “feeling me” if they don’t sound it? I need to hear what my partner feels. Haha! I should get a wife, really. I wasn’t destined to have non-communicative sex. Olorun m’aje!

Most importantly, I need someone that doesn’t feel entitled to me. I need someone that can kiss and love me right; play video games, watch football matches, discuss philosophy, science, and art; and play with nail lacquer and makeup. An average man wouldn’t do this because masculinity is so fragile that femininity, being “girlie”, breaks it.
Patriarchy also says good hygiene is a sign of homosexuality in men! It expects men to be dirty pigs that roll around in their filth. I can’t be with a pig shrouded in human flesh. Little wonder some boys “deliberately” leave their houses dirty in a bid to test their girlfriends. If I were courting a girl, I know she wouldn’t be that “overreaching” (stupid, actually). Where is it done that an able person leaves his/her house for his guest to come and clean? Seriously, take a minute to ask yourself if it makes sense. Assess the concept.

For anything to be balanced and whole, it must have duality. Yin and yang. Masculine and feminine. I want to feel whole! I need to be with someone that would not make me suppress a part of me in a bid to fit into the societal ideal of how a woman should be, based on gender roles and expectations.
I need to be with someone that would not think we are in a superiority tussle.

Wives are delightful! Everyone should “get” one. If men can have them, women should. As society has said people with salient protrusions on the upper part of their anatomies can give me what I need to be happy, I will go for happiness.
P.S. Interested girls, please, contact me. Let’s make a happy family!

Photo Credit: Elena Elisseeva | Dreamstime.com