tHe GiRl I’m GOnna maRRy…

I was walking back home from the office the other day and as I did, I asked meself, what if the girl I finally get to settle down with doesn’t like POetRy? In my mind I was already hysterical as I walked along the sidewalk, it was all I thought about in my long 15minute walk on an average speed of a hundred steps per minute… Hehehe. On a normal day that was uber fast but today wasn’t one of such lucky slow days, I was so impatient and wanted to start writing.

For starters, I’m still single, and searching hard cos I miss being in lOvE, my last love story didn’t last long so I’ve been back around single for what, two years? Yeah and I’ve been in love with the same girl ever since (yeah I get it, but hey keep your voice down, I could hear you telling me to get a life and move on already, you’re that loud… Lol).

But have I really searched? Hmmmmm maybe not hard enough and I think in my two years of being sober (yeah not with the booze… Lol), I’ve met two girls who would have made me get all romantic and emotional again cos I’ve actually forgotten how, but somehow I lost contact with one and the other well, it didn’t just work out right so I kinda fell all in with my first love – music!

In all but one of my past relationships, they never really liked my music thing like they had some kind of a rivalry or something going on which got me thinking they never liked rap until I found them rapping to Eminem and I’m like “Yo’i thought you didn’t like rap?” Hmmmmm or maybe you never really liked me cos the awful face you put out didn’t need someone to say, “hands down” hommie, she’s just not into your Hip Hop thang.

But the last one, my ex, remember, the one I’m still in lOvE with? (Oh I thought you forgot lol) OK so back to the story, at least showed interest and even calls me “rapper” sometimes, and to some degree liked my rap, (loves my writing, and is probably reading this now), and also is enthusiastic about my music, kinda cool if you ask me, but the penultimate one I thought did, a pebble dropped in the river, and the ripple effect just told me how phoney she’d been – (😔).

So all that got me thinking, just maybe… Maybe the woman I’m gonna marry won’t even like my cooking or she’d be so good a chef that she’ll think my cooking sucks! Maybe she wouldn’t like POetRy, or won’t even like it when I get all romantic on her with a gift box I made just for her or have her portrait paiNtinG hanging on the wall, or she might just think my rap song’s wack too… Yeah, and well it’ll be okay not to like all those cos I’ll still do them anyway.

I imagine wRiTinG a poem and having no one to read it to, or wRiTinG a song or a paiNtinG she’d never get to hear/ see or hang on her wall…

I’m not saying it’s gonna be that way but I’m just asking questions like what if she loves me but not what I do? (and maybe this should be the subject to my next song lol).

So well I’m just saying it’s okay if you don’t like all them things, but it only means I’ll have to figure out how to do them in a way that you’re gonna like or find things that interest you and don’t worry if POetRy, raP, paiNtinG, or cOOkinG isn’t one of them… It only means we’ll have to explore the outskirts…

lOvE you to the moon baBes, and where are you sef? Cos I’m still trying to find you!

My GPS got me lost in the woods…

What’s In That Big Open Space… – That Blue???

What’s In That Big Open Space… – That Blue???
I came outside my room after about 30minutes aerobics at my lobby to get some air; some natural air i.e outside before having a shower to wipe off the sweat off my skin, I took a seat on my neighbour’s giant generator breathing heavily and after just a few seconds, my eyes were up gazing at this beauty… this beautiful sky which soon afterwards gave rise to these questions...

I looked deep into the sky, looked South looked up North, looked West looked far East but there was no end to it, all I could see was space; wide open space. Was I really expecting to see anything? A UFO maybe…lol but no there was nothing!! Maybe that premeditation prompted the bigger question “what’s in my open space”? I look at myself most times with a third eye, wondering what lies ahead in my tenebrific realm especially when it seems a little bit rough on the inside, that time when everything seems to be caving in with you sticking your arm right up hoping someone would just grab it lest you get buried beneath the surface.

