TOO HUMAN TO SUBMIT

HE created everything
I know HE sees all things
All HE asks of me is that I submit totally,
so HE can give me all that I desire to live happily
But oh no, I am sure He asks too much of me,
How on earth should I be expected to just leave things be
When I can contribute to my own paintings?
Oh no, I’ve got to help myself I can’t just do nothing!
I know, I know, I am expected to surrender
While HE takes charge and make my life a wonder
Being me, I couldn’t help but fight HIM every step of the way
Wondering how HE could be so slow and expect me to wait
HE has fought my battles I realise, with the benefit of hindsight
I know HE has foresight, hindsight and all sights
I just wish HE would not expect so much of me!
Expecting me to submit totally is such a heavy burden!

ÓAdenike Abimbola Oyalowo
10082010

OWHIESKY

I heard a joke today on my way to court and I feel it will be criminal for me not to share it with y'all. The joke was about a girl who was meeting her boyfriend's family for the first time. The girl was nervous, not sure exactly how to behave in front of her potential parents-in-law. To make matters worse for this girl, she started having the kind of discomfort can sometimes be brought on by eating too rich food that sometimes do not agree with the system. And so it was that the girl (Jane) let out (inadvertently), a faint sounding fart. The boyfriend's father after the fart looked towards their dog under the dining table and shouted "Owhiesky". Jane heard this and smiled in relief and so when nature came calling the second time, she did not bother to muffle the sound and the boyfriend's father again looked towards the dog and shouted "Owhiesky". Jane again did not bother to hide or muffle the sound of yet a third fart when it beckoned, and this time, the boyfriend's father shouted 'OWHIESKY, WILL YOU GET AWAY FROM THERE BEFORE THAT GIRL MISTAKENLY DEFECATES ON YOU?'

I couldn't resist bursting into loud laughter when I heard that joke this morning, and it reminded me of a quote by Robert Bloch which goes:

A man who smiles when things go wrong has thought of someone else to blame.
Surely, Jane would not have comfortably continue letting out fart after farts if she did not think the poor innocent girl nestling under feet was a convenient fall guy, well, fall dog if you like.

Those Little Things!

Someone shared a link on Facebook yesterday. The link was about a man who had made up his mind to divorce his wife but who accepted his wife's conditions that he put the divorce on hold for a month for the sake of their son who was to write his exams at about then and also that the husband carry her out of the house the way he had when they newly got married. The husband accepted the conditions thinking nothing would change his mind as he had found love in the arms of another woman. To his surprise however, carrying his wife of ten years out every morning for the 30 days made him to start paying attention to those things that he had long closed his mind to, and he discovered that he loved his wife still. Though he resolved that he would not go ahead with the divorce, his wife eventually died of some sort of cancer just at the end of the 30 days period.

My focus here is not on the death of the wife and the guilt the husband would have felt had he not resolved not to go ahead with the divorce, rather, it is on the fact that the time in close proximity that the couple had to spend together made the man realise that the love he thought was gone from his marriage was still very much alive. Reading that story, I could not help but be amazed at how seemingly little things could destroy major things in our lives. A lot of us for instance, tend to take our partners for granted once we feel that our feet are now firmly grounded in the relationship/marriage, we expect our partners to understand when we fail or neglect to create chance to spend real quality time together. Of course we always have 'valid' excuses why we can't find that time to spend together; the men have to work very hard to make the money for the family to live a good life, the woman also probably has to be more up and doing in order not to be part of the load that her office will shed in this time of economic difficulty and on and on the excuses can pile.

The major suspects in marriage/relationship break-ups usually include lack of trust on the part of one or both of the partners,actual (and sometimes imagined) infidelity, lack of communication etc. However, little things that we do not often suspect also wreak havoc on marriages and relationships and cause sometimes lasting damage to a relationship that has taken years to form. Like the man in the story, we may need to ask ourselves when we last took a really good look at our partner. The man in the story had not really looked at his wife in a long time and that was why he never noticed that she was suffering from cancer and was in fact dying. We may also need to remind ourselves of the original qualities that attracted us to each other and whether those qualities are still there, hibernating or can be rekindled.

About two years ago, a lady came to me that she wanted a divorce from her husband and she wanted the paper filed before November 11 of that year. I was of course puzzled by the mention of that specific date and inquired why that date. She replied that the day was supposed to be her third wedding anniversary! Now, November eleven happens to be my birth date and I frown seriously at anything untoward happening on that day. And so I decided to become an emergency counselor, preaching and pleading that she hold on and see whether things could not be salvaged. Fortunately for me (and of course she and her husband), other people also intervened and she and her husband decided to have another try at making things work. And guess what, things started to work! Now she has had another baby and she could not contain her excitement when she was telling me about it on phone. I was also very happy for both of them and thankful that they both decided to make things work again. I often wonder how many marriages could be saved by the couples trying just that much harder to see things work? When was the last time we reminded our partners of how much we value their presence in our lives?

Don Marshall once said Love is like a muscle, it needs constant exercise or else it loses its strength. How many of us still exercise our muscle so that it responds to us every single time we need it to? With the spate of divorce and break-ups and separations all around, you'll be surprised at how amazingly few the number will be. I was shocked when I read the recent report of Al and Tipper Gore's break up of their 30 year-old marriage. After staying together for 30 whole years, I wondered what really could have gone wrong.

Well, it should not be too surprising if it just happens to be those seemingly little things that are often overlooked and yet contribute in making marriages and relationships so much more pleasant and enjoyable.

