Twenty-Seven Years and a Day

A Manchester Eclipse

Time is measured in epochs that put our ephemeral existence into insignificance. I have been in the path of a few celestial events, solar eclipses that, without the explanation of modern science, would have left us in total dread and foreboding.

Today in Manchester, we witnessed a partial solar eclipse. Things did not really go dark, but everyone was looking up to behold this once-in-a-lifetime heavenly sight.

I could not get hold of eclipse glasses, so I improvised, making a pinhole camera. I probably needed a bit more depth to the box, but it occupied me enough that I did not dare to look directly at the sun.

An AI-generated infographic on the blog content. (Click to enlarge.)

Finding a Better View

As I live in an urban city centre with many high-rise buildings, getting a good view first entailed standing by the roadside, before I made my way to Mayfield Park, which we as residents sometimes forget is so close and quite vast.

I watched it well beyond the maximum before a lady offered me her glasses, and I then looked directly at the majesty of our universe.

Twenty-Seven Years Earlier

Twenty-seven years and a day ago, we had another solar eclipse. This one was quite prominent; not totality, but you saw and noticed the dimming of the light. As the light dimmed, it took on a sepia hue, almost like being inside a photograph from the 1940s.

It was also a different place. I was visiting a friend in the Netherlands, who lived out in the countryside at Doorn, and what a spectacle we saw in his garden.

Doorn is also the town in which the Kaiser of Germany spent his last days. Wilhelm II abdicated in 1918 and lived at Huis Doorn until his death in 1941; fittingly, he seems to carry that same feeling of the 1940s that the sepia light evoked.

The House at Doorn

My friend's mother took me on a tour of Huis Doorn. As her father had been the groundsman, their house stood on the grounds, and she, with the other children, would run around the house having tea with the Kaiser.

She showed me the chutes they slithered through to get from one part of the house to another: a historical monument, visited with a guide whose own history was formed within its walls.

A Turning Point

I cannot tell why an eclipse could be both momentous and auspicious. I did not see the future, for I had just come out of a seven-year relationship. We remained friends and planned a short holiday to Brussels.

As he returned to England, I headed north to Holland. Nine months later marked the beginning of a new life in the Netherlands, twelve and a half years of it. No, it was not to enter a relationship, though I remained in contact with my friend in Doorn.

Written in the Skies

And God said, "Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years, and let them be lights in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth." And it was so. [Genesis 1:14-15 NIVUK]

I do not do things by chance. This might be a harbinger of things to come; the least you can do is to be ready for when change and opportunity come.

Life is like a story written in the skies, sometimes clear, at times cloudy, and even, on occasion, in the dimness and haze of sepia. It comes as experience, to be written into memory and history.

A Gemini Notebook AI Podcast on this blog

Thought Picnic: The Many Mirrors of Criticism

The Mirror and Its Drip

Criticism is a mirror, but not all mirrors are polished the same way. The polishing might bring clarity, or the mode of polishing might scratch the surface and distort what we see. When we look in the mirror, we hope to see the best reflection of ourselves rather than a caricature that makes us recoil.

Dripping criticism is subtle and persistent. It is the raised eyebrow, the “interesting choice” comment, the slow leak of disapproval that erodes confidence over time. A manager who says, every week, “We'll need to tighten this up eventually,” without clarity or support, creates doubt rather than direction.

I dare say this almost always comes from familiar settings: the parent who has constantly said something that becomes ingrained in memory, a habit formed with the intent to change yet one that does the opposite, creating tension, resistance, and resentment.

Left unchecked, those early and well-meant words settle into the inner critic we carry into adulthood, a voice that goes on speaking in a parent's cadence long after the parent has fallen silent.

Burning on Contact

Caustic criticism burns on contact. It is sharp, often clever, and sometimes public. “Did you even read the brief?” may get a laugh from bystanders, but it scars the recipient. Its power lies in humiliation, not improvement.

Its purpose is to reduce a person to insignificance; it highlights inadequacy in order to expose weakness. The person on the receiving end is likely to shrink, wishing the ground would open so they might fall into the crevasse. It is wholly unkind, the bailiwick of the sociopath.

Tearing Down

Destructive criticism tears down without offering a path forward. “This whole plan is a mess” ends the conversation instead of advancing it. It may be emotionally satisfying to the critic, but it leaves both the work and the worker diminished.

This goes beyond cynicism; it is the need to complain without helping or offering solutions. It sees the problem clearly yet fails to realise that identification is not resolution. There is a close cousin here in withering criticism, the scornful, contemptuous remark designed to make a person wilt on the spot.

It borrows the sting of the caustic and the finality of the destructive, which is perhaps why it is so hard to place: it wounds like the one and forecloses like the other.

Care and Clarity

Constructive criticism, by contrast, is anchored in care and clarity. It names the issue and points towards growth. “The introduction is strong. The argument would be clearer if you added evidence in paragraph two” respects both the person and the goal. It assumes capability.

This brings the best of helpfulness to the fore: empathy, guidance, and emotional intelligence, which engender growth and productivity. It takes a wholly different mindset. Yet every sort of criticism, given with the right intentions, can become constructive; it depends on motivation, desire, and drive.

