Love thy neighbor

When my mother was sick and dying, she was surrounded with love. We knew she was in her last days and we made extra effort to devote time and care for her. I had just started a new job in the federal hospital at the time, and I had to take some time out of work to be with her. I traveled to Lagos where she was, in my elder sister's home. You see, my mother suffered from cancer of the colon, and at the time we had been to some of the best oncologists in town and they had told us, her time was up. It was quite an emotional news to receive. My mum had been the pillar of support, not just in her family of marriage but in her family of birth. She was the uniting force among her 4 brothers and only sister after the demise of their parents. So in this period of the end of her life, the best we could do was to rally round her and make this inevitable demise as painless as possible. My sister and her husband accommodated her in their home and made sure she got all she needed. My brother would pay her a visit every single day, and I had taken a break from work to be with her. It was the least we could do. Everyday we prayed, we got men of God to pray, as the only way out was a miracle. We sang her favorite songs, kept her engaged and happy, made appropriate meals for her condition...I mean, the least we could do.

Her brothers regularly checked up on her via phone calls, except one. There was this brother of hers who would not speak to my mother even in her dying state. He was so bitter about about an issue they had, that he swore never to talk to her for the rest of his life, or may be her life, and that he did. This bothered my mother so much that when we went for her medical treatment in India, she would frequently veer off at intervals, and ponder about this. 'Does it mean that Felix hates me so much, up till the point of death?' she would ask. 'What is it that he is so bitter about?' So much was her pain that several times, she would pick up her phone and call him. She wanted a reconciliation, for she knew her time was up and she wanted to depart this world, bearing no grudges against anyone. She desperately wanted to clear up issues with him, but each time she called him, his wife answered the call, and she would give all manner of excuses as to why Felix was incapacitated at the time. So they never spoke.. and she died. This was in the year 2010.

In April 2014, I was to have my first child. My husband and I had decided that it would be best to have the child in the United States. I chose to put up in this uncle's house during my stay in the US. Now you may wonder, why would I choose to stay with someone who never talked with my mum. Well, it happened that he traveled down for her burial and we had a family meeting, all grievances were expressed and all forgiven, but my mother was no longer there. I felt that his dislike for my mother may not translate to dislike for me. He received me at the international airport in Atlanta and we had a fun ride home, although I was tired from the long journey. We eventually arrived in his dainty, but spacious brick veneer home in a calm and balmy neighborhood in sub urban Georgia. As I stepped into his home, I was greeted by a delicately bland aroma, of a pretty expansive, rhomboid-shaped sitting room with simple, traditional decor. And conspicuously placed in the upper right corner of the dinning section was the most alluring, appealing, beauteous, comely and elegant portrait I would ever see. Beautifully designed and carved with the finest blend of mahogany and pine, towering over 50 x40cm; was a photo of my mother! The shock I had was choking. The bigger shocker was that he also had another photo of her, with similar design in the room he shared with his wife!

And I began to wonder...... How do you put up the photo of a dead woman you wouldn't speak to in her life time, despite desperate efforts by her to connect to you? How do you display this kind of affection in death for someone you hated? How do you love in death, a person you never loved in life? And I realized, it is easy to love the dead. We tend to love people we have never met, people we do not know, and people who do not know us. We always love the dead. Relatives with whom we are not in talking terms, die and their photographs adorn our homes, everywhere, everyday. It's so easy to love them because they are no more, but those who are here and just next door, are so much trouble.

Celebrate and love the living. Love and show people how much you love them while they are yet living. After they are gone, all the love you display is meaningless.