In about five minutes just  before getting up to take a shower-step, I noticed a relieving smile on my face, think I found the answer, answer to that question  I was asking a few minutes ago, what’s lying in that open space must be something exceedingly beautiful else why can we not see it? It had to be I thought cos if it be nothing then there was no reason hiding it from us, guess that’s why God had to just let the beautiful sky cover us and leave us with the ‘just-imagine’ effect. Then again I thought that my dreams, me, my relationship, my future is thusly beautiful, outrageously since I can’t see it. I can only live with the excitement that comes with it and the feeling of fulfilment it gives me.

Certain things give me that push every day and enough reasons not to break, encouragements from self, beautiful people around me who give me soul lifting words every now and then I couldn’t let them down let alone myself even when I step into that dark planet. I’ve always found a way to turn darkness into light and that sadness into gladness, one of the reasons why I always want to walk home after work every day no matter how tiring or tasking the day was, it is my way of relaxing so don’t come jumping on me trying to give me a lift home (lol at least not now since I’m only a few meters away from the office), I’ve always rejected that kind gesture with a warm smile hoping to diddle them with it and it’s always worked out for me (thanks to my beautiful smiles hehe… ). Each time I see my bosses taking a ride home my prayer begins; oh please don’t ask me to hop into your ride plsssss….lol. And after a few seconds with a smile I say, thank God.

It’s beautiful when you find something to fall back to after a long day; something that brings you back alive, something that awakens your spirit and makes you the beautiful human being that God created you for, cos if darkness was good and was the whole nine yards, then there wouldn’t have been such a thing called day, everywhere would have been locked in it with no traces of light but since we have them in equal share, then its only right to share and enjoy in that big open space everyone has, it is for us to dwell in and always remain hopeful. I don’t know about y’all but, my big open space is BEAUTIFUL!!!

Who Would Cry For The Little Ones?

I live in a country where communal clashes, tribal/ religious often termed political (which I frown at sometimes) conflict/crises is the norm, and before the government intervenes sometimes, a good number of lives and property would have been lost.

The thought of this often drives me crazy and teary-eyed, I think of these little ones and their bullied parents, who live in this fragile world without a voice, and the only time they seem to have one is when their names vanish into thin air, they’re not born hearing-impaired but they sure can’t speak.

Growing up, I know a people who lived in the woods and villages; homesteads, they seldom have offices, perhaps the only pen they hold in their hand is a hoe, and the only sentence they can make out of that pen is a ridge, thus the only book they get to write is a but a farm. Season by season they plough, they have a way of life and it ends in these farms, we survived and still do because of these people. They don’t have hospitals but clinics, buildings but huts, schools but mushrooms, and don’t think for a second they have them in abundance, but, they still are a happy people and remain contented with all they have and are.

As a kid, I used to hear my mom speak of a few clashes that will quickly die down somehow, but not today, not again. They’ve been driven away by insurgencies, out of their farms, their ways of life has been throttled and now heading downhill; take the gun from a soldier and he’s nothing…

These days when I read about these killings and incursions, so many things come to mind, how will they survive if they can’t go to their farms? You destroy their crops forcing them out of the land that gives them everything, you who? The almighty bully; leviathan; fierce and ferocious mean enemy, is that all you know how? You cut the food out of their mouths, burn their houses and slaughter them like chickens. But then again I ask you, what will they do if they can’t go to their farms? I lay on my bed as I wonder… Each time my mom traveled home (the village I.e), she’d come back with loads of food crops, yams were my favorite and couldn’t wait for her to return, these days I’m afraid I can’t tell you that much. They now live in constant fear of been attacked by foreigners on their farms who again rape their women, kings and government where thee? Vision goes dim with no sight of thy shadows, not even with a telescope.