Gentler Forms and Love

There are gentler forms too. Reflective criticism asks questions rather than making declarations. “What outcome were you hoping for here?” invites ownership.

Self-criticism, when healthy, refines craft and character; when excessive, it becomes an internalised drip. Cultural criticism challenges norms and systems rather than individuals, asking whether the rules themselves deserve revision.

Ultimately, criticism reveals as much about the giver as the receiver. The best criticism carries three traits: specificity, proportionality, and goodwill. Without goodwill, it corrodes. With goodwill, even hard truths can build something stronger than what existed before.

Its reach is wider than the work in hand, for over time criticism shapes confidence and character, bolsters or erodes self-esteem, tips us towards obstinacy or leaves us open to persuasion, and quietly colours the way we see the world; but that is a thread for another day.

Beyond goodwill, perhaps the real driver of the best kind of criticism is love: a deep love, concerned to bring about the kind of change in others that we wish for ourselves. The root of that is self-love, from whence springs the ability to love and to be loved in return.

A Google NotebookLM AI Podcast on this blog

Memory Pain

The Familiar Stranger

As I was walking to work this morning, I had the onset of stomach cramps, the abdominal pain I have written about often, which I have experienced since childhood. I don't know what brings it on, but if I remember correctly, I last had this discomfort 14 months ago.

It is different from what you suffer with food poisoning; after emesis and bowel movement, you are usually alright. The other situation comes after a hot shower; lying on my belly cushioned with a soft pillow makes things subside.

Memory and Recognition

This is memory pain, like a visitor you cannot bar from coming round to your place, it comes with a keen recognition, and the way it begins to tire you out is remarkable. For comfort, I take highly sweetened milky tea. It eases but rarely cures; however, some bed rest helps.

Yet, there is another concern. My tolerance of pain is high. I would endure discomfort for longer than is necessary as I attempt to put the issue out of my mind, even when it is becoming unbearable.

Perspective Through Experience

My reflexes have been schooled by cancer pain; any other kind of pain seems almost insignificant by comparison. I would rarely take analgesics because the pain is not deemed that serious.

Though pain is your body telling you something is wrong that needs addressing, I reckon I can bear it and manage. Do not think I treat the endurance of pain as a sign of machismo; it is more a matter of perspective derived from lived experiences.

Dignity and Humility

Eventually, after completing a change request in the office, I decided to leave for home. Walking back, I banished thoughts and images of me just falling in the middle of the street, writhing in pain. Could one be too dignified for such a humbling by sudden incapacity?

I am grateful for one last thing: regardless of the pain I am suffering, I have never lost my sense of humour or my ability to write about what I am going through.

For now, Akin is indisposed and taking a bed rest, looking towards a speedy recovery with a prompt return to verve and vigour.

Pain through the times

Blog - I remember this tummy ache (October 2007)

Blog - Take away the pain (September 2009)

Blog - Knowing pain is personal (August 2021)

Blog - The pain is a long story (September 2023)

Blog - That unwelcome discomfort from youth came visiting today (November 2024)

A Google NotebookLM AI Podcast on this blog

For Healing and Forgetting

Abandonment and Healing

I suppose everybody hurts in different ways, and the path to healing may never be a prescription like a pill to deal with a simple headache. Over the past year, as I have lived in the expectation of turning 60, I have also relived memories and events from my early childhood that exude all kinds of pain.

On several occasions, I have shared my experience of secondary boarding school and how the lasting impact meant I have no enduring relationships from that time, neither with friends nor teachers. Whilst there are occasional messages from old schoolmates, I received only one congratulatory message representative of my time in secondary school.

The Trauma of Boarding School

Whilst I was aware of the broader decision-making process my parents engaged in when putting me in boarding school far away from home, it was only recently that I began to appreciate some of the trauma associated with that phase of my life. The privilege of going to boarding school should not mask the lifelong consequences of that experience.

It was meant to toughen me up and give me a sense of independence, but it also destroyed my trust and willingness to confide in them about other aspects of exploitation and abuse that I had suffered before, during, and after the boarding school period. I internalised so much when I should have been screaming for help.

Even when I took therapy, it was limited to addressing the catastrophic loss of status, means, and livelihood after my first encounter with cancer. I still had to fight for that service because I presented none of the indicators of ideation that people typically display with depression or even suicide. Yet I was hurting and suffering, coping mostly through what I learnt in my religious beliefs.

Understanding Boarding School Syndrome

The psychologist Joy Schaverien, who died in 2025, described the hidden trauma from early boarding school experiences using four key elements: Abandonment (separation from parents), Bereavement (grief from loss of family), Captivity (powerless feeling in an institutional setting), and Dissociation (detaching from feelings to cope).

She termed this the ABCD of Boarding School Syndrome, though it should not be limited to the boarding school experience in England alone. I was in boarding school in Nigeria, and it extends beyond those institutional settings to family and life in general.

