DRIVE SLOWLY TO ARRIVE EARLY:
In talking to you this afternoon, I cannot but narrate a particular incident that I transpired between my father and I as I was growing up. My dad once owned a very prized asset - SUZUKI 125. Those days, the quest and lure of ridding that motor cycle was obsessive. Not minding entreaties from my mother and stern warning from my dad, I would always find a way of cruising round the village at killing speed, especially around our secondary school so that my friends could see me.
At a time Papa had to accept the unpalatable and costly reality that the motor cycle was no longer strictly his but ours. It was one bitter-sweet reality to him as our co-ownership of the motor cycle meant incessant visits to mechanic workshops with its attendant unbudgeted costs. One fateful day, he gave me the honor of conveying him to my elder sister's place on the said motor cycle. To get to where my elder sister is married, you have to pass through our secondary area. As such, I had to speed in a way to impress both my dad, friends and fans. As I sped crazily, my dad did a very simple but extremely didactic thing that has remained ever fresh in my life. He tapped me on the back and said: "BOY, RIDE SLOWLY THAT WE MAY ARRIVE ON TIME". Thinking it was a slip of tongue on his part, I accelerated my speed. After a while, he beckoned on me once again saying: "ENYI, REDUCE YOUR SPEED FOR US TO ARRIVE ON TIME". Of course, I hadn't any option than to do as he commanded but the import of his instruction was lost on me till much later in life.
As I become daily confronted with the craze, the fury, the noise, the maddening rush, the cacophony of tunes, the haste and impatience I begin to wonder where we are rushing to and for what? In the mist of all these, I have learnt to stay my haste, and not to out run my shadows. I can hear a voice saying: "the race is neither for the smart nor the battle for the brave but it's chance and time that happeneth to them all".
In talking to you this afternoon, I cannot but narrate a particular incident that I transpired between my father and I as I was growing up. My dad once owned a very prized asset - SUZUKI 125. Those days, the quest and lure of ridding that motor cycle was obsessive. Not minding entreaties from my mother and stern warning from my dad, I would always find a way of cruising round the village at killing speed, especially around our secondary school so that my friends could see me.
At a time Papa had to accept the unpalatable and costly reality that the motor cycle was no longer strictly his but ours. It was one bitter-sweet reality to him as our co-ownership of the motor cycle meant incessant visits to mechanic workshops with its attendant unbudgeted costs. One fateful day, he gave me the honor of conveying him to my elder sister's place on the said motor cycle. To get to where my elder sister is married, you have to pass through our secondary area. As such, I had to speed in a way to impress both my dad, friends and fans. As I sped crazily, my dad did a very simple but extremely didactic thing that has remained ever fresh in my life. He tapped me on the back and said: "BOY, RIDE SLOWLY THAT WE MAY ARRIVE ON TIME". Thinking it was a slip of tongue on his part, I accelerated my speed. After a while, he beckoned on me once again saying: "ENYI, REDUCE YOUR SPEED FOR US TO ARRIVE ON TIME". Of course, I hadn't any option than to do as he commanded but the import of his instruction was lost on me till much later in life.
As I become daily confronted with the craze, the fury, the noise, the maddening rush, the cacophony of tunes, the haste and impatience I begin to wonder where we are rushing to and for what? In the mist of all these, I have learnt to stay my haste, and not to out run my shadows. I can hear a voice saying: "the race is neither for the smart nor the battle for the brave but it's chance and time that happeneth to them all".
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