Since the dawn of time
men have strove to unmask the mystery of life. They’ve sought to understand it. To explain
why life is built the way it is. Why we grow old. Why we die. Why we dance to
music (isn’t this one odd?)…They’ve gazed into the sky to find answers. They’ve
stood on shores and cast their eyes into the sea and wondered what lies beyond
the enormous mass of water. They’ve taken voyages to find out. But they’ve mostly
wound up without answers – convincing answers. That notwithstanding, the make-up of life - that very thing they’ve sought to break down and
muster - has remained largely intact, unaltered by their scalpels.
People still love, laugh, feel pain, forget today as they did nine, ten thousand
years ago. Life’s very much like a piece of music which goes on being played forever.
Instruments wear out, and the players too, but the notes remain as they were.
People have come at
different times who have taken a serious stab at figuring it out. Serious minds. People who’ve thought they’ve laid it bare, found the Holy Grail. Philosophers and
priests, poets, rulers, mathematicians... They’ve yapped and left, all of them. But life has remained unmoved.
Then there’s that faceless, uncelebrated guy (must have been a peasant) who sat quietly in
the back through all this hankering, listening to these famed men argue their theses
aloud, about who really got it figured. I imagine he
must have been sitting atop a rock, this guy, silently following the
proceedings. And at some point he must have climbed down the rock and stepped
into the open area, nervous somewhat, as peasants are wont to be in the
presence of important people. He must have waited for the chatter to hush
before he raised a finger and said, “Gentlemen, life is a revolving door!” And there must have been stiff silence. And shock in
people’s faces; they must have thought him a fraud. In a sense he was; he had
stolen the ground from under their feet and moved it. For me, a man had finally come who had
explained life simply. In a way that I saw reflected in things around me.
You notice that there’s a
certain pattern to things, almost a scary one at times. Something starts out
and you can tell how it’s going to pan out – every bit – based, perhaps, on
something else you’d witnessed six thousand miles away thirty seven years ago.
You think there’s too much distance packed in between the two events to even
imagine they’d run the same course. But they do. Other times it seems as if
something is gone; done with, forgotten…only for it to make a turn and come back around and sneak on you around the next
bend. And you feel like you’ve seen it before, somewhere. It’s familiar, like a
friend, when it unfolds. Déjà vu. That scares the bravest of us; it’s creepy.
Now, if you think am into
anything grand here, just get off the boat right now because you’ll be
disappointed. Am headed nowhere particular with this. Am just gonna yap, and
waste your time, and sip tea that the lovely amiga gave me till I fall asleep, but…Wait!
Before you step out I’ll tell you a little personal story.
Take a step back in time
with me to high school. Am a mono, okay? Almost 15. First time away from home
for an extended period of time. So naturally, a heady time for me. Am kicking it, eyes
closed. But there’s a minor problem. There are bullies in town and they’re
wringing all fun out of my life. I’ll skip their part because I think they
are cowards. They think they are the shit; I think they are shit. Scumbags in
uniform. They are bigger kids than I am, so I figure I cannot take them down in
a fist fight…but I have to find a way to cope. So time goes by and I develop a
killer bully-ward off strategy. It’s a science, I tell you. Revolutionary, by
all standards.
I learn to be quick with the
mouth. I teach my mouth to run. I practice insults in front of the mirror. No
kidding. I compose and rehearse insults just in case I need to use them in the
spur of the moment. I say no to being caught flat-footed by a bully and with not
so much as a word to yell to shield my ego or a stone to throw back to ward him
off. I become quite the comeback master. What I do is I size you up in a split
second and while your mind is still buffering at 40% trying to figure out what
am up to, booom…I drop the heaviest expletive I can get my hands on right in
your face, aloud. The sort that not only leaves you embarrassed but also leaves
a big crater in your soul, if you have one (which I doubt many bullies do). I
let that crater fill slowly with bitterness. It works. And in case you are wondering,
here’s how to build your arsenal: try random pejorative adjective-noun
combinations from the thesaurus when you have nothing to do. Try stuff like
‘insouciant scumbag’, ‘incorrigible creep’, ‘flea-bitten hyena’, ‘nonsensical
ragamuffin’ blah blah. Try some in the language you are most at ease in. Keep
it real.