Abandonment came in many forms: the early months of incubation, being left with foster parents (a norm in the 1960s that acquired the term "farming"), even one 'caring' family starving me, the mental torture of being threatened with reliving a dreadful experience to buy my silence, the lack of curiosity when abuse was reported, and obviously the boarding school experience itself.

This was compounded by the refusal to bring me back after realising my coping mechanisms were highly stressed. [The Guardian: ‘Farmed’: why were so many Black children fostered by white families in the UK?]

Given time, I could develop the other elements of 'BCD', but there is enough in Abandonment to see how it can be the root of additional trauma. None of this has found any means of discussion between the affected parties, except in the catharsis of my writing over the last two decades.

Love and Protection

This is not to say that I am unloved. I am deeply loved, but trauma can set you up for feeling both unloved and unlovable. Love cannot be passive; it needs expression and the conveyance of tangibility and feeling.

Much as we do need a hedge of protection around us in all the issues of life, that hedge can easily look like prison walls, giving you the earnest desire to escape because you are caught in a claustrophobic enclosure that suffocates every facility of self-expression. Their protection becomes your prison, an overcompensation that does no one any favours.

Faith and Letting Go

In three situations, this aspect of hurt has been challenged: from preaching tapes I have listened to, in a sermon at the crossover service I attended on New Year's Eve, and from Brian. "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past." [Bible Hub: Isaiah 43:18]. You wonder, how do you let go of the past when it still has that much of a hold on you?

It involves taking your eyes off that and looking to see something else that God is trying to catch my attention with. "See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland." [Bible Hub: Isaiah 43:19]. This would suggest I do not need therapy, but belief, trust, and faith. A bit of empathetic counselling could help build that trust too.

Finally, much as it is difficult to explain, there is healing in reconciliation: just reconnecting and carrying on rather than raking over the coals of angst and trauma. Let God handle the broken wings, as we get beyond the narrative to become more than just Boarding School Survivors of childhood and adolescent trauma. The eagle will fly and soar again.

References

The Guardian: ‘Breaking our spirits was the plan’: the lifelong impact of having gone to boarding school

Bloomfield Health: Boarding school syndrome

LinkedIn: Boarding School Syndrome: Understanding the Hidden Trauma Behind Privileged Education

Hope Therapy and Counselling Services: Did Boarding School Shape Who You Are?

A Google NotebookLM AI Podcast on this blog

My Dear Boy: Turning Sixty

Reflecting on Six Decades

I suppose for most people, except those who, as a matter of doctrine or belief, do not observe celebrations, birthdays are moments of significance marked with both reflection and revelry. I would not suggest I am given to the latter except under duress.

From yesterday into today, I have received many congratulatory messages across numerous platforms to celebrate this momentous day. Family, friends, neighbours, the church community, acquaintances, colleagues, and well-wishers have contributed in ways that have made the day exceedingly memorable.

One such endearing message came from my father, including the phrase, "My dear boy." In that simplicity of language, my father had encapsulated the span of 60 years into a single memory and recognition. [Facebook Status]

The surprise of my birth, announced by a telegram dropped through the letterbox at 7:00 AM, invited him to attend the maternity home immediately for formal matters concerning my transfer to a larger hospital for neonatal intensive care for premature births. Then the realisation that that child is now 60 must be profound.

Heartfelt Tributes and Quiet Celebration

Brian, my partner, wrote a proclamation that should, at some point, be recorded as a dramatisation of a town clerk announcing at the entrance of a city hall the significant occasion of a diamond jubilee.

The low-key event I preferred took place in the Manchester Cathedral library within a bible study group, where we had, amongst other things, a cheese platter and cupcakes. Then, in the evening, my neighbours, who had put up "Happy 60th Birthday" banners in our corridor and on my door, took me out for a meal.

As expected, I also made full use of napping time, so I missed many calls on my phone. Some I was able to return much later in the day.

Staying True to Myself

Some who would think one should have had a grand celebration or now prepare for one, but that is not what I want, need, or desire. I am not the partying type; the prospect of it is already draining my resolve, and I hope I can nip it in the bud before it gains support, currency, and momentum.

Thank you to everyone who has graciously afforded me love, recognition, consideration, and greetings for my birthday. May the joy of Christmas and the best things for the New Year be with you, your kith and kin.

Living the breeze of Cape Town

Cape Town on My Mind

I might miss Cape Town this December, but when I look back on the last seven years, I have spent a bit of every month of the year there, except for February and March.

This city brings me more than joy. I get to spend beautiful moments with Brian: walking the promenade, shopping at the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront, eating and dining in friendly restaurants, feeling the breeze on long stretches of beach that seem to have no end for miles, attending cultural events, and basking in the nature and beauty of Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden.

If we wander away from Cape Town, it is to a wine estate, though we have not done that in a while. We live and desire Cape Town as the destination of our dreams. We can be as occupied as we can be idle, but every moment is fulfilling. Nothing beats the yearning to return and have an extended, or even permanent, stay there.

The Cape Town I Know

After Brian met my best friend in Pretoria last month, Kola left for Cape Town, where he saw the city through my eyes and my knowledge of the places he went to, as if we were there together.

