Childlike Wonder
Here’s a trajectory I recently stumbled upon: We begin our lives with a childlike wonder. We do not know to be afraid or to not expect or hope. We do not care what others think, because we have not been exposed enough to let what others think define us.
Then, life schools us.
We learn to exercise caution. To second-guess our decisions. To ask others what they think before we trust ourselves. We begin to care about what others think because we want to be accepted and being the odd one out all the time is not the best look. We master the art of camouflaging, fitting in. Mostly because it’s easier that way. Or so we think.
Until we’ve gathered a few more years of experience. Then we realise we are all the same and yet different. We have all fallen for life’s game and tried to model ourselves after ‘the norm’. So much so that we have to dig deep within to find who we once were, what we once looked like. We now know that it’s okay to be different. To be true. Authentic.
And most importantly, no one cares. Not as much as we think they do. No one even really knows enough to have such a grand opinion about anyone’s life. Why? Our paths are unique. The best we can do is take bits and pieces from others and weave our own tales.
Just like that, we are back where we started. Battered but appreciative.
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I think this is why the best people to be around are those who have not seen it all and those who have. They are mostly true to themselves.
Maybe that is why last night felt like homecoming. As I prepared for bed, I overheard the children in the next compound singing Christian songs. I believe they tried to replicate a church setting. There was a lead singer who would chant or raise a song for the others to respond to. Peterson Okopi would not have believed his ears if he had heard their rendition of Osuba Re. But I bet heaven delighted. I delighted.
It took my mind back to when I was less than 10 years old and we still lived in a rented apartment. The building was a bungalow that had a shared quadrangle in the middle. We had about five neighbouring families in the same compound. But we, as a family, were closest to another young family who had just moved in.
For some reason, there were rarely any other children in our compound. So it was just my sisters and me. At night, we would all come into the quadrangle — my mother, my sisters, the young wife who was pregnant at this time and me. Sometimes, the young husband would join in too.
Some nights, the women would sit together talking in hushed voices about husbands, marriage, children, or work while we played. Some nights, my mother would tell us stories, the kinds that have songs with a back and forth chanting. Other nights, we would sing praise and worship songs for hours and then end with prayers. Sometimes, we prayed for the wife’s pregnancy and when the baby came, we prayed for the baby.
Thinking back to those times fills me with warmth. It was one of the rare moments I was certain my mother would not find me wanting in anything. In those moments, I felt God. Even if I did not fully know what I was experiencing.
That phase passed by very quickly. Almost too quickly. Until I heard those children yesterday, I had forgotten about those times. I still randomly burst into singing, no quadrangle, no audience. But it is a struggle. With all the distractions — the million fleeting thoughts that pass through my mind in minutes. Oh! To be a child again. Or to at least see the world again with that childlike wonder. To sing at the top of my lungs with reckless abandon. To pray without second guessing, without an iota of doubt. To pray because that’s what one ought to do.
These children have reawakened something in me. The desire to live with childlike wonder. However hard it may seem. There is so much to live for. Singing boldly to God without a care in the world is one of such things.
