EXPERIENCING LIFE

ONCE YOUNG, THEN OLD.

( A COMPELLING STORY ABOUT LIFE – 10MINS READ).

A newborn kid goat was frolicking in the green grass watched by Mama goat in admiration. He looked fabulous in his mint white coat. His little black hooves contrasted well with the greenery of the meadow. He was thrilled, jumping and prancing about, discovering life. 

“This is good he said to himself. Life is full of treasures. I am so glad I was born in this beautiful place”.

It raced around leaping over some fallen logs until it got exhausted and ran back to Mama Goat who nuzzled it closer while showering it with love.

While this was going on, a silent observer was taking note.

The observer, known to the villagers as Old Soldier, was a mysterious figure in the small village. He had lived there for as long as anyone could remember, always lurking in the background, silently observing the events that unfolded before him and taking notes as usual. No one ever saw what he wrote in those notes though many were curious to find out what he always jotted down.

Old Soldier had seen it all before – the grim realities of life. The struggles and troubles that the innocent and naive among the living would experience cum the joy and riches the patient and wise will benefit. He knew what war was all about and treasured what peace could give. He was knowledgeable enough to caution and to impart wisdom to many but kept much of what he knew to himself because the world, was no longer what it used to be. People have become feeble. Emotions ruled over reason in their lives. You could end up in jail if you made anyone including a kid goat sad or cry.                   

“This kid goat doesn’t know the life it has come into. He’ll find out pretty soon. It was only a matter of when, not if” he said to himself. 

After adjusting his weather-beaten army beret, he stroked his grey beard with a withered hand as he walked away. The tap, tap, tap of his walking stick resonated through the sandy footpath, carving a faint record of his thoughts onto the sands of time for such a time to come.

A week later, Old Soldier was back at his duty post in the field of life. The time had truly come. While observing and writing as usual, he saw Mama Goat with its offspring in the company of a herd of goats. The kid goat was not prancing and playing around this time. He stuck close to his Mama walking and limping painfully. 

Something had happened. One of his hind legs appeared to be broken and was decaying. It was clear he would no longer run or prance around like before ever again. Worse he may not be able to sire an offspring as he no longer had complete hind legs to stand upon to facilitate the rigors of mating. Neither would kid goat ever become a leader in the herd as the ability to fight or assert himself is now badly hampered. Within a week, he had experienced life. 

The thing that killed the ostrich, has taken its eggs too.

In despair, Old Soldier looked up to heaven, sighed then looked down and, a lone tear made its signature roll down his wrinkling face. Memories of the pains he experienced in life and the trauma of the wounded during and after the war came flooding back. A lot of his friends and family members were no more. He was living with PTSD and there was no therapy available in the village. That was why he took notes. He wrote down positive things about all the negative things he saw in life. You should too. It’s called positive journaling. Old Soldier had a happy ending for every sorrow he witnessed. His notes would never be published. But he kept it going for therapeutic reasons. He once tried drinking to deal with his PTSD. But like every drunkard soon realizes, the sorrows and the ghosts of the past flooded back when he awoke from his drunken stupor.

“Why, why” he asked himself a rhetorical question. “He is just a kid goat barely a week old”. 

Once again, the tree that does not know how to dance, or learn to bend has been taught by the violent winds.

This world is like a well-cooked bitter-leaf soup. Bittersweet taste it gives to its eater. 

A sad and joyful world full of ironies. Where some laugh others are crying. Some are born, while others are dying. Some are promoted at work, some just got the pink slip.

It’s a market where we all come to trade. Some make a profit, while many end up with losses.   Its not all the monkeys that jumped into the grains farm that will come out satisfied. 

Life did not spare a kid goat. 

Life is likened to a cane. 

It flogs one when it bends forward making fools laugh at the pain of the afflicted. Then it bends backward to flog the mocking fools. The person wielding the cane also at other times gets flogged by his cane. Life is a bundle of ironies and contradictions.

Reminiscing, Old Soldier thought of his youthful days.                         I was young, full of energy, and zest. I ran, swam, jumped, and had the loudest shout amongst my mates. No matter where you were, if I hollered, you heard it. Mama loved that loud booming voice. So when she wanted everyone home from the neighborhood or farm, you know who would be given the task. This voice served me well in the army as a platoon leader, but that’s not why we are reading this.