Such is the familiarity and sense of belonging that we, Brian and I, have acquired. However, we need to cultivate stronger ties and relationships beyond just knowing the city: to have friends and become part of the community.

In some ways, Brian also needs to take the initiative on planning and scheduling, rather than suggesting outlandish ideas that he would never attempt, like hiking up Table Mountain or paragliding from the mountain to the Sea Point lawns. He uses these crazy ideas as a tactic to get me to suggest something less dangerous.

Cape Town in Our Hearts

We rarely do anything on the scene, just as I have no such interest in Manchester, but there is much to gain from engagement in the churches we attend.

We seem to attract both interest and curiosity, and for most of the time we have met with a very welcoming and enriching atmosphere. Brian, though, would rarely attend church alone, usually after I have left, when being there could provide some succour for the feeling of separation.

Cape Town exudes that vivid quality of pictures, memories, events, and feelings, all too real in my mind. Even from 9,900 kilometres away, I feel the warmth, hear the waves, and could touch the wooden slats of the benches at Nobel Square, watching the clouds billowing over Table Mountain and listening to the marimba bands performing as we sip Mango Bang fruit smoothies. We do love Cape Town.

Dreamscape: Truancy presages abject failure

Why I was a truant

It is becoming like a haunting of my dreams, for in times past, I played truant. My absence from class could never be properly understood. When one school report included the word "truant," my mother, a secondary school principal at the time, took such offence that I had to check if we were sharing the same meaning of the word.

In secondary school, my truancy was borne of boredom: boring teachers, even more boring subjects, and a total lack of engagement. In my English class, for instance, the whole activity was pedestrian. I was probably not helped by the fact that English is my mother tongue, as opposed to a second language, even though it was the official language of Nigeria.

Later in life, I came to understand that while I naturally understood the language, I did not understand the mechanics of it. I knew why a sentence had to be a certain way, but not how the elements of language were arranged to make it so. This became evident when a Dutch teacher of English used my intuition as a native speaker to review his notes. I found myself learning about the scaffolding that gives English its structure and grammar.

The unpleasantness of bad English

Elsewhere, my disinterest was compounded by distraction. In certain classes, I was so clueless about what was going on that I drew a total blank. It would have been so helpful to have had a student affairs department that addressed emotional, mental, and psychological health; I might have been saved a lot of misery.

The worst culprit, however, was a lecturer in electrical materials. His teaching style rankled to the point of irritation, and how he ever became a lecturer in a tertiary institution baffles me to this day. If he had used sign language, I might have been more engaged. Nearly every sentence of more than two words contained a malapropism or a grammatical flaw, and I felt such an urge to correct him that I could barely listen.

I remember in primary school, a new pupil came to our class and announced, "Teacher told me to come to class." We all laughed, as it sounded different, strange, and odd. He ended up in another class, but we soon became good family friends.

Always found wanting in Maths class

The haunting that has invaded my dreams for a long time now is finding myself in an advanced Mathematics class with no idea of what is going on. The lecturer walks in expecting the submission of some homework and then continues a topic I cannot seem to grasp, with the final examinations only a couple of weeks away. It is never a comfortable place to be; in that dreamy world, you are left wondering how to avert the looming prospect of failure.

I do, however, remember one final Mathematics examination. On the Friday before, I was not convinced I had the wherewithal to tackle the subject to the best of my ability. I found a primary school blackboard and worked through each of the topics to fix the gaps in my understanding. By Sunday evening, I was sharing better proofs of equations and theorems with others. I got an 'A' in that subject.

Between the dreamland that occupies the present and the reality of old, where I got it all together, I think of copying my friend's notes to pay off the knowledge deficit. Yet, a niggling thought suggests that I will not be able to pull it off.

The dream never goes beyond the lecture class, but the foreboding of failure lingers. What is it in my life that is showing up as a parable of omission and unpreparedness in my dreams? That is the mystery, something to pray for insight about.

The price of not forgetting

Mind what you show

A while ago, I saw something both unusual and attractive in a face online, and did wonder who it was. I was gripped by curiosity but unaware of the tools at my fingertips to satisfy it.

In one of those events of one thing leading to another online, I happened upon PimEyes, a website that thralls the Internet for image similarities, it uses a form of Artificial Intelligence and for the free product, it is good.

I did find the face and just the other pictures and URLs you could not visit on the free version was revelatory. Let's just say you do not want to put pictures online on sites and profiles that could leave you compromised.

That it out of face

The same happened with a chap with totally enviable model looks, I found out where he took his modelling pictures from one of the URL results, but some other pictures were in flagrante dilecto, giving full expression to his sexual proclivities.

The prude in me did wonder how such a beautiful man could be up to such naughtiness. Even in my wildest years, my nudity never included a face, which must be a law, a rule never to be broken regardless of your state of sobriety, except where that is your clear intention.

It’s somewhere online

However, more pertinent was the impression of the Internet never forgetting, when a website I used for a core part of work research went offline months ago.

As I needed information only it could provide, in simplicity, I found the Wayback Machine, a website that does a sweep of the Internet, it periodically captures literally anything published online, it is an internet archiving resource. I was back in my element for the recall of an essential service.

