Childhood Hark-back

Hello everyone. Hope you all are having a very nice time preparing for the big day. I also can't wait. As a matter of fact, I have been suffering from sleeplessness for a while now. I always pass through this whenever I am anticipating the outcome of a very important event. May we all experience a beautiful and blessed Christmas . 💗💗💗

So, I was going through my facebook to see all what I have missed. I have not really been very active on other social platforms ever since I discovered read and noise, Lol. I hurriedly started to approve the all my friendship requests then my eyes caught a very familiar face on my request list.

You know that perception you always get when you see a particular face and you are very confident that you have met in the past but still unable to remember when or how you met that person?

After some moments of closely examining the photo, my brains suddenly turned on the lights and I finally recognized the person in the photo. I let out a sharp scream of excitement and couldn't wait to call mum and tell her who I found today.

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You know those days when we were much more younger and free. In the evenings around 7pm to 10pm when there would be power failure, women and children comes outside of their rooms to get some freshened air while waiting for the arrival of their breadwinners.

A neighbor would return home every now and then and warmly exchange greetings with the women outside. Some of the playing kids would momentarily pause in their bustle and rush to embrace him. Bear in mind that as kids, we only go to welcome neighbors who sometimes buy goodies for us on their way back from work. Any neighbor that always return home empty-handed is not worthy of our hugs. We simply tell him a simple "welcome sir" as courtesy demands, albeit absentmindedly then quickly returned to our source of entertainment.

Usually, a young man living alone would return. After exchanging greetings with the women outside, he would go into his room and bolt the door behind him. I watched this happen almost every night and it became a constant source of astonishment to me. I would wonder and say to myself, how could someone be able to stay alone in such darkness. Isn't he afraid that all the scary figures we saw in those movies would come at night to get him when he's alone. Or was it that those monsters never visited his room? Anyways, i asked mom about this and she simply replied that when i have come of age, i wouldn't care about those movie monsters anymore.

Under the moonlight,Moms usually sit on little stools and benches where they woud gist and gist while Children would play and run here and there .Eventually, the children gets exhausted and we go to take our place beside our mothers as they continue to chat without getting tired. Few moments afterwards, I would slowly lay my head on my mother's thigh. But as as soon as I put my heads on her, she would immediately jerk them away and yell at me in pidgin english: " Bilqees you better go inside and sleep, if you dare fall asleep here, i shall leave you outside and the mosquitos will finish you !!

If you are a Nigerian, your mom must have definitely made such empty threats to you as a child, Lol. Even at that very young age, we already knew that our moms were bluffing whenever they made that statement.

With heavy eyes, i would slowly fall on mummy's thigh once more. she might permits me this time. Minutes later, after i have enjoyed her thighs and she had endured my head, she would once more push my head away and threatened me once again with stupid mosquitoes. I usually yawned at her warnings while i temporarily drowse in a sitting position. Instead of this woman to be talking too much,she should rather be adjusting her thigh into a more comfortable angle ,because that's actually the perfect cradle for my head. Her thighs are even more comfortable than my yeye pillow. Lol.

Ofcourse, mummy knows that her daughter is so scared of the dark and will never agree to go to bed on her own. And she dare not force me to go inside, else I would cry and keep crying until I succeeded in bringing her conversation with the other woman to an abrupt end. Its either we go inside together or I would continue sleep on her thighs as we keep waiting for daddy's arrival and there's nothing she could do about it.

I won as usual and mom hadn't any other choice than to help ward off the mosquitoes away from my head and legs with her scarf as I slept on her while she continued to chat with the other woman. When dad finally returns, he would carry me on his strong shoulders and together we would go inside. Mom would also bid farewell to her companion and also follow us into the house.

If the power was eventually restored before dad's arrival, mum would gently tap me the head. Sometimes, she doesnt have to do that because the screams of other children from the excitement of seeing the light is enough to wake me up. As soon as I saw the light in our house too, I would jump up and rush to the sitting room and immediately switch on the TV .

At that brief moment, just like the quick and menancing footfalls of soldiers very close to an ememy's camp, the atmosphere in the compound would be temporarily rented by the sounds of trampling feet of little children, happily running towards the sitting rooms and aiming for the TV sets. This was such a beautiful and euphoric moment for kids those days. Mom and the other woman would at this point,quickly conclude the topic of discussion and say their goodbyes before entering their house and joining their children in positions in front of the Television.

We had a lot of interesting T-V dramas in those old days and my favorite is titled "super story". In fact, super story was the leading TV drama and also the favorite for all household in Nigeria. Sometimes we would be so deeply engrossed in the drama that no one will be aware when daddy opens the door and enters the sitting room.

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