The loss of purpose (2009)

THE LOSS OF PURPOSE By Dr Wilson Orhiunu(Babawilly)Babawill2000@gmail.com

2009 Chidi was a dissatisfied man. He hated his job, car and the council house in which they resided. Despite his Christian faith he hated his neighbours. In number 15 was a middle- aged man who always seemed to look at Sonia lustfully. That drove him mad. While he accepted that with a butt the size of Australia she was bound to draw glances from some men, Chidi drew the line at Mr Jones’ (the chronic bachelor) lascivious expressions.Number 19 was permanently drunk. Empty cans of beer and cigarette ends littered his front garden and the wind helped to bring the mess over to Number 17.
Then there was Phil, the scrawny white kid who lived across the road who thought of himself as the new Quentin Tarantino. He was in film school and for some reason was always filming the children. Chidi Junior, Anne and the baby Tony featured in his assignments on a regular basis. Whenever he visited to take permission to film the children and there was music playing, he asked to borrow it. In the end Chidi told him to take the entire CD collection home, down load to wherever pleased him and return as borrowed. Chidi disliked the boy but Sonia liked him.
Chidi’s patience was stretched to breaking point when Phil turned on boxing day last year with a camera. He wanted to film Chidi and Sonia kissing under the mistletoe. It was half time and Arsenal were losing. Chidi had been complaining about everything. His pounded yam was too lumpy. The soup was too salty. ‘The world is reducing their intake of salt yet my wife is cooking Hypertension soup to kill me with’ he protested. Phil could not have walked in at a worse time. 
 Sonia shooed Phil off very quickly.
Chidi could not afford to move to a neighbourhood he felt was deserving of him.Sonia suggested he spoke to their Pastor. Chidi liked the idea. He looked up to his Pastor who was on the telly more times a week than his beloved Arsenal football club.As Chidi got to his car Phil walked up. ‘Chidi, can I film this tree in front of your house? The leaves are falling off beautifully. Will do it from my bedroom window using my zoom. You wouldn’t be disturbed. I hope to fast forward the..’‘Do what you want. I am sorry, getting late for an appointment’ said Chidi dismissively.After a short prayer his Pastor, Reverend Kunle looked him in the eye and asked how he may be of help.
‘I don’t know where to start. I seem to have no purpose for being in England. I haven’t told my wife but I am thinking of moving back to Nigeria’ said Chidi.‘Fine. You know what you what. When do you fly back and on what airline?’ asked the Reverend. Chidi felt the slimy tentacles of irritation begin to grip him. Surely the Reverend must have known that the going to Nigeria was an opening gambit. Why was he trying to humiliate him?‘Eh, I am not sure that I really what to go back home’ said Chidi. In the silence that followed Chidi heard his belly rumble.
‘I see. So you are unsure about your purpose in England’.‘Precisely sir’ said Chidi happy that his predicament was now being fully comprehended by the Man of God.‘So that brings us to the next question. What is your purpose in life? I am sure you are familiar with the scripture, I paraphrase, “without vision the people perish” ’ said the Reverend. Chidi’s irritation began to return. He watched the reverend unconsciously fiddle with his cuff links. He noticed the wrist watch. He once argued with his wife Sonia about if it was a Rolex or not. They had both moved close to the telly that day but it was impossible to say. Here, now, with the benefit of close range vision he knew it was a Rolex.‘That is why I am here sir. I do not know my purpose in life. I provide for my family, love and protect them, go to work, come to church but I feel something is missing’ said Chidi. ‘The Maker of the Digital Camera writes the manual. He knows its purpose and he only explains how it works’ said the reverend. He pulled out a box from a drawer in his table and out came a camera. ‘Get the picture? Let God show your purpose’.‘I get the picture’ said Chidi. He hoped his disappointment did not come across in his voice. He was not sure what he had expected to hear but this was not it.‘I will give you one hint. Your purpose will be linked to your natural abilities. That thing your do effortlessly. Done with grace. That thing your don’t mind doing for free’ said the reverend.The only natural abilities that  Chidi’s could think of were eating pounded yam with draw soup and sex. ‘But who will pay me money to do that?’ he thought.