My blog started in December 2003, hosted by a local company in Scotland that I thought I was supporting until they decided they found no more pleasure in hosting blogs in mid-2010. The harsher lesson was they used proprietary tools which made it impossible to migrate my blog to another hosting provider.

We were given 18 months to do whatever we could to get our content off before the hosting facility closed down in 2012. It took a good few weeks to copy each of the over 1,500 blogs to another location, but I lost the images, internal links, and interactions in comments.

Publish and be damned

Imagine, 13 years later, I plugged my old URL in the Wayback Machine and up came captures from 2003 to 2012, including comments.

All was not lost, just somewhere, if you knew where to find it. That is both a solution and a problem, how you can find what you thought you had lost, but worse still is what others can find that you had totally forgotten, you had done.

When Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington was being blackmailed to be left out of the saucy memoirs of his mistress Harriette Wilson, he retorted, “Publish and be damned.” The publisher Joseph Stockdale did publish, but retribution came through others who ruined him with libel suits.

To many of us, there is probably no fear of libel or defamation, just the unfortunate situation of someone being able to dig up something from the past and make it relevant to the present, at a point of ascendancy, that you might have to relinquish an honour, an accolade, or a position in ignominy.

Think about what you post or court controversy at your peril.

A second fainting spell, fifty years apart

Just a lift too high

He lifted my right leg by the foot towards the back, and I was out. I cannot tell how long I was out for, but I eventually came to, and considering he neither panicked nor called for help, it could not have been that long.

That was fifty years ago, around this time of the year. We had gone cycling together into the wilderness among the tin mines of Jos, near Rayfield. This was both adventurous and dangerous. We once came upon a gathering of menacing men who not only shooed us away, but they were also quite threatening, though it is unlikely that reporting them to the police would have made much difference.

On that day, we had ridden out on an uncharted route around the paddocks, too deep to approach, with standing water that spelled danger and death by drowning, with the possibility that one may not be found at all. However, that was a story of childhood.

Woozy, down and out

What brought back that memory was suddenly standing up, and I had a serious woozy feeling, very much like when I took my eighth COVID-19 booster on Monday. I had willed myself back from the pharmacy to the office and sat down; everything seemed to sort itself out in minutes.

This time, I grabbed onto something, thinking I was holding on until I heard a crashing sound. It was me hitting the floor, and I lapsed into a kind of dreamland, believing I was still holding on and about to get up.

I was out, quite totally out, and I cannot remember how long for; I just realised I was picking myself off the floor and made for the sofa to sit down and gather myself together. What just happened? I had a fainting spell.

A bit delicate, I realise

Until this afternoon, I had handled these sudden drops in blood pressure caused by standing or sitting up quite well. I think it was exacerbated by my medication, which, as an alpha-blocker, could accentuate light-headedness and, in some cases, lead to passing out.

It was not a side effect I had associated with the medication, having only learnt of this usually rare side effect from a YouTube video this morning. [The NHS: About Tamsulosin]

While I have tried not to feel too delicate in my recovery stretch, the reality suggests that I need to be more careful and considerate of the unforeseen events that could put me at great risk and peril. The knowledge is helpful, and I am doing quite well after that episode.

Postscript: The medication for the treatment of benign prostate hyperplasia (an enlarged prostate), also treats high blood pressure.

Sam: Most impactful in lowly endeavour

Beyond the strength we have

Understanding and appreciating frailty after illness or treatment for disease can be a difficult thing. We strive as much as possible to get back to normalcy even if our bodies suggest we are nowhere near the capacity for the abilities we once had.

The bodily stresses of fatigue, lethargy, weakness, or tiredness are signals requiring action from rest to additional medical attention towards some sort of resolution. The life and circumstances we live in harshly dictate the reality of there being no pills for the bills.

Even where we have a cushion of support to banish the concern of livelihood, we need some sort of activity to take our minds off infirmity and adversity. Having lived through this sort of thing, I am quite acquainted with the issues involved.

Escaping illness for work

Attending the office this morning, I was met with some rather sad news, the lady who maintains and cleans the office, with whom I have had a good rapport had passed on. I saw her barely 3 weeks ago, it was my first time back in the office since before I commenced radiotherapy in September.

We had a few conversations, a big catchup from the end of June when she had been in hospital for an extended period and though she was back at work, she looked rather gaunt and frail, we were both glad to see each other. It never occurred to me that it would be the last time.

The shock of learning of her demise was quite unsettling, someone would suggest she returned to work much earlier than necessary, but how do you gauge the right time to return to work if all your life you have espoused dignity in labour? Call some of us old-fashioned, we’d rather work than get by on handouts or welfare.

The value in everyone

For those who can game the system to exist in indolence, there can be no praise or adulation. I guess it belies the flaws in the system. To live a purposeful life is what matters. Sam, as I remember her was forthright, clear-minded, tough, and engaging. I remember my father not wanting me to converse with the help, but how could we be in proximity and not engage?

Sam’s work kept the office environment clean, conducive, clear, and comfortable. She was as much a member of our team as anyone else, if not one of the most important of us all for what she did, for without her contributions, no one would consider the office a place to work.