I see these little ones crying over a meal, crying because they only need a meal, they don’t want to know how their parents get it, all they want is a meal, and it is their right to have one and nothing more. Unfortunately, all their parents would want is their once safe farmlands, and interestingly, all the farms want is justice, they don’t want any red liquids of human origin running on their precious green skin but heavenly rains from the sky, that’s all they need. Not your bows, not your arrows, and not your darn machetes; not your guns and daggers, certainly not your African science. But all these little ones would want is for Peace to be restored back to their lands that once breath life and sent them to schools, and made presidents off them, that is what they need. I only wish they could have that…

These are only wishes locked in my mind, locked inside snowballminds left for you to read, and I only wish these wishes could come true, not only on this part of the world but everywhere, Africa, the Middle-East, Europe, just everywhere again…

Love Falling From The Blue Sky

My eyes are looking at my nose, my nose looking at my mouth, my mouth looking at my ears, and my ears are trying to steal glances at my eyes… The world is like a circle, and I’m just watching it spin.

Sometimes that’s always the case with love, you’re loving another, and that person you’re loving is loving another who in turn is in love with another and it goes on and on. But there comes this special moment when as the eye looks at the nose, the nose turns back around and looks at the eye, that’s a moment that changes everything, and suddenly everything is beautiful again. So beautiful that it feels so new, like love never existed the whole time until now. If you ever had a chance to be in love once, you’d know exactly what I’m talking about.

I see love as that safe haven, that mysterious place that has only but beautiful tales, a place where two ying yang twins meet to complement each other, that place where the common goal is but trust, faithfulness, kindness, truthfulness, and all the attributes that comes with the word. That is the realness of the word – love. Each time I hear it, it strikes me as though I wanna keep it for as long as I can, maybe till the end of time. But each time we fall out of it, some give up on it, but the stronger ones try to pick up the pieces and start anew… It doesn’t matter how horrible it ended, or how shattered you were the last time, all that matters is, this time you’re stronger, better, plus this time, you’re fit for love… You look up, and that amazing person falls out of the big blue sky, sent to only you, there your heart opens, there it syncs with this heavenly being, and right there, love takes you both captive, and swallows you up leaving no traces of pain, sadness, or anything awful… And now you know why the whole time you were never prepared.

But guess what? Preparation just met opportunity, Seneca watches from that blue sky and smiles, yes again, it just happened…

FEAR

Trying to conquer fear’s been one of my biggest and greatest weaknesses and the subtle reason behind my procrastinating to things now and again. I kinda let it consume me locking me up in a box left to suffocate until I manage to pull myself out somehow. Albeit it knocks me off and gets the best part of me even before I realize it. And each time I finally get to outrun it, I often feel great and I’d be like, was that all that it was to it? Why then was I so scared in the first place? pssst!!!

And isn’t that the way with fear all the time? You let it clad you allowing the stronger you remain locked inside, concealed. Just like cladding a building made out of concrete with glass giving it that wow effect and fragility so when people see it they be like, “this building’s made out of glass”, it’s so cool… well think again ‘personas’, try shattering it and just maybe, you’ll see the real thing -concrete.
 
DON’T GET COMFORTABLE… With Fear

Fear unlike money isn’t one to get comfortable with, coz the moment you let that happen, you become numb; dumb until you stop growing. You ever wonder why you always have to keep updating the database of your antivirus? Being comfortable is installing the antivirus and that’s it, no further updates ever again; and your system will crash at the plugging of an infected flash drive with the newest virus in town, or it’s like the scientists saying we have too many diseases and outbreaks to deal with (ebola dey town oh…) so no further researches, and countries won’t even need to get belligerent for any reason coz for sure, we have a killer in these viruses. Thus, to obliterate coziness, we must therefore learn how to not get comfortable or better yet, learn how to snap out of it real quick and also being sensible enough to realize it when we’re beginning to get comfortable.

I’ve tried a few tricks myself by saying the words out loud “don’t get comfortable” and it seems to be working, it’s simply telling me that dude! You don’t have any prerogatives to remain here, knock yourself out.
 
DO YOU HAVE A K.O (Knock Out)?

