a cooking pot and twisted tales
Thoughts and Tales…A Lifestyle Blog with a Zing.
Should I fail to say these words
That are etched upon my soul,
If I should fail to give voice
To the thoughts that wrangle for space within my head,
If I should fail to give birth to the dreams, in streams of eloquent consciousness
That run after me,
I would have died a thousand deaths.
I would meld within me,
And evaporate to nothingness.
I would implode.
An empty carcass of being.
Leaving nothing behind,
For you to feel me.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
One can choose to rise above adversity or make excuses for the rest of their lives We live our best lives now because we are not guaranteed tomorrow.
One of my best moments of the day is when I settle down to surf the internet. It’s a daily routine I enjoy. My companion for this daily act is always my favorite cup of tea. It keeps me warm, especially now when the cold is gathering momentum, making me reach for warmth wrapped tightly in woolen clothes.
I tell you, the thoughts of stepping outside at this time sends cold shivers all over me. It’s no longer news that I dread this harsh winter. However, it has become a necessary evil to live with so I should just learn to love it or pretend to love it, at least. But I do love the fact that it forces me to stay indoors and connect with my home and inner self. I guess I should stop this nagging or whinning, right? Haha!
Yesterday, while observing this ritual of connecting with…
View original post 420 more words
The tiny cry is simply magical.
The best sound that she’s ever heard.
For sixteen years she waited in the Lords chambers, until her faith had virtually shriveled to nothing.
Raising her tired arms, she holds them out for her brand new bundle of love.
At last, when she no longer expected it, fate chose to visit her in Wintertime.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
Image credit: Pinterest.
Sometimes, I read the news online as I work, just to keep abreast with what goes on in the larger World that I am part of.
Occasionally, you stumble across good news but 98% of the time, the rest of the news are the heaps of rubble of wicked acts perpetrated by mankind.
Why would a man kill his own little son to accommodate the whims of his teenage girlfriend 
?
Why not return this child to his mother or better still send him to CPS or whatever welfare around him that would accept the boy if he had no other choice and didn’t want him any longer?
How heartless can a human be to snuff the life out of a young innocent being?
I guess he will claim temporary insanity, when the poor little, trusting boy didn’t get the opportunity to claim anything.
It is so sad to see so many people out there seeking the fruit of the womb, seeking for just one child to call their own and some undeserving human gets to kill the one that they have been blessed with.
Now, I hope his teenage sweetheart is happy and they should be hanging together for the rest of their days behind bars? Such people are even a waste of space and taxpayers funds.
Such news leaves me feeling ill about humanity.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
The Daily Post Prompt Ripped into the headline.
Write about something that happened over the weekend as though it’s the top story on your local paper.
I am late for this party, the great book of lists challenge, considering that I re-blogged the post and was all excited. Somehow, I failed to start off last week.
However, I am still going to gate crash and hope that La Duchesse Derat won’t throw me out without as much as a mince pie and a glass of warm drink.
![1452772090288[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14527720902881.jpg)
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
Our sense of not feeling lost comes from our deep sentiments to have value and common acceptance as an individual. Nothing validates us like a sense of belonging; of being part of a bigger unit.
As humans, we all have this desire and craving for the care or that sense of feeling cared for, which when we receive it, nurtures our intrinsic being.
Knowing that I can come here and write without giving thought to prejudice, but to being myself, leaves me with warm fuzzy feeling. That I can traipse around and blog hop to visit others and later return to my own little domain to find little sticky notes all over the door of my blog, makes me realize that I have found my tribe.
Naturally, we all have tribes that we are born into by virtue of genetic pool and geographical placements.
Then, we have tribes that our driving passion, needs and experiences makes us seek out.
Blogging cum Writing is such a tribe. A unique, wholesome, heartwarming, dynamic tribe where even the most flagging of hearts can be revived and get a boost if they should keep an open mind, heart and seek out the welcoming hands within this tribe of ours.
As is normal, even in nuclear families, you will find those that do not particularly agree with each other, but like every symbiotic existence, we still need each other in order to thrive.
Therefore, for me to be, we all have to be. I am because we all are, irrespective of our differences, in brotherhood, we stand.
Let me leave you with a couple of African proverbs to ruminate on:
‘A bundle of firewood cannot be fastened with one hand.’ In essence, you cannot go the journey all by yourself. You look up to others for support, to teach you the way and to benefit of their experience.
‘A single tree cannot make a forest.’
‘A single string of bead can never jingle.’
My appreciations go to Random Ramblings who invited me a while ago to take part in the 3 days, 3 quotes challenge. My posting calendar has been a bit hectic hence the delay.
I would like to invite these following bloggers to participate in the challenge.
The rules are:
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
![1452754983970[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14527549839701.jpg)
![1452754850187[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14527548501871.jpg)
![1452755227962[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14527552279621.jpg)
On Thursday’s, I share a picture about ‘Echos of my Neighbourhood.’
