ECHOES by tosin onabanjo

ECHOES What a great privilege to meet with you on these pages once again, I really don’t take it for granted. Talking about privileges I don’t take for granted, a friend of mine led me through a path, she’s walked in her short life and I would be sharing this with you. A path she’s closed the doors on because it’s taken of her that which appears will never be regained, paths with voices from the past whose echoes still speaks. Hmmm! Now I understand that we all are not just products of events that take place through our lives but more of the interpretation we give to the events. In putting this together, I have discovered in the place of thoughts that there are indeed intimate predators in life. Hmmm!! That sounds kind of literally contradicting because intimate speaks of a strong ties and a predator speaks of something or someone who drains life off another. There are indeed people who we revere yet they are as such with tender hands beneath which lie unseen claws with which after strumming our back as if to pat us, leave scars that we sometimes carry all our lives. I’m beginning to feel this is sounding like some parable with no interpretation so I’ll just plunge into what led me to these thoughts. Here, I was at a function and just felt like it was a bit too quiet. The sanguine side of me decided to make its presence known and so I saw this familiar face with a familiar smile, an appealing one for that matter and like I always say, there are certain glimpse you catch and this one certainly one of such and so I gave permission to this distraction by walking towards this lady with this pleasant smile and then the tale of our friendship began.

In a couple of weeks or perhaps days, we were sitting in this restaurant talking and having a flow, tossing question to and fro and I must say she has a way with words. The flow was brought to a halt when I asked about her dad who apparently she’s lost contact with for a while and so I thought to enquire the ‘why’ and she gave that kind of “don’t even go there” kind of response and that just aroused the curious part of me and stirred me to probing further. She was quick to put me on a pause by saying “whatever it was, I’m over it now and I don’t have anything against anyone, just don’t want to talk about it”. That kind of shut me up a bit not until I dropped the thought that was lurking around my head; “A past you cannot confront, you cannot conquer”. That was the beginning of the walk down the long preserved path. “A past you cannot confront, you cannot conquer”

It was like any other Saturday and we got chatting on the mobile phone network with weekend calls offer and so we had no phone bills to worry about. I had asked her to give me a suggestion on any life story she thought could be of benefits to readers on this magazine which she agreed to after a while. And so we began this journey into her world. Hmmmm!!! Hmmm!!! I don’t know where to start she said and I responded with anywhere will be fine for a start as we both laughed it off. I could hear from the tone of her voice that she was trying to get herself to finally letting light into the long hidden dark side of her past.

I just remain dumbfounded with a regular hmmm, ok and other monosyllables just to indicate my commitment or full attention, as she began to share her tales. While growing up, the supposed caring hands of her nanny became the same hands that left scars on her. She spoke of how she became a part of an everyday routine of sexual abuse. Your nanny!! I thought to myself. Isn’t she supposed to be the all caring female figure that appears to be a baby’s second mummy and she’s playing the part of an intimate predator? Couldn’t you have told someone about it then, I asked? She was quick to share how often she tried but was shut down and so she lived on with the silent screams which none one could hear. The nanny’s saga went on and finally came to an end. Your nanny!! I thought to myself.

I thought that was the end and was surprised to hear more room opened to another intimate predator in the person of her uncle who also gave expression to the wickedness craving for containers. She had tried to scream on several occasion but the screams were too silent to be heard. Fortunately for her, her mother saw her around the uncle at some point and sensed something strange was happening but rather than dig deep, she dashed her some heavy punishment to keep her head straight. No blames to her, I guess she was just acting based on her own level of reasoning. We had to call it a day, having spoken for God knows how long. The batteries of my phone was crying, Help! Hmmm!!! Went to bed that night wondering why a young girl of her age with little or no self defense and no listening ear should be a victim of life’s blow of injustice or should I say a victim of insane fellows such as demonstrated by the several uncles and nannies out there who exploit innocence to satisfy their own lust.

Woke up the next morning thinking to myself ‘WHO’S TO BLAME?’ fortunately for me, a friend came visiting the next morning and we got talk about people exploiting innocence and guess what? After we busted into a flow, she gradually began to relay her own experience and it just sounded like the same story with a different cast and I just wondered how many people are out there with untold stories which have shaped their lives in ways they from the unset never committed to.

…crowd of victims of circumstance

They had just become the crowd of victims of circumstance. These scary events of their life leave echoes that keep re-sounding. We hear the echoes but ignore trying to trace the source. My friend is in her mid twenties now and she recounts how she lived with insecurities all her life and still battling with it, she tells of how her insecurities have led into deeper mess still. From consenting to demeaning acts in the hand of men to…………… Enough of all the gory details!!! My focus here is the mystery of how voices of our past relay echoes through our lifetime and sometimes and the echoes have travelled too far that it becomes too difficult to trace back. It so easy for us to read and hear of tales of people’s dark past and just expects them to get over it like that. Well since we live in a micro wave age, it’s just assumed the way out. Just get over it they say.

I oftentimes hear ‘time will tell’, ‘time heals’. Well, those could be true if only, we use the time to heal. It’s really, what we do with time that determine what it tells or does. I see people always shy away from facing the issues in their lives squarely in order to conquer them. We all need at some points of our lives to get back to the places where pieces of us have been buried to get our lives back to course. We can’t keep focusing on the outside to change us. What changes us is from within. A fashion design with a wealth of experience after reasonable thought came to conclusion that ‘the unhappy people are, the more they expose their body’. It might not be true for all people but truth does have a place in it. I just see that as a way of trying to sort their inside out from the outside. The cycle is on in different spheres of life and you have a choice either to remain in it or step out. Open your heart and see clearly, unsettled hurts have a way of relaying echoes I mean reproducing itself. Hurting people hurt other people and the people who hurt you are most likely product of a hurting system.

I oftentimes hear ‘time will tell’, ‘time heals’

I grew up to discover my dad turn his back on my mother just before I was born and so I grew up with questions on my mind as I watched the travails of a single parent. Why would he just abandon me? Silently I began forming thoughts, maybe there wasn’t much about me or that would become of me. To make things worse, I had a slight limp due to some funny injection I had as a kid. I grew up with anger against myself, my dad, and life generally. I would get angry at anything that stood against my self worth.

Not like I’m an old man but in my short life spent thus far, I’ve built relationships over time that blew off over night not exactly because of what the other party did but more of reactions from the echoes ringing from my past in my head. I got my head straight, the day I realized I had too much bitterness in my heart against my dad and it was ruining me. He tried moving on with his live and gave me permission to his acts to give form to my life. As crazy as it sounds, God helped me to pray for him and released him from the hurt bank I created for him. From that spot, I began to pick the long buried pieces of my live back. A couple of years later, I stand by his corpse with tears rolling down my eyes wondering what it would have looked like to live with a father. What lessons I would have learnt from him on dealing with woman. Thoughts of questions, I would have loved to ask him such as, why did u really decide to leave? Did you ever cheat on mum and why? Funny question running through a young man’s mind, yet the greatest lesson was that learnt. He could have finished his life to that point and I would have taken the baton to keep his life going because his acts still rules my life. Thank God for God for the grace to forgive and finding a true identity to my life and not that which a life event tells of me. I found the voice behind the echoes of anger and low self esteem. God showed me and help me how to conquer them and he can certainly do same for you. There’s more to you that the echoes the voices of your past tells and dictates to you. Nobody or circumstances is strong enough to rule you life safe for those you give permission to. There will always be voices contending for your attention but it’s whichever you give permission to that will rule your world. Rule your world and don’t let the world rule you.

Michael ADEBIYI