As I have always taken my time to chat to everyone most especially the cleaners, she would be sorely missed. May her gentle soul rest in peace. Her light has gone but her memory remains.

Martinair: Memories of returning to work after cancer

One man’s passing and my story

A waking moment to attend to a nature call, then a brief glance at my phone to find that J. Martin Schröder had passed on early last month at the age of 93.

The obituary I read in the Telegraph filled in many gaps in my knowledge of the man who I never met but whose company on the verge of being absorbed by another played a significant role in my life. [The Telegraph: J Martin Schröder, enterprising Dutch pilot who built Europe’s first budget airline]

In early 2010, it was a dauntingly impossible task to write a resume with a one-year gap for jobs I used to be able to cherry pick for highly remunerated contract rates. Times when I could take a month or two off work to do other things were a luxury I could no longer afford.

Have you a job for me?

In the aftermath of the failure of my health and treatment for cancer, I had received a grace period from my creditors and despite the generous welfare payments I eventually applied for, 8 months later than I should have because I was unaware of my entitlements in the Netherlands, I was ready to get back to work even though I barely had the strength for any activity.

I had this idea to place a notice on LinkedIn explaining my situation to my network and out of it came an opening, a young colleague I worked with a few years before contacted me saying the job is not what I normally do but I could be useful for the project his recruiting outfit was getting personnel for. If only I had an enterprising business head like him, he worked on both sides of the game.

A different engagement

I attended an interview, and I cannot say it was my perspicacity that got me the role, I was a shadow of myself in many ways, but I was given the opportunity, there and then.

I got into the activity; it was an IP Renumbering project with Martinair the airline and cargo company. Their IT infrastructure had IP Address ranges that overlapped with that of KLM, all their systems needed to be reconfigured for the absorption into the broader enterprise.

My first 5 days at work totally knocked me out, I was too tired to get any rest, I was more exhausted than I had ever felt before, that it immediately dawned on me, that I was everything but superhuman, I needed to slow things down. In the process, I was able to negotiate a 4-day week with Wednesdays off.

The project was canned after 2 months and resurrected a month after to the end of the year. It gave me a big break and I am forever grateful to the many colleagues who accommodated my issues through the project. It was my last job before I left the Netherlands to return to the UK.

Grateful for the opportunity

That stint at Martinair meant I could notch up another industry in my career profile and to think I had worked so close to Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in Hoofddorp and Schiphol-Rijk for many years without being in that industry.

I however maintain my links with the Netherlands through the Flying Blue loyalty scheme as I mainly fly with Air France-KLM except where they do not serve the intended route.

I cannot think of what I would have done if Martinair, the dream and enterprise founded by J Martin Schröder, did not have a job going. So many memories and some enduring friendships too. I acknowledge them and to the great man and pioneer in the aviation industry, may his soul rest in peace.

To that lonely man of Quernmore

The England that was

A big house stands lonely in remote Lancashire in the hilly countryside that looks far away from anything known bequeathed in a legacy to a man who served a family for a long time, and it became his hideaway.

Born in the closing of the Depression just as the Second World War began, to a young couple who might have ancestry that stretched to the ends of Yorkshire, steeped in the Victorian working-class values of duty and service, of which they were obviously exemplary.

The road sign to this village is one of those English placenames that is a Shibboleth, it sets apart the locals from the outsiders, and fascinating it is.

Happy and sad together

And 80 years to the day, tragedy and fortune struck, in Arnhem a father never returned and in Lancaster, a girl was born, and so was a life so marked from that day until the very end. He was the grandson of grieving parents as his mother cradled his little sister in her arms.

This is not my story, but one for which I seek to remember a man who was uncle to my friend. We all have uncles that we fondly remember, who we know and yet do not, whose persona reveals cleaves of the unsearchable travails of life represented in their quirks and tics.

In the passage of time, mother passed on for he never left her side to travel or get married, a lifelong protector even from a boy, seeing duty like he might have been told by his father as he left for war, make sure you take care of your mother. And now, he also had a little sister to watch over too.

The forever memories

When I met him during my many memorable sojourns to Lancaster for Christmas, his impression of things might have belonged to a forgotten age, but nothing he said was out of malice, it was a way of making conversation and you dug deep for wit and laughter rather than take offence.

I knew once the bond that brought us all together at Christmas had gone, he would become a total recluse back in his big house out of reach and out of sight, usually sought by his nephew and rarely seen except for letters and notes. He was free from the oath to care for his mother and the rest of the world could care for itself.

No one could blame him and what might never have been truly known was he was both liked and loved, every visit to another village in Lancashire would include the thought to ask after him. We sadly learnt that he had left his footprints in the sands of time now only to be remembered with a sigh and in dreams.

The lonely man of Quernmore (KWOR-mər) is gone. May his gentle soul rest in peace.

Thought Picnic: We will not be deprived of our memories

I beg to differ

Under the guise of misremembering with the advantage of being caught unawares in the heat of the moment or a discussion, you hear things that on reflection you know for a fact were never the situation when what is being referenced is recalled differently.

