Mourning Attire

Just my way of passing a message across to those that can read big things from little ones, I refused to wear her mourning dress. Almost all the relatives connected to her one way or the other were on one that every single day she was being bid final farewell.

Food is what keep one alive on earth, if you don't eat, or even feed well, it will come to a time you will be bidding farewell also by those that still eat food on this green earth so i equate any attempt to preventing me from getting money that will ensure i keep food no matter the quality and quantity on my table as wishing to be on uniform to mourn me. I equate such a move to murder attempt on my life and family.

When you want to tell me that you have connections, unruly one as despicable as cult groups controlling the city i get my daily bread from, that without any tangible thing other than nonsense ego, you start thinking on how to prevent good from reaching me, you organized those that threaten the store owners that had been in my family since 1960s when your mother is not even yet married out of the our hands to prevent me from getting my daily bread, why pretend i don't know what happened?

I am not voicing anything out or calling those village and kindred courts kind of "you said and did and I said and did" kind of customary court the village elders here are fond of. Not me. If you can move nocturnally to fix me, and funny enough, i accidently knew because those that made your wish happened suddenly are not seeing what you said to them and wanted discreetly to know why. I already know who my enemy is, not the color of teeth being shown to me.

Well as with the custom here, the immediate family of the deceased will choose the color of the mourning dress they want and send their choice through whatsapp or any other means they found okay to all those related to buy the same color, same design and sew in any style you like. But it must be that color. I did not buy, not out of poverty, but my subtle way of passing a message across. Ha!, my stores, my money. No money to spare on mourning cloth. Had my store still in my hands, I would have… 

Funny enough, this thing called conscience is something else. To think that the day this guy came to bring the traditional instrument some "Umuada" those females born in the village his mum hails from will use to keep her wake in the night before the burial, he came with few of his village guys to deliver the instruments and they were offered traditional garden eggs and peppered peanut butter that goes with it and he never opened his mouth to talk so my old mother don't even know he was the one till he talked and in her surprise, she asked " is that you CY?" As she peeps towards the four youths munching away. "Yeah, Mam"  "And you don't even care to come up and greet" he laughed awkwardly, snickered and came up. I was in my room typing away when I heard and witnessed the scene.

Yeah, my writing is what I escape to these days to purge my mind, spirit and body. I had escaped to it as usual when I heard my mother at the balcony voicing out her surprise ignorantly but I guessed it was a conscience attack at work in him or something.

Funny enough, this my supposed cousin I will call CY for I am educated enough to still have modicum of commonsense in me even though one of the lines of this my supposed cousin is that I am illiterate, not me writing what you are reading but something else supernatural. I am counting that he was among the educated and that his moves proves his educational status.

It's funny that many that had been ringing my illiteracy status as a bell are those I am still wondering about the kind of school they pass through. There is no way in my heart of heart I will ever believe that what they passed through, passed through them. Yet, they are the ones  pointing fingers in my direction in the name of accusation or proving foreign government is right and don't care to halt and ask how come. It's unusual to see foreign government sending such status back home to an ex-convict. 

I was of the opinion that someone will want to know or ask why I am not in uniform like other relatives but none asked even though they were casting glances my way and probably whispering as usual to know why and curse and shake shoulders in curses they believe will be effective when I die. I at times can't stop myself from chuckling seriously from such expectations. 

I am not breaking away from myself like my aunt they buried did and I am guessing even that she was around there in spirit watching people come and go. That possibility never left my mind while I was there. I was highly conscious of that possibility while I was there moving along with others. It can't be only her. I think many of them, especially women, are in this habit of sticking around in spirit when their body is gone.

Why some can't just accept reality and move on, move forward is surprising to me. Reality is what many have failed to accept this century but it's a pity from my calculation for there no frame, no body to climb back into anymore. Why not just face south and call it quit here? Some just want to inherit this earth.

Well, as for CY my cousin, he succeeded in throwing my brother that was fighting to see that we retain the shop in the family. I am of the opinion he sees that as a failure on his side as the first male born as tradition stipulates. Had our father been around, would that have been possible? That kind of question was running around in his head. But I knew better. He was throwing money into seeing that the shops were retained for ego or self assurance or something. But I kept my mouth shut. I don't move around in spirit or engage in what I believe is meant for my good in no foreseeable future. My own God works in a mysterious way. When you think you have cornered me, he is active in such tight corners. I never worry about tight corners, salvations abound in them.

None asked me that uniform question in that burial but I think something else is happening  that some of my other cousins were not voicing out but were hinting and I don't care because I know what I agreed with my God while in foreign land. So, I never shake an inch from all these things, expressed or insinuated happening here.

Since I started following what is happening since this new nature came into an infectious foray into the human kingdom, how humans had been managing themselves and trying and failing to handle what invaded them, I knew that many don't even know why they behave, act, or react the way they do. But I think I can see the reason behind them. So, i was handling my cousin and his move as "Forget about this for they know not what they do" kinda mature handling. So, no need broadcasting it or telling those that don't also know what invaded them or the why of my mourning uniform. I sure will rash out like him only to regret later.

One invaded woman I don't know what her own problem was, was busy accusing me indirectly of everything I don't know indirectly and wanting to know how I think my father will be feeling wherever he is now made me to chuckle a bit. I seem to be doing that chuckling thing more often these days. She doesn't know that the father she was mentioning might be sitting right there beside her or hanging somewhere observing her and her disgruntled state and sighing seriously. That one is an Aunty too.

I think they want this to end up in a test which is their ultimate source of truth. I think to settle ignorant minds, that should be the case when done by an organized body. Some sound in mind groups without personal interest in what is happening.those that are mature as maturity goes. I am for it.