Being a child was so much fun and at times I wish I never grew up. I know it sounds crazy but that’s how I feel right now. Whenever I look back and reminisce on those days, I wish I could sleep and wake up twenty years younger and relive the experiences of childhood even if it were just for one day. Adulthood and its huge share of responsibilities has a way of cutting out all the fun and when you look back for a second at all you had to forsake for the sake of growing up, you can’t but wince and sigh. That’s my story presently.
Why do I say this? I realize it’s been almost
a year since I last dropped a post on this blog. Talk about one hell of a
hiatus! What have I been doing all this while? The only answer I could think of
right now is that I was being a responsible man – a husband, a father, a C.E.O,
a church minister and so many other things all at the same time. I should also
mention that since my last post, I have become a father to another beautiful
baby girl. She’s going to be nine months old in a few days time. Talk about time’s flight.
At some point, I was beginning to think I
would never write anymore – really, I still feel that way. I’ve begun several
(emphasis on ‘several’) posts on my laptop in the last one year and after the
first five lines or the first paragraph, I would suddenly run out of steam and
stop. I’m actually hoping that doesn’t happen with this post as well. Of
course, the fact that you’re reading it shows that I made it this time and you
can’t imagine the extent of my elation on this singular achievement. Trust me; I
know what I mean here. Imagine a dancer suddenly losing his dancing skills or a
singer suddenly losing her voice; that’s how it has been for me in the last one
year. It just seemed as though things that used to be so easy to do became a bunch
of much hated chores.
What really happened to me? I still don’t
know. I’ve tried to blame this on my ‘huge chunk of responsibilities’ but then,
I ask myself: Am I the first person with these responsibilities? Of course not!
There are lots of people with much more on their plate and they still find time
to fulfill their passions. Writing used to be a passion – a big one at that –
for me but somehow, that passion has continued to slip away. As much as I try to
shake it off, the resultant feeling hurts. I want to go back to those wonderful
days again and perhaps, now is the time!
The spate of recent trekking embarked upon by a number of Nigerians for particular reasons got me thinking. Initially, I considered the idea as outright silly and stupid. For chrissakes, why go through the stress of trekking all the way from Lagos to Abuja to show your solidarity for a newly elected president? Why trek all the way from Abuja to Bayelsa to show your appreciation for a sitting president who simply conceded defeat in the polls? I believe there were numerous cases of trekkers all trying to outdo one another. I even heard of a newly wedded couple who embarked on another trek from Warri to Otuoke, Bayelsa and with their three-week old baby in tow. The entire initiative sounded ludicrous to me and I simply considered these people’s actions as baseless attempts to attract unnecessary attention to themselves and curry some executive favour. I actually began to write a post on it some weeks back but after the first paragraph . . . you know the rest.
Regardless of my lack of conviction or
appreciation of what these people decided to do, I have to admit that they did
something heroic. They all set out to do what a greater number of Nigerians
would not do. The underlying connection they all share is their resilience and
determination. They refused to pay any heed to the possibility that people like
me would laugh at them and consider them silly or crazy. Most certainly, they
got discouraged by people around them who said it was a pointless act but they
decided they would do it anyway. The first man who did the trekking perhaps was
the real hero amongst them all by virtue of his position in being the pioneer
of the scheme. The others who came after him would probably have been ridiculed
and labeled as desperate imitators or copycats and the likes but they simply
didn’t give a shit. They decided to go ahead anyways and I have to salute them
for that.
Getting my steam back is going to take a lot
of courage and determination. I would have to brush the dirt of my shoulders
and keep walking again. The more I sit back and look for excuses, the more time
keeps passing me by and in a flash; it would have been ten years since my last
post. I really wouldn’t want that for myself. I wouldn’t want to look back
sometime in the future and begin to smile and sigh as I remember ‘the good days
when I used to write’. I rather choose to look back then and remember the days
when I couldn’t write as well as I would be writing then. I want to look back
and remember days like this when it was hard to get back into the game but
still I did. That’s when I would be truly proud of myself. In spite of the
responsibilities and other things that seem to want to block out my original
passion, I choose to stick with that passion. Like Johnny Walker, I’m going to
keep walking! Or better still, I’ll keep trekking!
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