Atoke’s Monday Morning Banter: Memorable Memories
Posted on Monday, March 4th, 2013 at 11:28 AMBy Atoke
There’s a place where good music takes me where I can forget all the challenges of reality; and albeit for a short time, I’m out of it. I’m in this world where there’s no bitterness, judgement, religion, anger, or intolerance. Times when there’s no music, I take solace in bants and laughter.
Last week, I stumbled across the English notebook of a secondary school child. They had been asked to write about their most memorable day. Below is an extract of his submission:
“… and the meat I ate were more than twenty and I drank more than eight bottles of minerals. I drank two bottles of Sprite, two cans of malt, three bottles of Fanta, one bottle of CocaCola, two bottles of Pepsi. I even put some minerals in empty bottles that I will take home. After that, I went to where children were taking ice cream. I saw that there were so many people in a roll of a single line waiting for ice cream but instead…“
Basically, he was narrating the most memorable day he’s had in his life so far. It was the day they were dedicating their church building and the highlight of the day for him was the copious quantities of food he ingested. I laughed so hard that my sides hurt. It dawned on my that “wetin dey worry every pesin dey different for this life!”
You gotta love the innocence of children though. When you grow up, you get bogged down by the harshness of life that it’s sometimes difficult to just enjoy the simple things. It now takes a special effort to bask in the beautiful things of life. We get so carried away with the things that don’t really concern us but we find ways to make them into time-consuming issues. Who’s sleeping with whom? Who confirmed that someone was actually paid a certain amount to attend a show? Who is homosexual and who is not? Goodness was that skin tone a tad different when we were in Airforce?
We find that we’re worrying so much about things that end up taking so much space in our heads that we end up becoming different. It’s essentially majoring on the minor things and missing out on the beautiful things in life.
So, I learnt a valuable lesson that day; going back to the days of simple things. It is true that life will hurl darts at us – it is true that how we deal with whatever is thrown at us builds or breaks us. However, there are those things we find that we’re dabbling into knowingly or unknowingly. We find ourselves a little too judgmental that we often forget that we aren’t flawless. I always preach the gospel of “Walk in my shoes first…” because many times, you don’t really know till you lift the veil.
Let’s leave behind some of the unneccessary baggage, spend time building more happy memories so that even in the midst 0f life’s drama we can find that happy place where we can smile and say “these are my most memorable times”
Have a fabulous week ahead! Stay strong, stay positive. Keep that smile in place and don’t forget to share your most memorable day with us. Let’s have some fun this morning.
Peace, love & cupcakes!
Toodles!
Photo Credit: depositphotos.com
Tags: Atoke, Atoke's Monday Morning Banter, Memorable memories
First.
We all went through similar I guess
If this is how a secondary school student writes in this country, boy are we in trouble!
Where do you even begin to correct grammatical errors. i was actually hoping that this was written by a primary school pupil !!
Its obvious this could be a JSS 1 Student. they are extensions of Pry school. By the way, the rate a which children are growing eh, you would be surprised its an 8 years old child in JSS 1.
Common ‘I said’, that’s obviously not an SSS3 students essay, cos if it was Atoke won’t be laughing (give the girl some credit) its probably a Js1 boy’s essay.
For me the memory dat makes me smile d most are from my wedding day and more recently conversations with my 2yr old daughter, she says the funniest things
Thanks for this. ”Let’s leave behind some of the unneccessary baggage, spend time building more happy memories so that even in the midst 0f life’s drama we can find that happy place where we can smile and say “these are my most memorable times””… God bless you
The construction of english sentences is a topic for another day .. Why not leave that and note the message the write- up is meant to pass across, do you have any idéal the school the child is ? But we are always so Quick to judge .. So fast to correct grammatical errors Like we were born speaking english .. Am not saying its good to make mistakes ,but its not a sin lets give other people who can’t speak as well as us a chance to air their opinion #stop cuber Space bulling #
@ Temi…….lol #no comment
@ Temi you are on Point!
Atoke! All i can say is that u r God sent. May God bless & preserve u. Give u more wisdom, as my friend will say ‘GOD BLESS UR HRT’
My most memorable day (for now) was the day my classmates and I stabbed lecture to go cook a bush-rat we found and killed around the lecture theater while waiting for the lecturer to come. lol
The guy was vexed and took attendance but I had fun and the meat increased the protein in our body..abi! lol
The day i got my first job, barely a week after my final exams in school.
Nice one!please love to get in touch with Atoke
One of my early ones was the day in August 1995 when our SSCE results were released and I surprised myself exceedingly (and quite a number of people in my life, I imagine) by getting 7As and 2Cs.
To put it in context, I was one of those “returnee seniors” who got made to repeat my entire SS 3 class because I got awful results the first time around and in equal measures, sef – 2As, 2Cs, 2Ps & 2 Fs. Therefore I got sent back to boarding school and everything… my parents didn’t find it funny at all!
So I worked very hard but I didn’t believe in my own ability or understand my capacity to succeed until I saw the second results. I learnt a very valuable lesson from that experience and it’s helped me grow my present attitude to life’s challenges, by constantly reminding myself – “I can do anything if I truly make up my mind, focus and work hard to reach that goal.”
Oh, plus, how did I forget to include Law School memories? Enugu campus, class of 2002/2003, stand up! Law school will always remain one of my best memories of life. It was all about going through a difficult academic year with a group of people who are just as stressed as you are but many of whom were just simply amazing. We read together, ate together, fellowshipped together, laughed together, cried after each exam together (because of some of those questions!), rejoiced together in Abuja during the call-to-bar ceremony in July 2003!! Oh, the wonderful friendships that emerged from that period in my life.
I will always remember every single moment of Law School with a big fat smile on my face. Thanks for taking us back to some good memories, Atoke! xx
Hey was in Agbani 2002/2003 as well.
I miss the days when everything was so simple. We didnt need to worry about anything other than having all our friends come to our party, sleepovers and food. How did life become so complicated?????????
Perhaps the most memorable times of my life were those days in primary and secondary school… Beautiful days of food, fun, play, hide and seek, holidays… Days when one didn’t have to make major life-altering decisions. But suddenly, adulthood was upon us… Thank God for everything.
On the other hand, my extra year in the UNI stands unique and memorable in my mind, ’twas like I’d been handed an opportunity to rock and live… Prior to my extra year, my life had been contained in school, fellowship activities and friends, THAT WAS IT ALONE!
But during this extra year, I got involved in extra-curricular activities and as my friends’d graduated, I’d space to look inward as a person and live the best way I thought I should without influence… And my, it felt good! Did I rock? Yup, you bet I did!