Cassandra

Ayard, once you hold an independent will and you own your views, male or female, you tend to become a Cassandra, metaphorically speaking that is. You'd be known for knowing and speaking the truth, yet disliked not for what you say, but what you know, and by those who tend to get hurt by the truth.

Just that unlike beautiful Cassandra, folks' dismissal of your valid warnings and concerns isn't because your predictions are cursed to be disbelieved, but because it's you, and so it's safe to say that it's deliberate.

Well, that's why you'd keep getting vindicated like, "didn't I tell you so? This too could've been averted if only you'd listened." A Cassandra state of mind is a blessings but often taken for granted, and those who do so always live to regret it, because they'd know you're right, or at least sense it, yet choose to ignore you, even though eventually, your predictions invariably happen.

In case you don't know Cassandra, in Greek mythology, she was the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. She had the gift of prophecy from Apollo who after she refused his amorous advances cursed the gift so that her prophecies would never be believed, but interesting, to the detriment of her community.

Truth doesn’t always attract goodwill

In today’s Gambia, especially on social media, good opinion is mostly from an emotional base. If you think I’m lying, identify your target, say what appeals to their prejudices, even if it’s so much fervour about nothing, or just you playing the devil's advocate, let it appear to claim as have they, and there you have your goodwill.  

But hear this, Rasta! The agreeable reaction thereof is only until you go back to keeping it real. That’s when you’re renamed a “hypocrite” – and that’s how I came to overstand that in fact, truth doesn’t always attract goodwill. So, my guiding principle: write whatever the heck you want to write, just don’t pontificate and don’t fuck with people.

Ignorance... is it bliss?

Ignorance and the said happiness thereof is no bliss per se. You don't expect much demand from someone so oblivious to everything except his single view of the world. It's like Mao Zedong's allegory of the frog at the bottom of the well.

You don't expect the frog to think as big, or see as far as you that's knowledgeable through books, travel and other forms of exposure, or you that's metaphorically on top of the well. It's only natural the frog thinks small because it sees the sky as only as big as the top of the well that it's able to see.

If the frog surfaces, has an entirely different view and remains lowly in thought, then you can now blame it or call it mumpsimus. But that's hardly the case, because most frogs eventually become the loudest; you know the intalk: "never see come see."

I think I may have found a word for that kinda mental state. Call it 'frogasm,' you know: that rush of excitement upon sudden enlightenment. It can cause the frog to croak until it blows its throat up; if you know what I mean.