Here’s the thing, whenever I find myself sleeping long hours through the night, wake up in the morning and I’m like darn! I can’t believe I’m late for work again!!! It simply means that sleep has managed to lurk in somehow and there’s something I’m just not doing right.

Sleeping off coz you worked excessively a day before or that you didn’t sleep well the previous night coz you kept busy is pretty normal and excusable, but when you sleep off out of doing nothing? Then we got a problem. Now in trying to curb that effect, there are certain therapeutic measures I’ve placed along my path and doesn’t it seem to work out just fine? Speaking of which, early morning workouts (aerobics) does the trick. That’s my little ‘K.O’ for laziness or eccentric sleep as the case may be. And through the years I found out that experience does help one create or form his/her own K.O, so if you don’t have one yet, don’t worry, time might just do the trick for you until it becomes your magic wand. Tell you what; I have this friend who would slap himself often on the cheek while driving whenever it gets a little drowsy, “different tricks for different folks, different hooks for different notes”… lol(pls disregard my rather obnoxious but frisky attitude… was I rapping??? uhhhh).

Believe you me, trying to fight something that often times seem bigger than you is no doddle (oh thank God for words mehn… 🙂 ) at all, it’s like fighting a billion legions with only but 300spartans but guess what? It’s not in the movies…lol. For what it’s worth, it’s ok to be afraid sometimes, but letting it override you, that just kills your drive, devours your confidence, and makes you less than half the person you were actually supposed to be. An actor once said, “Courage isn’t the absence of fear, it is the presence of fear, yet the will to go on” (Martin Lawrence in the movie Black Night). So, see it this way, as a pin stuck underneath your foot, the pin is fear, and pulling it out, your will to go on.
Think about it, yes you are afraid, but don’t just get comfortable being stuck in it!

-$nowball.

…THE TRUTH ABOUT PH_ (Passion & Hobby)

The hairs on my skin rose to the occasion from the very first moment I heard his deep toned voice on radio. I was mesmerised and I said to myself, oh I pray he’s a Nigerian. It didn’t take me long before I realised that he wasn’t just a Nigerian but also a Jos boy, and wasn’t just a Jos boy but a Junuco boy as well. This means, it’s someone I know to some certain degree. It was MI, Mista Incredible.
He stepped into the Nigerian music industry and in less than a year he had everybody talking. No wonder he named the album “Talk About It”.
On one of his songs MI rapped … “I flow with a passion”.. what I think? Its deep. And there’s more to that statement than just a punch line.
Its so easy to put back the words together for some folks, while for others, its just a cliché.
As easy as they sound, those poignant words could be enigmatic and can thus imply … “I know my onions”. How about you, do you know yours?
Give it some thought. Ever stripped yourself deep down beneath your skin where beauty lies to ask yourself what your passion is? Forget the fame, the job title, the comfort zone, but, is that really you?
Often times, people find themselves in medical schools and what not, not because they actually wanted to, but for the simple fact that okay, my dad is a successful doctor and me being the first son or daughter, it just had to run in the family, and in as much as I crave for a carrier in music or painting, my chances are but slim or even none at all cos my dad thinks am better off a doctor (because am good at it) than in my obscure villa which he considers rather obnoxious and bleak.
Other times its been driven by parental loss, responsibilities of being a father or a single parent that came quicker than you thought deep down to widowhood.
All these could actually restrain you from getting closer to your dreams and until you listen to yourself in that claustrophobic state and pick up the little pieces that make up the beautiful story called “you” , you might never get a chance to pull yourself out of the doldrums.
It’s 4: 00 a.m and it’s been three hours since I began to write. All so dark just me and my deemed light coming from a phone. Tell me what in the world will keep a man awake in the middle of the night all glued to his clutch pencil and paper(diary) just writing? Passion; hobby… haha yeah that. And hobbies like it as not once in you, they never leave, they remain deep inside of you until the end of time.. Fact!!
Someone once said, whatever you consider your hobby, put a little business sense into it and bingo!! Its a hit. Massive success. (That was my big brother some years ago). To the fact, most people are oblivious of their hobbies and often times tend to pretend or even lie about them when asked either in a job application or better yet to themselves. Nobody wants to know how bookworm you are. All they wanna know is how you’re gonna fit in to that field of application and how your impeccable ideas and commitment can turn their organisation around. Picture perfect, if your hobby isn’t anywhere near teaching or impacting knowledge unto others, for the simple fact that you obtained a first class degree or an upper class back in College doesn’t give you a good enough reason to be in those four walls. It’s simply more than that. It takes passion, skill and best of all, patience, lest you flare out your temper at the most cretinous questions asked even when it’s not so ditsy.
Not everyone has the patience to sit down with a pen seven straight hours writing on a blank note, writing what? But to some people, its a way of life, its something they love doing, something they crave for. And while others think its like comprehending with the one that really matters, what i think? Its the honest part of you. You don’t lie to your diary, at least not me.
So imagine taking a hobby for a career? Remember it’s something that gives you an ineffable joy and brings fulfillment to your soul. Tell me, why won’t you excel and not give it your best shot when it’s all that you know. Its something innate, burried in you, spontaneity you’d say, build on it and you’ll bloom like roses. You’ll strategize every minute and find better ways of doing what you know how to do best until it reaches a point where you stop thinking. You become an expert. And experts, they dont think (Frank Lloyd Wright)…

