Golden thoughts

"Benjamin, stop staring out of the window during lessons," the teacher said, "Pay attention to me." Ben turned his face from the window and looked at his teacher. However, his mind wasn't on her nor was it on what she was saying. He was re-living last night . The image of daddy and mummy fighting couldn't leave his mind. He had heard them last night. Unlike other times, this time, they had been really loud. His brother and sister were also awake. They were twins and shared a bed. They had been whimpering in it. He had whispered to them to stop crying. "I'll be right back, okay?" he had said reassuringly. He had been very scared but, had tiptoed out of the room. Luckily, the door had not squeaked the way it had the day mummy had caught him going outside to play instead of taking a nap. She had scolded him then, for being naughty and had sent him back to their room. His parents had been in the living room. He had walked very softly, alon

Fresh from the shower, Tina hummed to herself as she stood in front of the mirror. She placed her hands on her waist and looked herself over. She raised her hands now and turned to one side, then to the other. She still scrutinized her body carefully. She had done this every month, since she turned twenty. So, she knew what she was looking out for. Since that scare when she was twenty-three, she had never again found anything to worry about. Now, she placed her right arm behind her head. Going in small circles, she examined her right breast and armpit with her left arm. Still humming, she repeated the entire exercise on her left side. Tina suddenly stopped humming. With her heart thudding in her chest, she checked the area around her armpit again. Sure enough, they were still there, unmoving and hard. There were three of them and each was small in size. She might have missed them if she hadn't been careful. "I bet they are harmless," she told herself. "Afte

Yesterday morning, I was watching a programme on Disney Junior channel with my twenty-month old son, Ikem, when the theme song came on during a break. I sang along with them while Ikem danced. (Yes, I'm a mother so I watch  that  channel and I know all the songs too. Well, when I don't exactly know the words, I act as back-up singer to my three-year old daughter, Nwando.) At a point, though, the words of the first line suddenly struck me as ridiculous. I found it really amusing too. I'm going where the sky is bluer I understood perfectly, how beautifully that line fits in the song.  It's a part of a lovely song that highlights all the beautiful things about the channel. It is also, very perfect and appropriate for their target audience... Individuals a LOT younger than me :) However, I thought it was ridiculous for an adult to hold on to the belief that the sky is bluer in some places, since it's the same sky everywhere after all. Then, I remembered th

In the latest season of Desperate Housewives, Tom and Lynette Scavo made a decision to seperate for a while. Anyone who has followed the series avidly over the years wouldn't be too surprised that, FINALLY, the cracks in their seemingly great relationship would become obvious to them. While they generally run a tight ship, Lynette's need for complete control and Tom's unwillingness to step up to the plate and handle certain responsibilities was bound to cause problems someday. As this season plays out, Tom starts dating someone else and eventually, Lynette does too. They even get physically intimate with their new partners. In episode sixteen, the subject of Tom taking the next step in his new relationship comes up. He had made the decision to move in with his new girlfriend of barely three months. Watching that particular episode, I was sitting on my couch and thinking, "This can't be happening! They are still married to each other." It was clear to me t

Today is Mother's Day and I'd love to use the opportunity to tell all the wonderful women in my life just how much they mean to me. To my wonderful-beyond-words mother: You are an amazing woman. You gave five children all the love in the world and against all the odds, too. We had a great life and we knew no lack.  How did you do it?   It certainly wasn't easy to be alone, was it? I'm a woman and a mother now so, I know most of those smiles happened even when your heart was breaking. You taught us that the love we had for each other was the best thing that could unify us. You made our house a home. When I'm exhausted and grumpy, I think I've made a lot of sacrifices but when I am sane again, I realize that I've got nothing on you. There was nothing you wouldn't, happily and selflessly, give us, as long as you could afford to. I thank God I lived in your womb and I thank God for you, today and always... I love you, mummy. Happy Mother's Day!

I saw the picture on this article yesterday, for the first time. I had cause to really look at it again, this afternoon. I see in this picture, a man with his lips pursed in intense concentration. His tongue is sticking out a bit too. He, obviously, is engrossed in what he's doing. I see the glasses he's wearing to aid his sight. I see the eyes behind those glasses, intently focused on his task. I see his task. And, what a task too! I see his stubby nails with some stains on them and I see his calloused thumb. They point to the fact that he, most likely, works with his hands. I am drawn again to his task. In those hands, are a needle and a thread. His goal is to pass a thread through the eye of the needle. That's a mundane task, right?  Not exactly so when you realize that his thread is lot bigger than the eye of his needle. Stupid man, eh? A thick thread with a jagged end cannot possible go through that tiny needle! Crazed lunatic? Oh, well, his eyes do seem a little

When I was seven years old, my best friend (at the time) and I had, for some reason, fallen out. We were in the same class and part of a circle of friends. None of the others took sides with either of us..... except one person. This mutual friend, immediately, stopped talking to me. I didn't know why but, I reciprocated and just like that, we stopped being friends. My best friend and I were family friends so it wasn't long before our parents noticed that we weren't friends anymore. At her home, one Sunday evening, there was some dramatic peace-making session where we had to hug each other and blah, blah, blah. Anyways, that was the end of our 'enmity'. We became friends again. Of course, the next day in school, all our friends noticed. Our mutual friend, who had taken sides with her, immediately tried to get chummy with me again. I didn't let her get close, at all. That was the beginning of a silent war between us. I remember telling anyone who asked

A friend once told me, "The best thing about being with other people's children is that when you're done having fun with them, you can give them back." I had laughed very hard at that. This was because that had been said at a time Ikem had stayed up late at night, refusing to sleep and preferring to watch Barney, instead. Of course, super mummy had to stay up with him, while grumbling about the fact that I needed to get some much-deserved rest. While that had been said as a joke, after I had thought about it, I realized it was something to take very seriously. Growing up, in Nigeria, the extended family system worked just fine. There were grandparents, aunties, uncles and neighbours even who watched out for other people's children. Those that had them were lucky. This was because, even when the parents were not there, a child would still be under the watchful eye of a responsible adult. Children were said to belong to the entire community and not just to th

Ada didn't believe what she was seeing. Two lines? "How is that even possible?" she thought. "I can't be pregnant. Not now, not just yet." She took another home pregnancy test and another and yet another. Those two lines refused to budge. Suddenly, she felt like her world had just collapsed. Coming out of the bathroom, she went to sit on the bed. "How do I handle this? This is definitely not part of the plan," she thought. “How did this even happen?" She had been using oral contraceptives for three months so when she had started feeling very tired and sleepy for no reason, it hadn't crossed her mind that she could be pregnant. She had only resumed work a month ago so she had thought that had been the reason for the bone-crushing exhaustion she had been experiencing lately. Her husband's cologne had made her nauseous yesterday, as they had dressed for work. It had hit her then that her period had been delayed by over a wee

Someone dear to me offended me, a whole lot, yesterday.   Enraged, I reacted in a manner that went against everything that I believe. I wasn't thinking about that at the time, though. I broke a lot of rules. That, certainly, wasn't my best moment. I wasn't only enraged because my good intentions had been misconstrued and completely twisted to mean something else. I was enraged at the way they had arrogantly assumed that, because they had thought the true situation had been a particular way, then they were right. I was enraged because, both of us had got our wires  crossed but they had stubbornly refused to see that. That was an altercation that should never have happened because it just didn't make any sense! Prior to that, we had been enjoying each other's company. In a matter of minutes, though, we were tearing each other apart in ways we knew would hurt the most. We had, totally, ruined what had been a good time.       The fight ended with both of us