It was a week to my promotional exams to form five, and I had been following a carefully laid out revision plan.
Then I caught conjunctivitis and had to be sent home. Conjunctivitis, known in my days as Apollo, is a highly painful, highly contagious disease that affects the eyes. It’s as if pins and needles are dancing on your eyeballs. You are afraid to blink because of the excruciating pain, yet you are forced to blink in order to get rid of the foreign bodies. And so the circle of pain continues….
Because of the infectious nature of the disease, the school authorities decided to send anybody that contacted the disease home –in my case, barely days to a crucial promotion exam. I remember asking my house captain about our chances of getting to the next class and he assured that the Principal had promised to use the second term results.
I thought that was dicey and whimsical since the Principal did not make a public announcement and resolved not to let my fate hang on a last minute sleight of the hand. I therefore decided to come on D-day to sit for the exam even if it meant coming from home with all the pain and inconvenience of conjunctivitis.
So fortified with antibiotics, analgesics, and eye drops — useful or not—I doggedly pursued my studies at home. I was left largely alone, and, free from the clatter and banter of a school life that was largely ruled by bells and sundry distractions, I was able to concentrate much more than I had hoped. The pain was there but the analgesics and my mind I guess, drove lot of it away. The result was that I had one of my best results in my five years of O levels.
It was also a week to a wedding a friend and his wife had spent the better part of a year to plan that the storm which passed through Lagos two years ago, took the roof of an event centre they had booked and paid for.
It is not what happens to us that really matter as even the best laid plans can go wrong
The owner of the event centre promised to do everything possible to get the hall ready within the week. In the alternative, he offered them their money back – money that is of no use as anybody who has had to look for a decent event centre at a short notice in Lagos knows.
Faced therefore with the grim prospect of having a wedding without a reception hall, my friend’s wife opted to work hand in hand with the owner of the centre. They barely made it and the gaily dressed guests that thronged the hall could not have known that it was such a ‘touch and go’ thing.
Another wedding incident almost went awry when the generator packed up a day to the event. The owner of the centre quickly rented a ‘name your price’ generator hoping it would be up and running before the church service was over.
It was not. Those who gave the church service a miss, or left the church early, were barred from entering the hall. After hanging around for some 45 minutes, nerves became frayed and tempers rose. Eventually, the security people bowed to the immense pressure and the doors to the hall were thrown open.
The hall was an oven! The gasps and snorts were still going on when the church entourage arrived. What impressed me most was how the parents of the bride and groom—which included a royalty by the way— handled the situation.
They dressed down as much as possible and started working the crowd. A cold drink here, a nice word there, a smile here, a joke there, quickly got many guests into showing empathy. All is well they say that went well as the generator sprang to life shortly after.
Finally, an incident happened to a very, very close friend of mine which shows that even the best laid plans can go wrong. His wife was to celebrate a land mark age so a detailed event was planned to mark the occasion.
The hall of a first class hotel was booked somewhere in the heart of Europe and close friends from all over the world were invited. Just as friends were checking into hotels and establishing contact, their son who had actively participated in planning the occasion took ill. Seriously ill. This definitely was not part of the script.
As at the morning of the event, only a few people knew of this twist in the tale. Should they cancel? It was not an option to be easily dismissed given the state of their son.
It was to their credit that they thought of their rainbow guests who had come from all over even as they thought of themselves. The show went on. I occasionally threw glances at the couple and the way they conducted themselves was admirable.
You see, it is not what happens to us that really matter as even the best laid plans can go wrong. It is what happens in us when the unexpected happens. Making lemonade out of lemon might sound as a cliché but it still holds true.
The cause of the problem might not be ours but the responses and decisions are definitely ours to make. It’s our response to the unexpected shocks and knocks of life that shows who we really are and can, at the end of the day, determine what we become in
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