-$nowball

Money Spending Formula?? Or uhmmm… The “3” Formula!!!

My very first blog post and I’m wondering just what to write about. The other day after my boss and I had gone through the stress of all work and no play… we finally wrapped it up with this presentation and shortly afterwards came the happy moment… “Please make my slim wallet fat and add up some weight or even get it obese,” i wouldn’t mind that at all… lol! So after making me happy he left me with these words… Emma! Let me ask you, how do you spend your cash? See, what I normally do – I share mine into three equal parts, one for family, one for my personal needs or what I call running cost, and the last one takes care of my project he said. Hmmm… Interesting and dumbfounded I stood and watched him walk away!! What I thought? It makes a whole lot of sense to me, nothing negative. Well if I never had a spending plan before, at least now I do. Or maybe I did have one in the past, last time i checked, it wasn’t working! So how about we give this a try… Before then though, Bambi my friend just made half a million bucks not long ago and within a split second, he blew it all up, nothing left but just passports and atm cards in his empty wallet. I’m sure by now some of you’d be like… I bet he’s talking about me!!! But let’s just cut to the chase while I let you chew on that. Have you been such people who spent all their cash quicker than they got it, or have you been at the other end swimming in flat pockets coz you couldn’t give an account of how you squandered your hard earned precious gold? Word is, I was just like you a couple of years ago, so hard to get, yet so easy to spend. Tis been a case of “no spending plan” and everything that came just got washed away by flood plus, not even a single penny got saved. Apparently, if a problem came, of cause it had to be bailed out, thereby incurring tons and tons of depths that would add up to the spends of the next probable income. Probable because in a sense, there is little or no chance at all that it’s gonna come again and well if it eventually does, perhaps there was no stipulated time or period. Thus, money fixed or intended for a need could as well be diverted for a want without a second thought, and possible cause of action? Simply indiscipline!

The best way to use money often times seems like the hardest thing to do especially when in hand. This popular cliché says a bird in hand is worth ten in the bush…. But I wouldn’t say the same for money, instead I’d simply say or put this up, < “ money in hand without a plan is worth  nothing at all.” So what’s the way out?

• How do you make the best of your limited resources
• How do you get what you need and not what you want. Best of all…
• How do you solve your problems in full and not in part…

Call it the sharing formula or better yet, the spending triangle. But I call it The “3” Formula… a saving grace for all…

Let’s see how it goes on my next blog post… But remember, save some for the rainy days!!! haha…