By Yinka Ijabiyi oneyinka@gmail.com
There are a number of defining moments in every living being’s lives. Plenty of them. But once in ever so long a while, one jumps out at you as perhaps the most significant. Hindsight is a course and sometimes a situation that looks life threatening and pretty drab and dreary may turn out to be the very situation that breaks light into your deepest darkness. So like it or not, you must just take the plunge, bite the bullet, strut boldly through the minefield and trust… God. Or Allah. Or Budha. Or Sango. Or Ogun. Or Oya. Or yourself.
Where we have been is not half as exciting as where we are going. The value of my life (and yours) is the sum total of our per second everyday experiences. We laugh, we cry. We sleep, we wake. We work, we play. We eat, we… We love, we hate. We exist. Our lives are a sum total of all our experiences. At some point, it feels like it all crystallises into one day. Or one hour. Or one half hour. Or maybe just one half. But it all comes together. Sometimes just once. The universe aligns. The elements connive. The gods get drunk. And the impossible. The turnaround. The miracle. Or the juju. This Sunday…
Where there is despair, hope… To get to the point where it’s all pretty clear and well defined and what happens next is definite and obvious, and to then have to accept it all with equanimity is a blessing. But what if that which you have accepted does not happen? What if your greatest fear is no more than that, mere fear? What if David defeats Napoleon? What if the waterfall flows upwards? What if the on rushing train stops dead in its tracks? What if certain death is life? The flash of your life right before your eye just before you die. This Sunday…
There is something to be said in God’s favour; apart from the fact that He knows everything and is good, bad, great, small, loud, silent, deaf, listening, passive, active, rich, poor, etc. His eternal joker keeps us all guessing. For what if we knew the day we would die? What if the day you are born you not only know that you will one day die, you even know the very second, what will kill you, how you will react to your death and even what comes after your death? The end is nigh…This Sunday…
The best time to live and be alive is a time of war. Because unlike a time of peace, there is glory to be had in battle. It is in battle that heroes are made not in times of peace. When you war, you dig deep into the deep recesses of yourself and pull off magic. War defines and refines you. Without fire, gold would be a crass dull metal with the potential to be great but the inability to shine. But with fire…wow! Gold isn’t afraid of a few flames. A man worth his salt isn’t either. A golden man looks death in the eye and says bring it on. One day we live, one day we die.
This Sunday, we live. We will be unbowed come what may. We may be 11 on the pitch. But we are billions off it. Chels**t will meet their waterloo at Old Trafford. The grave of champions will have an extra tombstone dedicated to another champion biting the dust. We are #ManUnited. This Sunday, there will be war!
Mark my words.
- Manchester United fan, Ijabiyi, wrote in from Lagos