Not So Gloomy!

Anybody familiar with the attitude of workers in any government-owned establishment towards their work and people who conduct one form of transaction or the other with them will readily agree that the attitude of the workers are usually one of people not obliged to do the work for which they are paid. Not only will they not do their work unless you soak their palms "with grease" they also are usually very rude to boot. My pleasant surprise can only then be better imagined on tuesday the 22nd June when things appeared quite different at the Ikoyi branch of the Nigerian Immigration Service (Passport) office when I went to take my picture for the new e-passport.

By the time I got there shortly after 8 a.m., the officials had started calling names of those of us who had appointment to take pictures for that day and everything was done in such an orderly manner that I had to remind myself that this is actually Nigeria! To add to the pleasantness of my experience, I was supposed to be in court that morning and time was already galloping very fast against me moreso because the particular court I was supposed to be in sits very promptly at 9 a.m.! I was thus forced to approach one of the officials to explain the dilemma I was in and see if something could be done to speed up the process for me or if I could reschedule my picture-taking for the following day.

The official I went to meet was really quite friendly and he directed me to a superior officer who also to my pleasant surprise was really quite friendly and because of his help, I was able to finsh with all the processing at shortly after 9 a.m. Perhaps what impressed me more was the fact that all the officials I came into contact with on that day were friendly and polite. They did their work well and organised the whole place in such a way as to foster orderliness.

With my experience at the Ikoyi passport office, I couldn't help but nurse the hope that things might get better yet in ths country, you can call me naive or whatever else you choose to, but I think it is a hope worth nursing!

SUPER EAGLES HERO

My brother told me a joke he heard yesterday about the performance of Nigeria's Super Eagles at the ongoing world cup in South Africa and it went like this in an exchange between a young student and his teacher:

TEACHER: Who is your hero? is it your father?
PUPIL: No, my father is not my hero because he beats me.
TEACHER: Is your hero your mother then?
PUPIL: No, my mother is not my hero because she also beats me
TEACHER: who then is your hero?
PUPIL: My heroes are the Super Eagles of Nigeria because they can't beat anybody.

I think that was really funny! While it may not altogether be true that the Super Eagles cannot beat anybody, it sure was true of their World cup performance because they couldn't beat anybody!

I did it again!

I have two immediate problems as it concerns my blogging folks, I don't know if anybody can come to my rescue, I seem to be suffering from two diseases; intellelazigintis and longstorigintis!

While the first disease is one I've been aware of for some time, I'm almost shocked at the second disease! Ok, ok I know I need to break down what each of those diseases really are. Intellelazigintis, as you good and intelligent folks might have guessed by now, is a condition of being intellectually lazy and not doing enough to challenge one's intellect. It's partly the reason why I had to start this blog. No doubt, having a blog has helped me, indeed, forced me to sometimes challenge my intellect and put something on paper (or is it computer?), but my good people, I'm very much aware that this intellectual laziness of mine persists even as I force myself to type out these words and report myself to yáll. .

Now while the first disease is one which I'd been aware of and had to start this blog to see if I could thereby cure, the second disease is one which this blog has exposed to me and you can bet I'm not finding it funny at all! Longstorigintis my good people is a condition which makes it almost imossible for a person to be able to write a brief story or aticle. I would never in a million years have thought myself capable of contracting this disease if not this blog and the notes I was writing on FB.

I had always prided myself on being a master at brevity in writing. One year in my first university, six years in UI and another year at the Law school during which periods I never once exhausted my answer booklet convinced me that I could not write a long story if my life depended on it. Boy!, how wrong can a person be! Since writing on my blog and the notes ob FB, i'm yet to succeed at writing a short article. I have tried and I have been failing! I will however refuse to give up, because only if I do will I have truly failed. I shall succeed yet! You just watch folks.

OMG! I just did it again!

My Best Friend: 16 years today

16th day of June 1994 was supposed to have been a reasonably happy day for me- it was my matriculation day at the first university I attended before I eventually found my way to the premier university in Nigeria. Indeed, the day started fairly happily enough, I had no inkling at all that the day would end with me almost drowning in a river of my own tears.

My mum came for my matriculation with the news that I had to follow her and my aunt that came with her back to Lagos as my dad's illness had taken a turn for the worse. Even at that time, it did not occur to me that my dad would have given up before we got to Lagos or that it was time yet for him to die.

I had always prided myself as being one tough gal, at those times with little to do and with the mind free to roam about, I had always asked my self what my reaction would be if one of my parents were to die and I had always assured myself each time that tears would not be part of the whatever feeling might overcome me.

As it happened, I couldnt have been more wrong! I was incnosolable, I tried but failed woefully to stop the tears from flowing (torrentially too!). And for the following two months or so, I could not tell anybody about my father's death without opening another flood gate of tears that stubbornly refused to stop!

Today the 16th June 2010 marks the 16th anniversary of one man I loved dearly, a man who truly left crystal clear imprint in the lives of his children and those he came across. He had his faults like all normal humans sure, but 16 yrs on, I remind myself now more than ever when it's so easy to fall by the wayside and join the bandwagon of a society fast losing its values, that I have to remember that I am my father's daughter and should not be (whether caught or not) doing things just because it's the vogue or it's what people do, knowing very well that a purported short cut usually end up lengthening the journey even more.

I sorely miss you daddy! I pray that God almighty grants you eternal rest and forgive all your sins. sleep well daddy, I promise I will try my best to not do things that will bring disappointment to you.