Oh, that we had the presence of mind to call out those things before they become the new narrative presented as the truth it never was. You do wonder if you are being taken for a fool or if the recollection is working in the assumption that you must have forgotten the reality that you experienced in full living colour.

How it really happened

The capacity of my memory sometimes amazes me, books and records of the senses in motion left apparently gathering dust in the shelves of the mind, at moments of deep thought and reflection get dusted off and leafed through to pages of an instant relived unmistakably as it is real.

It is against that vivid recollection that some seek a revision of the fact to suit a new narrative and press a point of view that is entirely invalid. If one were to look at this charitably, how we are being lied to and taken for dullards is expressed in their talking out of both sides of their mouths.

Our silence buys peace

The lasting effect of that sometimes-inadvertent deception is distrust and anger, for once again, you are discounted in the equation of things as inconsequential and irrelevant. Your restraint or occasion to the unfortunate absence of mind is taken as agreement and acquiescence. It ultimately comes to my writing to redress the false impression, it matters little whether it is read or not.

What we have been witnesses to, remains an aspect of our participation, that no one thought to ask how we were affected by it lends itself to certain cultural norms that appear to infer that time resolves things and children forget things. Nothing could be further from the truth. We compartmentalise and put things away to save ourselves from trauma, it is a self-preservation mechanism more than anything else.

We saw it all even if we did not offer an opinion then. When they think they have pulled the wool over our eyes, we see through it all, that the perfect is as imperfect as it is given to wilful corruption. What we excuse is for the sake of peace and de-escalation of the confrontational, the day we decide to challenge the presumptions, no one can be prepared for the shock of our clear perceptions.

Thought Picnic: The convenience of what we choose to remember

Games of the memory

It is easy for others to forget or misremember things when things are remembered, they could also be remembered differently from how events occurred, where things happened, and who was involved.

Too frequently, we are blindsided by the misremembered or forgotten, though whether that is deliberate or inadvertent, one cannot say in the purity of innocence or the sleight of chicanery.

With one’s parents this can be interesting, the charges you want to lay against them, they would rather have forgotten or swear never happened, whilst the accusation they level against you they expect to be a perfect recall of memory, unfailing and playing back like film. Maybe, this is where one learns forgiveness because it feels like taking poison oneself and expecting the other person to be affected.

Feelings of the memory

The wrongly accepted canard is that the child by the passage of time and the influence of life soon forgets totally and never recalls, if ever. That is rarely the case, things are left in the recesses of memory and certain triggers lift them out of the archives of the mind to present new realisation and probably in new contexts too.

Many of these things might not appear in my blogs but have come up in conversation with others, much at the risk of cynicism that subterfuge is at play. What I do is note them down for the broader narrative of the story that the spectrum of the best to the worst is usually represented in relationships.

That way we have been wronged by those we love as much as we have been loved by those we wronged. Each has their own perspective, and no one owes the other a convincing story; most of the time, it is the words of Maya Angelou that ring true, “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” It works both ways, especially in the words of our kindred.

In the quest for that sliver of constructive criticism that mattered

The hostile oven of criticism

“Oò serious, Akin”. Is a code switch of mixing languages that you might find among people who speak more than one language, and in this case, this is a Yoruba-English construct roughly meaning, “You’re not serious, Akin.” I however found out that the Dutch who are usually polyglots find the mixing of languages confusing.

The many variants of this phrase, I have heard as the lead-in to criticism and excoriation, an unchallengeable viewpoint posited by those with responsibility, means, opportunity, and the power arrogated to deliver the cutting without the growing.

Along with this, is another in Yoruba, “Kí lón ṣe ẹ́?” “What is the matter with you?” Delivered with sneering, disdain, and derision, maybe just disappointment, but implicitly implying you are not trying hard enough with all the advantages, privileges, and benefits you might have in relation to others, not accounting for any extenuating circumstances that anyone is willing to discover.

Humiliation as character building

In one seminal case, when I was addressed with the first statement, I dared to respond that I thought I was doing my best. It was taken as disrespectful and an affront, and at that point, another uncle stepped in to deliver a stinging slap, before commanding I grovel and apologise. Then, it was necessary to compound the humiliation by being ordered to do house chores, which we had someone employed to do.

Somehow, in many cases, there was an absence of constructive criticism in elements of my upbringing, though, that is not to say that I was not a difficult child and adolescent, I had my issues, and I could argue that they were not considered important in the scheme of things.

Bygones that cannot be foregone

Why dredge up these historical events when as the patriarch is wont to say, let bygones be bygones? It is because the bygones were defining even if the instigators would like to forget what they did and the impact of the same. There is a child in us that never forgets, despite all the work we do in self-development to ensure that the hold of the past does not become a limiting factor in our present or immediate future.

We all bear scars that we apply the makeup of presentation, expression, and personality to conceal to varying degrees of success, it is gratifying that there were still people who believed in us and supported us from under the crushing weight of unrelenting criticism and much else.