I would like to invite you to participate. The challenge is quite simple.
Every Thursday, share a photo of bits and pieces of wherever you are at any point in time. It could be houses, backgrounds of your neighbourhood, activities and so forth and you can tag it Echos of my Neighbourhood, add my link to your post so that I will get the ping from your post.
Every other Thursday, I will publish a post with the links of all those who participated the previous week.
This is just a fun way of getting to see more of the World around us through your eyes, since we cannot all be at those places, we can at least see them through you.
I look forward to seeing your pictures.
Best regards,
Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
At night, when these skyscrapers come alive with the twinkle of their lights, I simply let my mind absorb it’s beauty and roam free. I think of all the humans contained within. The Good, The Bad, The Ugly and The Downright Dodgy.
![1452704405830[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14527044058301.jpg)
![1452754697430[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14527546974301.jpg?w=663)
Last Week Thursday, Echoes received a decent number of entries from these awesome bloggers below and I encourage you to take a quick sneak peek.
From Kat Myrman’s glimpse of her hometown, we see Dr. Pepper bringing the Superheros to town.
Oba’s shot of Lagos ‘Okada’ had me thinking of my Lasgidi home.
Pancake Bunnykins glimpse of the beautiful Suriname River behind Zorg Hospital makes you think it’s more like a hotel.
Never a dull bling shows us some insights of her work neighbourhood and that very cute live bunny.
There is definitely something stunning about black and white pictures and Tildy of Beespeak shows us snippets of her neighbourhood in black and white.
Spiritual Journeys queer tree deceives the eyes.
Now, let’s see yours.
Super powers are certainly lovely to have, if such possibilities exist, however, I doubt very much if I can have those kind of super powers that would make me appear and disappear at will, besides, I am not sure I am keen on the connotation that this power might be used for negative endeavours.![1452698473919[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14526984739191.jpg)
I think I am far too gregarious to appear and disappear. In my language, my mother would call me “the one person, who is welcomed like a crowd of multiple people,” and my love for life around me, almost makes it impossible for me to sneak around.
Even if I had the luck to possess such skills, my reverberating energy would definitely alert those that I am trying to hide or seek from.
That said, I do think it would be lovely to possess the super-powers of a very convincing tongue; so that when I get to sit down with an agent/publisher, I would look them straight in the eyes, wearing my heart on my sleeves, I would tell them my writing thoughts and they would simply nod and nod.
They will have an auction war over my works and sign a fat check, sending me on my merry way to go and hammer out some more words. That’s my dream of super right now.
If I had the wings of a cooing dove,
Soft and gentle I will perch on your cove,
I will coo into your listening ears,
Understanding your sighs and your tears.
If I had the sweet tweet of a Nightingale,
Enthralled would you be with my tales,
You will let me out of my cage,
So that I may soar through the glades,
Tweeting high and free in the blue skies landscape.
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
The Daily Post Prompt Now You See Me, Now You Don’t.
You have a secret superpower: the ability to appear and disappear at will. When and where will you use this new superpower? Tell us a story.
Life brings friends our way who turn out to become our families in almost every sense of the word and I am particularly grateful for such a friend as my dear good friend Mrs. Ekaete Augustine-Edet. ![1452678658237[1]](https://acookingpotandtwistedtales.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/14526786582371.jpg)
We have journeyed together from our days as single ladies working at the French Embassy, Lagos Nigeria almost two decades ago, to today as mothers and wives and she has remained such a steadfast friend, sister and motivator.
She is one of the driving forces behind my starting my blog, because she believes in me and my writing skills. She kept asking me when I would start my blog, until I got started.
She is there anytime I call with a need or something on my mind. I had reason to make such a call and as usual she selflessly gave of herself, her time and her pocket.
I thank God for a friend like you and really don’t have much words to appreciate your kindness.
On another hand, I have been blessed with running into interesting characters since last week.
Two lovely neighbourhood dogs, Lola and Cookie and Meow, The cat seem to have adopted me for reasons best known to them, though I do stop to say hello to the cute dogs when I am taking my walk and they are out and about.
Meow is a lone ranger, but always appears by the chair where I sit sometimes to watch the World go by and he rubs himself on my pants legs seeking attention.
I am more a dog person and not particularly a cat person but strangely, this would be the third encounter where different neighbourhood felines come up to say hello.
Since I don’t know much about felines, maybe those who do can tell me what this indicates.
I am grateful for little meaningless moments like this. They end up meaning a lot when we appreciate them and each moment that I spend in a state of gratitude, the phrase that the best things in life are for free couldn’t be more true than it is.
There is so much to be thankful for. Just look around and you will see.
You can join Colline’s or Maria Jansson‘s gratitude challenge platforms
Regards and blessings
© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha
a cooking pot and twisted tales 