As you know or as you will know very soon, at The Ramblings of a Madman aka Troambyafam, we’re all about you guys. If you aren’t reading, Afam is depressed. If you aren’t sharing, Afam is anxious. And if you aren’t commenting, Afam will make excuses for an afternoon beer. The rest of us are pretty much fine. We’re concerned but we don’t tend to throw ourselves pity parties on the scale that Afam does.
Luckily, you’ve been reading, sharing and commenting at a truly ridiculous rate. There were 16 comments this week alone, and that’s a Troambyafam first. We’ll take a moment to say a massive thank you for showing us that our dreams are valid. Our hearts are full, and our good vibes runneth over.
Reading the comment section is always interesting. The alerts come in by email. It’s lovely when they’re sweet and it’s painful when they’re not, but we love them anyway. Each comment will be replied to individually, but before we get to that we’re going to reply to some of them front and centre where everyone can see.
A year ago, Afam wrote about the 60 Angels. He went to a school in Abuja called Loyola Jesuit College. While he was there, a plane with several of his peers and friends crashed. Sixty of them died. Because of the comment’s gravity, we’ll leave its reply to Afam.
Enter Afam.
This time of year is always painful. It’s ingrained in my flesh. Whenever the eighth of December rolls around I feel it. It’s a longing, a pain and a regret. It just lingers in the air. Every year without fail, I’ll ask myself why, and the answer is always in my calendar. December 10th is round the corner. I’ll think of Wole Ajilore, we roomed together for 5 years and I loved him. He hugged me that morning, fiercely; a hug of never letting go. Bare chest to bare chest; I thought it inappropriate at the time. Now, it’s one of the memories I cherish most dearly. It was as good a goodbye as I could have hoped for. Wole was so badly burned that he was identified with his dental records. I remember his teeth too. They were white, and they had small gaps inbetween them. The sixty are gone but all that knew them will never forget.
We will never forget what they were worth. They were bright. They were good. They had great futures ahead of them.
We will never forget how they died. Nigeria killed them with its petty foolishness, endemic corruption, and its general I don’t give a fuck about anyone nature.
We will never forget our duty to them, to make it so that such a thing does not happen again.
I was moved when I saw a comment from Tee Hillz, Uzo Egwele’s older sister. Like so many others Uzo died that day. She said “Thank you Afam for remembering our 60 angels. I miss Uzo Egwele (my immediate younger sister) terribly and on this day I pray that God continues to give us all the strength to carry on their legacies.”
Thank you. I hope that you know Uzo was loved by us. She had a perfect smile, and she was generous with her time. I wish I could say more, but much of that life is lost to my shoddy memory. I remember her walking down the hallway, green skirt floating in the wind. And Amen.
Exit Afam
Afam’s post about his battle with depression caught second wind recently. So we weren’t surprised when we woke up to this lovely comment by Mr or Miss Anonymous. “Are we really good. We all have our struggles thanks for sharing yours. May the universe be kind to your friend and papa and mama Afam. They are the best for you.”
We agree. Although, they did keep him from the weekly Friday night shenanigans this week. They say that it’s because there are some spirits that come after him in December and that the only safe place they know is their house. We’ve been working to get him back home before midnight as a result, Papa Afam is not a man to be trifled with.
On the blog’s about page, Teni wrote, “Sexy Beast. Yea; Definitely got a crush on this man and his writing. PS: Cougar Alert. Not so cougar though, if you are into women 3 to 5 years older than you.” We approve of this. Afam needs a lady to take care of him, he’s absolutely useless at it, and we’re tired of doing all the heavy lifted. Any assistance would be appreciated.
Sarah Gadau on the other hand was laughing hard at the post about NYSC. We laughed too. We asked him to flee from camp but he was forming hard guy. So we laughed. We even laughed when an insect flew in his eye and scratched his cornea. The quack camp doctors gave him Vitamin C for his condition.
When Chukwudi read that Afam graduated he said, “Congratulations man. Best of luck with all future endeavors and may this degree open better doors for you :-).” Chukwudi is the best guy. In good times and in bad times we can count on him to read this blog. Thank you for your kind words man. They mean everything to the man-child.
On the post about Izien and his fiendish ways, Anonymous said, “What means do we have of judging a man if not his past? - Church agbasala.” What does Church agbasala mean? It sounds good so we’ll take the compliment.
And then Ms Anony Mous struck again. Quoting a line from our article about what you go through when the one that got away gets married she said, "I laugh at anybody that thinks that I, Ms Anony Mous, is holding my breath for them.” She’s clearly got the right idea.
On Death to the Mumu button, abCDeeO wrote, “When do we march? Lol. I’ve missed you. ***Tiny correction- On the blog, we wrote, “space is the request of the confused. You cannot both want me and *NOT* want me.” Thanks so much for the correction. Sometimes, you can’t help but miss the errors, so thanks for picking up our slack. On the same post Oga or Madam U know me said, “I’m in total support of this! Lord! My mumu-ism is out of this world! This needs to stop.” Ah! You need help fixing this. Don’t let any undeserving human being destroy your destiny all because of mumu.
A lot on the blog is drawn from deeply personal moments in Afam’s life, Are you hungry enough is a fine example of this. We’re glad it resonated with one reader who said, “Lord God, if this isn’t my life. *tears*.”
And then on the post about the experience which I wrote with Afam’s help, Anonymous quoted a line, “I kept looking at myself and saying, “is this really you Afam? You’re smiling like a fucking Christian.” and said “Bless you.” We all need blessings we can get don’t we!
Finally we got a question from Kanmi on our Who's Afam page. She/He asked, “Hi Afam! how do i subscribe to your newsletter or something?!” We’re going to put up a portal that doesn’t pop up and ask you to sign up at some point, but until then, you can do it here.
Happy days,
The troamteam.
2 comments:
Flattered that my comment made this post. Haha! I did a quick deconstruction of the sexy beast term to see what part of you I found sexy and what part, beast. Face, fingers - cute. Hence, sexy. Body,beast. Something about your body makes it looks fit for palm wine tapping - and this time, like you fell off the tree. So beast, in the good and not so pretty way. Together though (coupled with your writing), you serve the sexy beast so well.
And to think I was just talking about loyalty in good and bad times. LOL. You're welcome man
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