She Moved In

She moved in
Since we moved into the neighborhood, I have noticed a certain creepiness about the long stretch of empty houses. Though decently lined up, one cannot but be mindful of the eerie silence that envelopes the street once night crawls in. It is not as if the day is any better but, it is certainly  ominous that people would labor to build houses for ghosts to dwell.
The street is peaceful. That certainly made up for the quiet. With noisome  neighbors come quarrel for no cause.
House 11 is particularly sore for its abandonment than for its friendliness. The far and in between times anyone occupied her were as empty as when it was empty. House 11 is a desolate place.
I learnt it belonged to a retired NPA  staff who had had his filthy hands in terrible unofficial duties and was constantly running away from shadowy tormentors.
House 11 changed and kicked to life suddenly when one innocuous Sunday morning the man’s 18 year old daughter moved in. She came on holiday from Kaduna where she was schooling.
Since she arrived, House 11 suddenly breezed to life. Music boomed from speakers no one knew existed in the house. The gates got opened and closed more often. The cleaners were busier than I’ve ever seen  them. House 11 wore the shirt of home for once.
The Girl never spoke much. She neither greeted anyone nor responded when greeted. Her trademark Rayban  eyepiece never left her face, even at night. Maybe, they were monochromic.  Better still, they had night vision. We couldn’t tell.
I was not bothered. I couldn’t be bothered. I have serious issues to grapple with at work. A car was equally misbehaving. Damn. I need another car. But who buys cars as if you were buying handkerchiefs?
I stood at the terrace to think through my many worries when I looked down the roof and saw the pharmaceutical  bottles. I counted.
They were 45 empty bottles.  Codeine. I knew where they came from. Her room.
Awww gosh. Pity and anxiety came over me. I now understood why she was not talking much. Why she maintained a dignified distance.  She was dealing with a debilitating sickness. She needed compassion and not scorn and derision. She needed love in such a trying time as this.
Her catarrh is of a very serious nature.
I noticed also she didn’t litter the rooftop with tissue papers. Poor considerate Girl. She didn’t want to overlabor the poor Baba whose duty it was to keep the compound squeaky clean; including the rooftops.
I ran downstairs to Emeka, the shop owner to purchase tissue papers for her. I was going to show her what friendly neighbourliness is all about.
Na wah o.
Emeka no longer sold household items since The Girl came.
Gone were Maggi, Alomo, rice, soaps and the like.
Market done change. Parade don enter second gear.
Emeka is wearing a white overall.
His store is full of things to seel.
He sells codeine and codeine and cough syrup and tramadol and Ice and revnol  and Turare Na Hausawa.
Drugs kill.

A Daughter's Question

My 3 year old daughter was at her usual playful best as she sat on my legs pulling the grey hair perched gentlemanly under my lower lip.

She asked for the name of the hair and I casually told her moustache.

''No Daddy. That's not the moustache. This is the moustache ' as ran her fingers across my upper lip.

I shivered . What manner of wahala is this? Almost trembling. (Who knew what a moustache  was at age 3?).  I asked her 'what is it called'?

If she had said 'mouche' which it actually is, I for run commot  house.

Which kain pikin we dey born sef?

Yes. It is a mouche, or soul patch.

A gentleman's beard

A Daughter's Laughter

It's me and my lil angel again o.

So, she was dressed up for church. She had on a new gown freckled with frills all over. She felt princessly.
Her gaits changed with brisk steps.  From the catlike to the slow, and then to the stomping.
As she stomped, she broke into a chorus.
'If you're happy and you know
Stamp you feet.
Jam jam.
Jam jam.

The more she sang, the brighter her shoe shone. You know those  shoes shoes with bright lights at the heel.
The bright light were her right to a good day.

She earned her happiness and I found happiness in her gratitude.

Then. She went cold.
Something was making her day incomplete. She was moody. I went limp myself.

She found her way to me and said
'Daddy, my finger hurts'

She showed me the finger and I saw nothing hurting or hurtful therein. I could excise the whole hand and not feel a loss.

Against my brusque best, I took time to listen VERY WELL.
I looked at the finger and saw nothing still. So, I brought out my phone flashlight and yes, there was it.  A cut less than the edge of a razor blade.