Where a child lives

It reminds me of something I read that is attributed to Dorothy Law Nolte who articulated quite succinctly the power of positive youth development. It appears on many posters that I read, and I tried to convince myself that much of what I experienced was positive and a good deal was, but it is never that easy to forget the criticism, the ridicule, the insecurity, the threats, the unfriendliness, and all that feeding a debilitating fear than was deemed respectful.

One moment of searing endearment and concern was delivered when they both ganged up on me in the administration of corporal punishment. He was taking a breather, probably in exhaustion, he said to her, “Mind his eyes.” That is love, I remember it well.

I love them, but they are not saints.

Some contextual references

Blog - Thought Picnic: A dreamy page of a family saga (2016)

Blog - Never maltreat a child (2023)

Blog - Thought Picnic: A child has memories that last a lifetime (2021)

Blog - The damage done when parents fail to listen (2015)

Children Learn What They Live

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.
If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.
If children live with ridicule, they learn to be shy.
If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty.
If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.
If children live with tolerance, they learn to be patient.
If children live with praise, they learn to appreciate.
If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.
If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.
If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.
If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and others.
If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

© 1955 Dorothy Law Nolte – Children Learn What They Live

Thought Picnic: Discerning insidious familial device

Sometimes fraught in thought

Finding the form of words to illustrate certain situations that are difficult to talk about would usually be an area of ability I would rarely be wanting or lacking. Yet, having harboured these thoughts for days, I finally began to gain a handle on things enough to express to an extent, how I felt.

We are essentially products of the environments and influences in which we find ourselves from childhood experiences and observations that many expect with the passage of time for us to forget through to the recent times where the occupation of situation might be both distracting and at the same time uncomfortable.

Abuse in its other forms

I seek not to commend myself in the ways that facing adversity and hard times has been borne with varying levels of stoicism and fortitude as much as with the help, support, and prayers of many who are acquainted with the circumstances.

In a moment of vulnerability, I was caught off-guard by parental device, and we usually are, when the focus was shifted from issue to collateral. Indeed, how well we are doing does reflect on others, just as the adverse might too. What it should never become is using the preponderance of the affected to press the point of your situation. The exertion of emotional menace can be insidious.

People forget the facts

I have a lot to say about many things, that I give myself to the patience of listening should not be misconstrued as acquiescence or acceptance, it is love, liking, respect, and even consideration that lends my ears to incident, inclination, assumption, and the paranoia that afflicts others to the point that it negatively impacts the listener.

People who have for decades cannot resolve their differences and then regale us with constant and unrelenting tales of woe that you have heard from time began, their stories seep into your narrative and could become your own story if care is not taken to understand what is at play.

During that conversation, it was implied that one had deviated from the kind of instruction one had been given from childhood, but that is a total misreading of the historical fact. Despite the good intentions at the time, I remember things quite vividly and differently. The experience was and is never one to which I would want to return. The path in which I seek better understanding and direction is quite different, but for the sake of amity over conflict, I have kept my peace.

The God loves me race

The things I remember should make me angry, in the particular, they should be totally unforgivable, but for the purpose of living, one should keep a tender spirit, even a heart of forbearance with an understanding that we all have many faults and limitations for which we have been forgiven not to impute the various infractions of others on them by total disengagement.

The race I run is a process of learning, the teaching for life will be valuable and the testimony at the end will be of wonder and beauty. I count my blessings even in the depth of despair and despondency that life gives hope, health is wealth, and the best is yet to come. God loves me, I just need to appreciate that more. My journey remains mine to pursue, if others are affected, they have run into my lane, and I keep my focus on my race.

Remembering Uncle Cash

First amongst men

I cannot say how or what, there would have been months of preparation and a different message written. When I last sent birthday greetings, I said, “You have been one of the greatest and consequential influences in my life, for the good, the better, and the best.” I meant every word of that and to my knowledge, all who have influenced me, you come first amongst men.

At the celebration of your 65^th when we gathered to give thanks at your church, even I wonder how that was the very first time I had set barefoot as is the tradition in the citadel of Celestial Church, it speaks to the kind of man you always were to me, accommodating and understanding, never imposing and frequently counselling.

An irreplaceable loss

Much as I looked forward then to the jubilation that would have greeted your 70^th birthday today, it has become your first posthumous birthday. There are times I scroll through the many WhatsApp messages we exchanged through the years and before that, the distinct sound of your voice in my head that gregariously salutes me with one of the many monikers from 'Ọmọ ìlú Òyìnbó' through Kakaakin to the slip that allowed 'Ọmọ Fish & Chips', therein was an irreplaceable loss.

In some instances, it feels like a canopy with the embrace of appreciation and encouragement that was that light to the eye as a long weary walk through the night offered a fillip to press on to a beckoning hospitality disappeared; snuffed out by circumstances impossible to anticipate, yet one must not despair.

Your example guides

I believe you would have wanted us to be the better examples of your mentoring, your industry, your zest for life, your broadmindedness, your engagement, your kindness, and your unconditional expression of love and grace. There are many lessons to cherish and more to revisit to learn anew purpose, direction, and determination.

I commend your exemplary life and that we do not get to celebrate another birthday would not take away from the footprints which we follow in the path of excellence you exemplified. Uncle Omo Uncle missed but never forgotten.