As he drove back home he planned what to say to Sonia. She would what to know how it went. Was great insight he had acquired that will stop his constant mopping about the house. He would tell her to keep up with the pounded yam. Served hot at half time during live Arsenal games on TV.The sex bit was going to be trickier. He didn’t call Sonia, Jayne Austin the period drama queen for nothing. Once she claimed to have been on a period for three months. In the end he took to surveying the bins for evidence, usually at night as if he was a UN inspector in search of weapons of mass destruction.When he confronted Sonia with his evidence; no ‘smoking tampons’, she instantly developed nocturnal headaches.
 On a particular night he wondered if he could open up her head to inspect her brain for headaches.
Chidi parked his car and placed his wheel clamp on. He looked up and saw Steve from number 19 fixing the fence. There were bits of wood everywhere. Bits of fried potato chips and newspapers caused an untidy mess on Chidi’s front garden. Steve’s dog was having lunch.
‘Steve, why are you serving your dog leftovers on my garden’ asked Chidi angrily.‘Let it rest mate. The dog is keeping me company. The missus said I must fix the fence today’. Steve took a swig from his can of beer and continued to hammer away at the fence.‘This is unacceptable. Ever since you dirty lot moved here, all I have done is clean up after you. The wind blows in our direction and all your filth gets blown to our front garden’ said Chidi angrily ‘If you don’t like it here, go back to Africa’ said Steven without turning to look at Chidi.Chidi grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around. ‘What did you say?’‘Clear off to the jungle Mr Kunta Kente!’Steve’s dog attacked Chidi. It bit his right ankle then backed off snarling. Chidi quickly looked around and picked up a piece of wood which he crashed into the dog’s mid section. It collapsed in a whining heap.‘You have killed..’ Steve was now swinging wilding at Chidi with the hammer. Chidi jumped out of the way twice. The third blow was aimed at Chidi’s head. Steve missed and spun like a hammer thrower before losing his balance and falling backwards onto the concrete floor.Steve was motionless on the floor but still held onto the hammer. Chidi rushed to his side and extracted the hammer from Steve’s grip.Steve’s wife ran out having  heard the noise. ‘Someone call the police! Get away from Steven. Put that hammer down!’ she screamed. The judge was lenient. At least that was what Chidi’s lawyers said.The good thing was Steve did not die. He had surgery on his fractured neck and was out of hospital in two weeks. He however came to the court in a wheel chair he didn’t need for each court hearing. Five years in jail was lenient. The humiliation was complete. Someone had leaked the story to a newspaper in Enugu State, Nigeria where Chidi came from. His parents were now in distress. Sonia during her visits to Hoston Prison brought with her news from home. It cut like a blunt knife.
‘They saying its drug trafficking. Some are saying it is wife beating. Some are even saying money laundering. Why can’t our Nigerian press men get their stories right, eh?’ Sonia said.
Sonia proved to be very strong. She organized a move from family home due a hate campaign organised by Steve and his friends. When a brick was thrown through the front room window the council agreed to move the family. It turned out well for them as they ended up in a new development. As money was tight, church friends helped with the move.She sat across the table looking much better than he had expected. He wondered if she really missed his absence.Chidi struggled with this new role. Absentee father. Prisoner. Absentee husband.Absentee protector of the family.
Chidi brought up how well Sonia looked, trying his best to sound as causal as possible. She saw through him.‘You are ungrateful. I am only trying to cheer you up’ she had told him. She came every month without the children. She looked slimmer each time. More attractive.On one visit Chidi mentioned her plummeting weight. ‘I am doing it for you. When you get out you would have a new wife’ she said.Sonia always came on coaches. They couldn’t afford the fares for all the kids. She had the car but was terrified of driving on the motorway. It was six months before the whole family came.It was meant to be a surprise.‘Mr Jones gave us a lift’ Sonia said when Chidi wore one of his quizzical looks.‘But we have moved. We are no more neighbours’ said Chidi. His tried in vain to suppression thoughts of Sonia in a tight embrace with Mr Jones whose large hands were place firmly on Australia.