Remember, though, that that’s
not all you need to know. This baby is for the bullies at school only. Do not
take it to the streets. I repeat: do not take it to the streets yooo (heheh I've always wanted to say that)…because the street is
a different kettle of fish, with its own rules. With no rules, actually. The
street can be crude and primal. It can be down dirty, as I later learn.
So schools close and we are
at the stadium watching a football game. Two friends and I. They are stark
raving mad about the game. Very loud and hilarious. There’s song and dance. Not
far from our terrace is a choir that sometimes sings dirty songs, songs that
can make a truck driver blush. And that choir gets filthy when they want. There
is a guy seated on the upper row who, when a girl with a big behind passes,
composes a hilarious on-the-spot song in praise of the said girl’s assets. His
lyrics are so funny everyone bursts our laughing, including the girl in
question. Right behind me is a guy with a vuvuzela who for some reason insists
on blowing it right next to my ear. You know how loud the damn thing can be,
right? I feel like my eardrum is about to split. My liver quivers when he
blares it but I can’t move; the place is so packed. But this is not the place
to complain, though; nobody gives a hoot here. I know it. I try diplomacy. I
turn and tell the guy to go slow on the vuvuzela, or point it sky-ward when he
blows it to which he looks at me like I just stole his mother’s pawpaw, and
yells something, and a buddy of his quips that I should have known that this is
not a church young boy! A few minutes
later something blares so loud in my ear I turn without thinking and drop one
of my many verbal bombs in the guy’s face. I don’t know whether he lets the
insult land or not, but so soon after the words leave my mouth, I feel
something heavy land on my skull with a thud. The impact clouds my head and I
feel my skull shake on its hinges. Like a wreckage. I didn’t see it but I think
it’s a stone. Am wrong; it’s ngoto –
fingers folded into a fist and the knuckles knocked hard against the head.
I play that scene in slow motion sometimes in my head
when am alone. And I feel that excruciating pain each time.
[Fast forward to March, 2014]
I’ve stopped by a mall to
buy something. It’s a Saturday afternoon and kids are milling all over the
shopping complex. I still don’t get it why all the fascination for kids with
malls… but I can’t complain, if it floats their boats, if it makes them happy. Plus
it’s their day off from school, c’mon Sani!
So, I’ve grabbed what I
came for and am walking back to the car so I can head out. I hear someone say,
“Hey man please leave me alone,” A kid’s voice. I turn to look, and a few
meters away is this kid sitting on a bench with his friend. Well, I assume it’s
his friend. They could be twelve or thirteen. There are three boys standing
behind them, older boys. They seem to be taunting them, from what I can tell.
One of the older boys is poking the back of the head of one of the younger boys
sitting on the bench with the pointed tip of a funnel fashioned out of paper,
and saying something that I can’t quite hear. But the victim is pleading to be
left alone. I get the feeling that I know what’s going to happen next, and
next, and next. I have seen it before,
I tell myself.
At some point, the young
guy being taunted turns, out of frustration, I think, and hurls an abuse at the
bully…and I find myself whispering under my breath, “Cover your head bro! Cover
your head, quick!” But of course all that falls at my feet. The helpless victim
has no clue what’s about to happen. He’s sitting there exposed and shit. And
then it does. And I feel the pain, once again - the thud, the wreckage, the
clouded sight. I yell something to scare the boys away. They take off but am
still reeling from that thud, the heaviness of it. That young man on that bench
is living my life. Maybe he is me. And I him. And I had just stood there and
watched an older boy taunt him…Sorry, taunt me.
When I walk away - to the car - I feel like am walking
away from myself.
