It’s a cold Saturday afternoon, and the day’s errands are done. Annie gets home to the beautiful little house in a gated community and the colorful mat at the door step invites you in. Opening the door, the fresh flowers on her table are a welcome break form the dust and the hustle bustle that has been her day. She puts her supplies on the kitchen counter, takes off her clothes and slips into something light and free. She then goes to the kitchen and opens the fridge door. She removes the meat that was marinating. Tonight, it will be lamb chops and rosemary potatoes with a side of fried spinach. She sets her grill to the right temperature, quickly peels three potatoes and chops a bunch of spinach leaves. While the meat grills, the potatoes are roasting and the spinach is frying. The aroma that fills the kitchen can slay a hungry dude to death. It is a meal for someone special. Someone she is having an affair with. It has been two years of love. Her life has transformed. She no longer just goes through the day. It is now all about her one true love. The meal has to be just right. The house spick and span: her love cannot come home after a day of hard work to a dirty, unkempt home. by the time the food is ready, her supplies are all kept and the fruits chopped and ready for breakfast tomorrow. She sets the table. The cutlery is sleek and the plates exquisite. The starch-white napkins ooze of class. She does not spare when it comes to serving a good meal. She aims to please, and is getting rather good at it. No wonder the affair has blossomed. No wonder her lover cannot escape her clutches: she does whatever it takes to ensure her lover’s needs are interests are met. Soft music plays in the background. Dinner is served. It is well done: just the way her lover likes it. It is a lovely meal. It will be a good night.

Across town Pete heads back home and opens the door. The breakfast cup is still on the table, and the remote is exactly where he left it. The shirt he dropped on the sofa yesterday after work is as he left it. The place reeks of bananas: evidence of what he had last night for dinner. Tea, a slice of bread and a banana. It is a hard life living alone, or so they say. Cooking for one is even harder and cleaning up is not something they had classes for in college so it just ain’t his thing. He kicks his socks into a corner and dumps the supplies onto the kitchen counter. The meat is already cut and so are the green vegetables. He can smell the beef and ugali and his stomach rumbles in hunger. The plan: a meal of ugali with fried beef and Sukuma wiki. But there is a problem: there are only three cooking pots in the house and all three are dirty. Can’t someone just make them dishes with the ability to clean themselves? Like a cyborg of sort? But before that happens, someone has to clean them.

His phone beeps and the messages flash as they come in. Pete takes a peek at his phone and before he knows it, it is 8pm. The dishes are still dirty in the sink, the supplies still in their bag and the hunger pangs are now worse than knives in his tummy. He spent all the time he was to cook chatting with his friends and checking up their Facebook status. His dinner can wait; these are important. He gives up cooking and dials up a half chicken with fries and coleslaw. He will cook tomorrow: he promises himself for the umpteenth time this week. He relishes a good meal but it is too much work. He prays that one day a beautiful damsel that can cook him a clean hot meal and clean them dishes will show up. Maybe he should call Daisy. She can sort out his house tomorrow and top it up with a good round of loving while at it. That’s what girlfriends are for, isn’t it? Well…..

Meanwhile, Valerie gets home. The house is clean alright, and she has had a long day. Work, a few errands and she didn’t notice the time passing. She also forgot to but some items for cooking. She had some breakfast but that’s it and she is feeling too tired to cook. Who is available for a night out? She makes a few calls and requests an uber. The boys are meeting at the club and have ordered some choma. She ate choma again yesterday and the day before because that is what the boys were having (there was a different crowd each day) and she did not feel like cooking. She would die for a plate of fish in coconut sauce and some brown ugali but it will have to wait. Maybe tomorrow.

Pete and Valerie relish good food, and know what that tastes like. But they feel too lazy to make it for themselves and wish someone else could do it for them. Pete loves a clean house but the investment towards making that reality come true is one he finds too high to make. But there is a reason why charity begins at home. Even the Bible says it: love thy neighbor as you love yourself.

Looks like we all need an affair in life. If it will take us to the place we quietly desire in our hearts; if it causes good things to abound in our lives and brings out the best in us then I need one. I know this sounds wrong but that is the lie we have heard for so long it is time we put an end to it. We definitely all need to be in an affair.

Annie was in one. She was in love: not in love with a man (or a woman for that matter). Annie loved the most important person in her life: herself. She loves her good food and will go all out to enjoy a good meal. She loves a beautiful space and will go all out to make her home the best that she can. Annie has her cup full to overflowing with love and has some to spare. Pete and Valerie: well, their cups are empty and that emptiness is what they will transfer to others around them.

It is time we rise up and declare love to ourselves. I cannot be a last resort and expect to understand what it means to treat others well. I cannot fail to love what I see in the mirror and expect to love what I see in another’s face. I have to see the image and likeness of God in me first before I see it in another.

Make an affair with you something to count on. Enjoy describing yourself in kind words, admiring how you look and complementing yourself for the good you achieve. Then in equal measure go out and spread the love. Out of the fullness of the heart, let the mouth speak. I rest my case……..