I saw it.  She was EXTREMELY happy I saw it. He joy flowed once again.

And she shared the story of her injury.
Auntie broke something and 'my fingers wouldn't stay by itself and I hurt myself'

I listened to every single word.  I was happy. She was exhilarated. My Sunday was complete.

Hmmmmmm

Just DO it

When he sneaked in no one knew.
His contrasting skin color drew a few glances and not more.
He sat with his girl of an equally contrasting body pigmentation from his.
Not that it mattered though because the binding relation between  them lay not in colours but In juices tucked somewhere between thighs.
Having settled in, he asked for a bottle of a cheap whisky. Even Baba Munira wouldn’t touch this drink on a good day nah. Why is this oyinbo falling
y hand  nah,? My tame and vain mutterings never went beyond my head.
He opened the drink took a few hurried gulps and got animated, almost on cue.
The stiff labia suddenly found expression and talk he did.
Only this time he no longer was merely whispering to his mismatched partner, he was literally addressing his country’s Congress. Not his alone. The whole world became his audience.
How do you restrain a man flowing in endless paroxysms of nothingness? You don’t. You  let him rant and let the music play.
So, amidst the drawl,slur and flutter of several F words, oyinbo man decided to dance whit the whiskey.
Omo, come see scatterings  of limbs, hips and arms  all flying in several directions at the same time in consonant to whatever each body part decoded was convenient. I never laughed so hard. I laughed  till my ribcage ached from my foolishness.
Foolishness because what I considered disconcordant in dance was a graceful display of body movement, of creativity, of rigorous exercise, of carriage.

Shame on you for scoffing at anyone dancing.
No dance is meaningless. Only meaningless audience abound.

Someday I'll Sing Again

One bad day In church

Those days you felt you owed God service of all kinds whether or not you were cut out for such service.

Flashback Ebenezer Baptist Church Saki.

I had attended choir practice sessions for a record 2 months in a row, not missing any. It didn't matter that a toad could outsing me. It amounted to nothing that I couldn't string doremifasolah on a mouth flute much less an accordion. I was that useless musically.  But, I wasn't deterred. It was all in the service of the most High.

But I need add despite my dogged fight to be counted with the choristers, I never got called to robe. I wasn't good enough and I never questioned the good judgement of the master Singer. I was useless, plain and simple.

Those days, songs were instrumentally intro-ed  by an instrumentalist with 2 wooden contraptions. You hit it in rhythmic pentameter as the song may require. Kon Kon kon/3. Kon/kon/. As the spirit may direct

Hmm. I guess the Choirmaster drank a bucketful of burukutu that morning. Yes he did. If he didn't what followed would never have happened.

He handed me those wooden things and asked that I lead the Choir on.

Emiiii? Me? Ehen. Me? This me? Today is today. The day of redemption. Tayo, the girl for whom my singing career was forcefully made to blossom, must finally see and respect me. Pa DM Durojaye must be told too. Uncle Kunle Kolade equally must hear.

I was in these thoughts when I was nudged to start.

Startled. I gathered myself together and strung the first few meters perfectly. The song got on the way. It was  a success. I was on my way to becoming the next Sunny Ade.

Gradually, I saw myself with a huge guitar around my neck I was twirling and strumming the best chords KSA couldn't even dare. I was on top  of the world. I could see Tayo running to me after service to congratulate me. I saw my next engagements and I was pleased.

Hmm.
All this while I was lost in my own thoughts, my wooden gong had lost rhythm.
The choirmaster had beckoned and shouted at me to stop. For wia!! Some Deacons had stood up to stop. Kilokanmi. .
The song had finished I was still knack ing on jejely.

It took one 'iko' to reset my mode to home default mode. Iko is a well placed knock on the temple.

Needless to say my musical career met its  timely death on that day.

Buredi Agege

Buredi  Agege.

I will demand utmost respect to myself this 'time around'. It is not what you think.

Hmm.

I have always minded my business on my streets. I bear myself witness. From $/G to Nassarawa, to GRA and Wall Street,Ayilara not exempted. I'm self focused.

So I thought until I began to notice something lately.

