Village Burials

 The groaning came from my mother after answering a phone call. I don't know who put  through. The groaning was growing in numbers and seems to be coming in rapid forms that period as she answers. I was sitting on the dining room table scribbling nothing in particular. I was just as usual whiling away time hoping to fall into a writing groove before seriousness will take over. 

That seriousness seems to be my whiling away time as a ritual that summons it in from where I don't know. If those in the know I have not stamped it into my psyche that a muse doesn't

  visit while you are in front of the computer or writing pad and pen at hand and ready to go, i would have believed that what my little ritual summons is a muse but this is not showerrom but dining table in the dining room. So, there is no way it could be muse. What is it then? I wouldn't know but once that being appears and envelopes, eagerness and ready to flow takes hold of me. 

The groaning and answering were still coming in rapid forms and by now, I have realized from little I gleaned from disjointed words from her that someone went away on the journey of no return some refers to as death. The thing now is that I was in an anxious state myself wondering who that person could be. I forget about my muse, the being that my summoning invites whatever sex, age, shape, it is, i don't know or care at that moment. I just want to hear the name of the person that went away eternally.

It came after the long talk and anxious moment it sent my way. Like most expected, it was never from the side I was expecting. Never who I thought it would elicites that deep groaning from my mother. It was my aunt from my father's side. Shit. It was a hit even though the woman is old and cantankerous at times. One of our family members needed to be there to see her buried.

Since no one was near my family, I was the one to represent the family. I don't know the family house well. I have been there in the 90s about four times but things have changed a lot. New houses, new roads, I tried to conjure the image and the route to the house in my mind but kept failing.

In the end i came out with brilliant idea that i don't think will fail. The two sons of the woman have all married and their wives I don't know well, especially the last son that is village based. Opportunity to get to know those of my cousin's wives better presented itself with this death.

I actually don't know the time for the burial but whatever time, i need to be there to see things are in order before people start coming. Canopies and chairs, sourcing of coffins and other tiny things. 

As nature will have it, it was on the day of national protest and people were well inside expecting clashes from the police and the protesters. So there were no buses running as usual. The shorter route back to my countryside was not running normal that Friday, so I needed to take a longer route to the state capital before connecting to my countryside and then find the local cyclist transporter that will take me to the woman village house. That is the only way I can connect to the house easier.

Those cyclists don't have meters in their motorcycles so there is nothing like what the meter reads, you pay. Nay. It was a mouth bargain. Estimate from the person riding the motorcycle. Nothing unified as far as the prices go. Thinking that I was late, the bus I entered to the capital was the run and stop kind. Pick and drop kinds that will take about three times the hour it will normally take to get to its destination. 

Many things and people and changes to see on our route but a man without a settled heart and mind is not a person that enjoys scenic and what they have to offer when on the kind of journey i was on that protesting friday so, i missed a lot of sightseeing sights on the route. 

I was wondering why our driver is tarrying unnecessarily at every stop. But I believed I was the only one heading to the death house on that bus so, others don't understand my haste whenever I groan and moan in anger for the delays. Others seem to be enjoying themselves and it seems as if I am now the selfish person among them for my will trying to override that of 99% others so, I kept my anger and groaned to myself. 

When I got to my country side, I negotiated with the cyclists that rushed me as was the case here. Economy is really bad. How do the familie these riders were its head, pay their kid's school fees and feed themselves? One that agreed to my asking price of five hundred naira and seemed to know his ways around the corners in the village took me from the route I didn't even know existed to the village and  the asking of the woman's house started.

Too many burials that Friday alone in that one village. Many of them are not far from each other.  So it's in many villages that make up my countryside town. You will not believe how many people leave this planet each day till you attend village burials. 

The dead woman village based son with some people have gone to source for the coffin when i finally located the house again and true to my estimation, almost all the houses, the landmarks and people have all changed. There was no way i would have located it on my own. I met the wife who hailed from two states away from ours, and talking to her and commensurating, I came to understand her a bit and took a good look at the face and sound of her voice so that I will not miss her again even in the dark. 

Not long afterwards, the coffin landed and some that went for it came back with it and we offloaded it to the room where my dead aunt was lying in state dressed in the catholic women organization uniform. Funny, out of all the clothes she coveted and all her earthly vanities we all are known for, it was that one piece of inexpensive uniform was her last vanity as far as clothes goes.

She got buried around 5:30 p.m. and I traced my way back to the city that evening.