As a young person growing up, I soon got tired of being young. Youth was fun, but they owned no cars. They had to wait for their turn to get pieces of meat from Mama while watching Papa eat the choicest piece leaving the remains for whosoever was smart and fast enough to grab the plate. The old could drive to the bars and order pepper soup at will. They always had money to buy or build a house and whenever they wished they would travel by air, land, or sea. They bought the latest phone for themselves and bought plastic phones for us thinking we were so stupid and wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. 

They don’t need to go to school and read boring books nor were they flogged on the assembly line or classroom for noise making when they weren’t part of the noise makers. The worst part was we always had on Monday, Maths followed by physics then geography my most hated subject in the morning. Those teachers collaborated with the school to make my life boring he reminisced. 

Besides, why didn’t our parents continue schooling if school was exciting? They could try wearing the oversized school uniforms they said looked good on us for a change. I was the butt of everyone’s joke, and I ended up with the nickname ‘Baggies’ because of my oversized knickers. Mama who slim-fitted all her clothes said it was great on me but my friends thought otherwise. I couldn’t work up enough nerve to let her know she was deceiving me, so endurance saw me through those years of mockery.

No one gave adults curfews and they got married doing what grown-ups do. 

“I wish I could grow up now and marry Bimbo the girl of my fancy instead of waiting to grow up later”. 

Adults stayed up late watching movies but we were to go to bed after sundown. How unfair?  We protested to no avail that we wanted to watch and enjoy what they were watching with them. Adulthood is enjoyable, I swear on my cornflakes. Anyway, when we eventually slept, the same people who made us sleep with our distended bellies like that of a frog full of what Mama forced us to eat and finish, rudely woke us up at dawn when the sleep was the sweetest. I love Mama, don’t get me wrong, but I hated it when she said “Finish your beans”. I never loved beans. I don’t know why it was created. Oh, how I wish this world was all grilled peppered meat and fried rice. What a great world it would be.

That was why I longed to be grown up when no one would tell me to eat beans ever again. Don’t tell me it’s proteinous. Is that the only source of protein? She never knew of the experiences we had when we slept.  You need to come to the boy’s room at night. The gasses my brother and I eliminated to ease the pressure in our distended rotund bellies were concentrated enough to fly a rocket to the moon and back. Just when you were enjoying the sleep after the beans were finally gassed out, that pesky cock crowed at dawn and Mama was back again. “

“Get up and get dressed the school bus would soon be here”.

 Why do they make us sleep and then force us to wake up again? You see now why I have to grow up fast.

Soon, the weeks became months, and the months morphed into years. Finally, I got what I always wanted. It crept up on me like a thief in the night. I was here, grown up and free at last from the limitations of being a youth. I am now an adult. Let the long-awaited benefits rain upon me. 

So I made a beeline straight to Bimbo. We all knew this was coming. 

But she would have none of it. She said I was below her class. My heart is broken. Life is cruel. She was one reason I joined the army and they shipped me out of the city, which was good for me because I couldn’t bear the pain, knowing she was no longer mine.

My crush crushed me and left me irreparably damaged. I made a big space for her in my heart. Guarded it for years while waiting for us to grow up. What we promised each other at the playground I kept, she ignored.                                                                                                

When you dig a hole in the sand and then try to fill it up again, you can never use the same amount of sand you dug out.

So she married the pimpled rich kid and I married my uniform. It’s why I have no kids and never married anyone else. 

Life is not all whistles and bells. You need to learn to convert disappointment into insight especially when long-held hopes end up as useless mirages or seeking the horizon.

Anyway, I don’t like being an adult without her. I need to return to being a youth when we both played in the sand and class and race didn’t matter. We had time to go on adventures and had fun just chilling out.

Being a grown-up is like a never-ending cycle of responsibilities. You have to attend meetings where everybody looks serious. Why look so serious after all you are just talking to another human being. You have to make decisions that may have long-term consequences. You have to pay for things or owe debts. As a kid, you got everything free. The worst is you have to work. Why work when you can play? To what benefit is work life? After all the stress and anxiety you get sacked, or get old and eventually kick the bucket, leaving everything for those who didn’t help buy the bucket.

Adulthood is a scam. Don’t fall for that lie. 

Babyhood is magical. Everyone loves you and kisses you though I wish they didn’t pull my cheeks so hard looking goofy saying “Fine baby”. Why do adults pull our baby cheeks? 

Adults have money but never have time to enjoy it.

