WHENEVER I reflect on my journey on earth so far, I tend to conclude that my whole existence must have been influenced by circumstances of my birth. Whether this observation is psychological or real, events as shall be seen later attest to this feeling.
On the eve of my birth, Papa had gone through his own tribulations in business which marked the general economic downturn of the second world war period. He had just repossessed his house at Ikenne for £47.10s which was sold off in his presence for £40 in 1940 when his business failed. It was at this time too that he came up with a personal five-year development plan. So when I was born on December 3, 1942, I was an added joy to him and my mother.
My father was a man of strong character, extremely kind and very proud of his children. I was probably one of the most willful and certainly the naughtiest of the children. I can remember he lifted his cane against me more than any of us. As a matter of fact, I can only remember my mother beating me really hard on one occasion. That was when I couldn’t get my own way about something. I threw a stone at my younger sister, Ayo. The scar was still on her forehead till she died, in 2011, an evidence of the naughty days of childhood.
The outstanding impression my mother has left on my memory is that of saintliness. She is deeply religious. She would not think of taking her meals without her daily prayers. Going to the morning prayers every Friday morning was one of her daily duties. As far as my memory can go, I do not remember her ever missing going to church on Sundays. She would take the hardest views and keep them without flinching. Illness was no excuse for relaxing them. To keep two or three consecutive fasts was nothing to her. Living on one meal a day was a habit with her for a long time. Not content with that, she fasted every other day.
My mother had a strong commonsense. She was well informed about all matters of state, and many thought highly of her intelligence. Often I would accompany her, exercising the privilege of childhood and I remember many lively moments she had with many of her colleagues. Apart from our immediate family, which consisted of about seven people in all, there always seemed to be relatives staying with us and our little compound was usually full of people. It is a custom among Africans that any relative, however distant the relationship may be, can at any time arrive at your home and remain under your roof for as long as he wants. Nobody questions his arrival, how long he intends staying or his eventual departure. This hospitality is sometimes very much abused, for if one member of the family does well in life, he usually finds his compound filled to capacity with men and women, all claiming some distant kinship, and all prepared to live at his expense until the money runs out.
My family lived together very peacefully and I can remember very few quarrels. It was a wonderful life for us children with nothing to do but playing around all day. Our playground in Ibadan was vast and varied, for we had land, the Ogunpa River, and the thrill of unexplored bush all within easy reach.
But we had a lot of toys. I remember one day my mother bought me a bicycle, and I was to be found daily pedaling it up and down the Ibadan Boy’s High School playing ground. My schoolmates were extremely envious of me, and longed to be allowed to ride it, but because I was not too possessive, I let it go out of my sight.
Looking back on the kindness and consideration with which they always treated me, I sometimes wonder whether they did not in their heart of hearts regard me as a spoilt little brat. Probably because they were so afraid that I would run home screaming to my mother, whom they held in high esteem; they were careful to give me no cause for complaint. Certainly my mother rarely denied me anything, and I graciously took advantage of this. I believe that she tried not to make her affection too obvious because whenever she was serving our meals, she always served me last.
Unlike most growing children, I was almost rarely ready for my food. In fact, my mother used to get worried because of the trouble she had in forcing me to eat. I very rarely ate a meal during the day and only returned from my games in the evening to eat the food that had been prepared.
My parents never complained about this and once they realized that I was flourishing in spite of my irregular meals, they ceased to worry.
I admired my father tremendously. He seemed to me the embodiment of strength and courage and cleverness, far above all the other men I saw, and I treasured the hope that when I grew up I would be rather like him. But much as I admired him, I feared him also.
Not so much with my mother; I had no fear of her, for I knew that she would condone everything I did because of her excessive and indiscriminate love for me.
I tried to dominate her a little. I saw much of her than I did of my father and she seemed nearer to me and I would confide in her when I would not dream of doing so to father.
So passed my early years. Sometimes, as was inevitable in a family, there were family squabbles but when these happened to assume unusual proportions they reached father’s ears and he was angry and seemed to think that all such happenings were due to the folly of us all. Father’s intervention, when it took place, shook us all up. As a child, my life was built around my family, my neighbourhood and the church, Agbeni Methodist Church, Agbeni, Ibadan. Faced or flanked by small apartment houses on either side and facing the road with its busy traffic, the small but not inconspicuous church was the center of community life for the whole neighbourhood.
Courtesy: Nigeria Tribune, as culled from ‘Memoirs at 70’.