You have not lived in Lagos until you have had a good fill of Buredi  Agege and Ewa Aganyi. I'm sorry I can't explain anymore than this because that is not my discourse today. As Uncle Jimi Disu will say, that's a matter for another day.

The matter today is about the Buredi sellers.

As if by unbreakable Torah, they never walk alone. Liverpool fans will be easily put to shame by these nubile itinerant  ladies hawking their bread all over lagos. Where they do not walk in pairs, they walk either in front of the  Ewa Aganyi seller or closely behind. But hardly ever alone. It is as if their unity of commerce promotes their sales by reason of association.

Competitive price advantage has never stood one in preference above the other, yet, they are never removed from one  other.

But, that is not my concern today.

My concern is this; how come every 6 months you have either see a new set or a doubled set?

You see, the most easily impregnated  crop of Yoruba female folks are among these bread sellers.
Just watch, hardly do you see a bread seller without a protruding stomach or one struggling to blossom. You will think that they are in competition.  Kilode!

If they be 6 in a file, be sure to see them all belle-fulled. HABA.

I'm really distraught tonight at my sisters who hardly remember which of the ovenboys poured the hottest juice inside their cold pot.

Yoruba  ronu o.

This is no satire.

One Body Mark

One Body Mark

A few inches away from my left nipple, yes o, I too have one, is a swelling, the size of a bean seed.
I once prayed to God to remove it exercising all my faith based proclamations. The stubborn thing wouldn't budge. God must be using it teach me a lesson, I reckoned, as I submitted to living with my body blemish.

How did it come about? Hmm. Where else did this happen but Saki. When I'm done talking Saki, I shall enter Ife before Ibadan.

We returned from midweek service. Our church, His Coming Evangelical Church isn't one of those places that eyed the clock while dwelling in the presence of the Most High. So, it was no skin off anyone's nose if we were tardy getting home. After all, home is home.

Only on this ocassion I was ravingly  hungry. That kind of hunger that makes you want to  command the books in your bag to pizza, whatever that was then.

Mum was aware of the situation. God bless that woman.

But the choices for that night were thin and meagre. It had to be Beans. It couldn't be anything else. It must be Beans.

Those were the days of Ife Brown Beans. All of Ifedapo Local Government and beyond were in a frenzied Beans mood. We couldn't be left out. It must be Beans ooo.

In a jiffy, the three prong stones were filled with burning sticks. Both lean and huge ones. Obediently, the fire caught up and was burning with feverish fervour, taming and subduing the Bean pods in no time.
The huge bonfire lit the backyard, providing both illumination and warmth and yes, an assurance of a hot meal.

If anyone told me there would be no meal that night, I could turn Elisha on that person. Fire from hell would consume such.

Anyway jare. Sister Grace,  my Mum, continued with her other chores while I monitored the softening and conquering of my beans. Our beans.

Once it softened to my mind, I told Mum to come see o. She saw. She agreed it was soft enough to add condiments. And she did.

Finally, food was coming shortly, very.shortly.
Ode. I never knew I was in for a long wait.
I never knew that the Palm oil used came from a source much cheaper than the last supply. Mum was balancing a difficult account I wasn't aware of.

So, the meal had to cook, boil, simmer for much longer. All impurities had to die by fire and by patience. 
Patience was the only substance I didn't have. If it was fire, I added more sticks and the fire glowed brighter with relentless intensity. This fire had delivered nah. Wetin?

Each time I drew Mums attention to the broth she only came to stir the thing while she went back to her.account books balancing some numbers that never made sense to my hungry self.

I got tired. I could sell my birthday right to Durojaiye Oluwabunmi. I didn't care.

But before then, let me bring down the Beans meal from the fire first.

I did. I shouldn't have.

The fire that scorched my hands while removing the pot was so intense that I dropped the pot instantly.

The lid flew in a different direction while the grains of avenging beans seeds attacked my fAce squarely. They were more than 2.1 billion.

My scream drew Mum to my situation. Pathetic is an understatement.

Anyway,  by next morning I had punched all the watery bean mArks all over me, leaving only as a memento.

The beans? 
Ask the Alfa what happened to his goatee the last time he got inflamed.