She's my gal.

Whenever the caveat "You need to know him/her" is employed, the same thoughts run through our minds: "Do I really need to know this person, have hem know me?" But when it comes to her, you really need to know her because she is the one of the few women in the world for which it is a privilege to love and love completely.

She is quite the stunner, allow me a bit of pride. If it wasn't for her advanced years, she'd be my date to every single important event in my life - except my wedding. She was the one woman of whom there were no doubts about where her loyalties lay: with me. She's been joined by her in that regard by Her, and I must say that from my perch, I have the best of many, many worlds.

I don't know which is the earliest memories I have of me and her, but my clearest must be when she whupped my ass. I think that day she wanted to literally smack the black off of me. It was one of her lessons that I am unlikely to forget: treat all of God's creatures with kindness and love, even when you think they do not deserve it, because if you don't, the world will treat in exactly the same way.

She isn't prone to self-doubt, and she has instilled, or tried to, the same philosophy in me. She will not second-guess herself; she will simply make a decision and see it through, come hell or high water. More often than not, she is the hell and the high water, and I love her to death for that. One day, if I ever hit the four score and fifteen that she has, I hope to have her certitude about things, because that simplifies things greatly.

On Mashujaa Day, we went to see her. She doesn't keep track of these "official" holidays any more; she spends her days in what I hope is satisfied somnambulent repose, taking the sun as it comes, or the chit-chat of the little ones when they deign to visit. So, of course, we found her wrapped up tight, sitting out in the sun, listening to her Sony shortwave at whatever it is she was listening to, looking particularly resplendent in her myriad of shukas and her favourite headdress.

As always, given my infrequent visits, I wasn't sure she'd do the "Na wewe ni nani?" routine and I hesitated before I approached her domain. But she lit up when she saw me. She ignored the Prof, the Doc or the Musician and focussed her startlingly direct gaze at me and declared, "Kwa nini umechelewa?" How she knew I was coming and that I had taken the three with me as camouflage I do not know. But I am glad that the bond she and I share is still strong enough that she knows when I am going to come see her. If that doesn't make her my favourite gal, then I don't know what does.

She still chews her own meat, reads without bifocals and can be quite sprightly if she suspects that you have the temerity to go stomping through her lounge in your filthy, filthy shoes. Take off you damn shoes, idiot! Stopping tracking God-knows-what all over her super-clean floors, godammit! It was one of the few days in the week when no matter what burdens I was carrying, I knew it was going to be alright. Lord help me, but that woman is the light of my life.

I feel a bit bad that I am not the robber-baron she hoped I'd be by now (she and I leave that to Peter and the rest of them), because I can't come and see her all the time. She needs company, other than Monica, the niece who's nearest, or Maria, who is the only woman alive who can put up with her sharp tongue. And my gal has a razor sharp tongue. When she turns her sarcasm in your direction, lord help you if a hot flush of embarassment doesn't colour your cheeks even if you are the colour of obsidian. It is one of her few traits that I am most afraid of, yet can't help but admire.

I miss her, every day I don't see her. She misses me too, I know it, and it is a cruel twist of fate that we come from such radically different generations that there is no way I can fit in comfortably in her world or she in mine. But what little we can take, we will take and we will snuffle down the mbuzi and the chapati and quaff down the Sprite (our secret favourite soft drink) and sit in silence, or argue vehemently about when I will bring Her to see her again. I love that woman. I hope she knows how much.