They don’t even believe in fairies and Santa Claus. The kids know that there is a golden pot at the end of the rainbow where leprechauns hide their stash of gold. Tell that to an adult and they scoff at the thought. They live their lives complaining they don’t have money, but there is money in the world of imagination. Just make a wish and the genie will get you what you need if you are too lazy to go after the gold at the end of the rainbow. In the world of imagination, the tooth fairy can put money under your pillow. Adults just don’t get it. There are castles and flying horses there. There are pink cows and friendly little men. Adults don’t know Cinderella and Pinocchio are real.  In the imaginary world, the rain can be ice-creams. Adults are too serious. They need to laugh a little bit more. They need Tom and Jerry but they choose to watch the boring news all the time. No wonder they get sad and cranky screaming at the kids all because they don’t know how to be happy. We could teach them a thing or two. But would they ever learn or change? 

The wisdom of the old straightens the confusion of the young. The old know so much but their physical limitations prevent them from venturing far. The years make them rigid, out of touch at times and resistant to change. 

The burden of the old is the regrets they harbor. There are too many should haves and could haves. If I knew back then what I know now is a common refrain we hear from the aged. If only I understood the what, when, why, and how. 

Alas, life is a river. It flows and never looks back. 

The young are filled with boundless energy and curiosity. Their hearts are full of wonder. They travel to distant destinations to enjoy life and blend with diverse cultures. 

However, their lack of life experiences and exposure makes them unaware of the world’s troubles and complexities which the kid goat learned too late. 

Being young is synonymous with adaptability, innovativeness, and open-mindedness. The youth of today know more than their fathers because of fast-moving technological advances. They are at the forefront of driving change, embracing new ideas, and shaping the future. However, though the youth excel in digital literacy, the elders offer timeless insights that enriches the whole society. Their wisdom and guidance can help the youth navigate challenges, make informed decisions, and understand the complicatedness of life. 

So which is better? Young or Old? This is the parable of life. 

It’s all a dance between ages in the ballroom called life. The sunrise is beautiful. The sunset is awesome—both matter. Old is yesterday. Young is today. There is no today without yesterday. Once I was an unripe fruit, full of future and potential waiting for my inner colors to emerge. Now I am a sweet wine, golden and full of nostalgic melodious harmonies indebted to the youth I was yesterday. The challenges and victories of my formative years made me become the best version of myself today. Every mistake, every triumph was like an anvil in the hand of a skilled blacksmith skillfully shaping me into the wise old man I have become. 

At a time, being old was associated with wisdom and experience, but now it’s often equated with being out of touch. The truth be told, without youth, the world would be dead. Without the old, the young will eat vultures thinking they are turkeys.

SELAH.

Epilogue:

They call me Old Soldier, but my real name is Victor Harrison. I am the man who lived transforming unfulfilled hopes into gladdening joys with my unpublished writings. My positive journaling eventually paid off. That evening, I sat on a familiar rock by the gently flowing river Hope (as it is called to this day) watching the sunset while reminiscing about what happened to the kid goat. 

Suddenly, I heard a familiar voice call out to me. “Vico, Vico…”( My pet name). 

Only one person was permitted to call me that. I knew whose it was but didn’t turn or answer as my ears could be deceiving me again. The PTSD was playing its usual tricks on me like it did several years before. A hand touched me. I shivered. A figure stepped and blocked my view of the horizon. This figure was more beautiful than the sunset. The voice speaking to me was soft and gentle. It couldn’t be, but it was. My Bimbo was back. 

I looked at her hand. There was no ring. A familiar single tear rolled down my cheeks as we fell into each other’s arms. The world stood still. Neither of us spoke but allowed our silence to say it all.

“I am sorry,” she said. “Can you take me back? My years have been miserable since that day we spoke last”. I was naive and stupid. I chose money over love and it became ashes from the get-go. After my husband passed, I tried to look for you but couldn’t tell where you could be. All our Old friends both in Nigeria and overseas could not also locate you. Most concluded you didn’t make it back from the war. I bemoaned my loss over the years hoping to apologize to you in Eternity to come. I refused to remarry but there was no day I didn’t think of what a beautiful life we could have had till I met Wale (our mutual BFF) at Lagos International Airport the day I came back to Nigeria. Wale said you were still in the village so I came here knowing you would be at our favorite spot”. Vico, I am sorry, can you forgive me and take me back”?

“Bim is this really you”? I said looking at her tear-stained beautiful face. I was experiencing sunrise at sunset. My youth has been restored at Old age. My Queen is here. Same face, now mature and gorgeous. A string of grey hair here and there but it was my Bim. 

“I forgive you,” I said in a shaky voice as we fell into each other’s arms again. “I am experiencing life again and this time, I would never let you go again”. 

(Curtains)

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