‘Mr Jones bought me a bike dad’ said Chidi Junior.‘And me too’ said Anette.Sonia had never mentioned Mr Jones during any of her previous visits. Chidi shrank into himself. The children being there meant he had to talk in riddles.‘A father should buy his children bicycles. Are we now a charity case?’‘Chidi dear, the children have been through a lot. They have been looking towards this visit for months. Mr Jones is a kind man. No fighting over this. Don’t let pride cause trouble today o’ said Sonia. There was an unmistakable threat in her tone. Chidi could not believe the changes that 6 months could bring. ‘Daddy, we exercice in our garden every evening. Skipping and stretching’ said Anette. Chidi instinctively looked down at his flabby gut and made a mental note to start visiting the gym.‘So many changes’ Chidi thought out loud. Changes that excluded him. He did not even know where his own family now lived.‘There is no one to wait on hand and foot so I fill up the time with exercises’ said Sonia. Chidi wondered if that was all he represented to her. Someone to be waited upon.
It was Sonia’s turn to comment about Chidi’s physique when she returned alone four weeks later.
‘Oh, I have started using the prison gym. Also reduced my food. That was not hard to do. The food is useless. Prophylaxis against hunger I call it. How I long for my pounded yam and draw soup’‘Hypertension soup you used to call it’ teased Sonia.‘Eight months in jail soon teaches you to appreciate what you had. What you have. I love you Sonia’. Tears materialised in both their eyes. Chidi had now been in jail for thirteen months. There was talk of a move to an open prison. He was now fully involved in prison life. He played in defence for the football team. Had become a lay preacher running regular Sunday services for inmates and worked part time as a gym instructor and a library assistant.‘Someone must be praying for me’ was his reply whenever inmates asked about his sudden positive out look on life. When Sonia walked into the room, he said it out as he thought it. ‘This woman is having an affair’. A sense of loss hounded him. ‘She will move off with the children into another man’s den. He would be alone’ he thought. He pondered on a few ways he might choose to kill himself. All the positive thinking of the last few weeks went out of his prison window.The main problem today was Sonia looked stunning. He had never seen her like this in years. Her lips looked like they had been smeared with the brightest of palm oil and her jeans were really tight. ‘Hi baby’ she smiled. ‘Yes’ thought Chidi. Smile at me then kill me.‘A Christian woman like you dressed like that’ he said coldly.‘But I am wearing a coat’ She stood and took off the coat and then slowly turned round to hang it over her chair.Chidi could see Sonia had returned to her Coca Cola bottle figure. Every part of her body had shrunk except Australia. When she turned to sit her saw her cleavage and swallowed hard. She was no longer the 2 litre cylindrical plastic coca Cola bottle.‘So who is the lucky man?’‘You’ she said
‘I am banged up’‘But soon you would have you filthy hands and mind all over me’ she giggled like a school girl as she spoke.‘Two things will have to happen. First you will need to commit a crime and be banged up and secondly the home office will need to introduce same sex prisons’ said Chidi.‘You are coming home next week’ ‘What do you mean?’‘Remember Phil?’‘If I die and I am resurrected I will remember Phil. Who can forget that pest with a camera?’‘His two minute film, Falling leaves won an award. You starred in it’‘He used one of my CDs as background music did he?’ asked Chidi wondering where all this was going.
‘Yes Femi Kuti’s Fight to Win’ said Sonia.‘I hope he gave me credit’ said Chidi‘Chidi my dear, prison life has made you slow. The short film featured the dog attacking you and your squabble with Steve. When the film is slowed down it clearly shows your innocence’ said Sonia.It too a few seconds to sink in. Then he let out a scream. A scream that had security guards rushing all over the place in panic. A scream of pure joy. A scream of freedom. 
‘Surprise!’ came the screams. Everyone was there and Phil was filming. This time he had Chidi Junior holding up a light for him. It seemed the whole church had cramped into the living room. He noticed Mr Jones and smiled at him. Even Reverend Kunle had come. There was a well dressed man who came up towards him.
‘I am glad you are out’ he said. The face looked familiar. Chidi barely recognised Steve. He was sombre for starters. Chidi turned to walk away ignoring Steve’s hand which was suspended in mid air. All the talking stopped. Chidi walked into Reverend Kunle in his haste to get away.
‘Take the man’s hand. He is a changed man. Do the right thing’ said the reverend.
Grudgingly Chidi turned, took Steve’s hand and then hugged him. Everyone clapped. Sonia, overcome with emotion ran into Chidi’s arms.
‘My purpose in life is to love you’ he whispered into her ear.
Someone raised a song. It spread like a forest fire in the middle of a scorching summer.
What the Lord has done for me
 
                                                            
 
 
 
 
                                                       THE END

WELCOME BACK DAD read the banner over the doorpost.  ‘It is good to be back. Thank you Jesus!’ exclaimed Chidi as he walked into the leaving room.

I cannot tell it all.