Childhood Memory

Growing up in Nigeria through my early childhood to pre-teen years, Christmas was my favorite time of the year and trust me, it didn't have anything to do with the festive foods but got lots and lots to do with the Pre - Christmas shopping for new clothes and shoes (we preferred to call it Christmas clothes and shoes then).

Ah! The most exciting moment was when we sighted our mom with a broomstick, our happiness knew no bounds, neither did our expectations. Mere sighting the broomstick, we all knew what came next and were all waiting patiently for that moment grinning from ear to ear at each other.

Then the golden moment in any child's life during those days finally arrived… "Bring your feets here, let me take measurements for your shoes" my mom will say. Sitting gallantly with the stick of a broom, while waiting for us to line up according to our ages.

As the first child among four children, I will step out first and bring out my little feet for mom to take my measurement for my shoe size, and while she's at it my imagination for the type of shoe I would love mom to get for me has gone really wild that I could not stop myself from giggling at my wild thoughts. Mom will look up from what she was doing and ask the cause of my excited giggle, then I will respond in my childlike voice "mom, I want a cover shoe with heels", Mom will just look at me and shake her head with a smile, then get back to the task at hand.

After the shoe sizing episode, and mom has left for the market, what happened next is, my younger siblings and I will spend the rest of our day by the living room window which faces the direction mom will come in from. We will talk excitedly about the special Christmas shoe and how we will strut, not walk in it. We will talk about everywhere we will visit on Christmas day just to show off our new shoes, dresses and hats.

And then we heard mom's voice from a distance and mom footsteps approaching the gate, we all jumped up as if on cue, screaming out our little lungs due to excitement of the final arrival of our Christmas Outfits.

Mom will pack our newly bought Christmas clothes, shoes and hats into her big box awaiting the D-day. Until then, we all (my siblings and I) will resolve to be on our best behavior to avoid mom returning the goodies in her box as she always threatened to keep us in check, Hahahaha!!!.

On the eve of Christmas, excitement about the next day would not allow us sleep because we couldn't wait to donned on our new Christmas outfit, go out and show it off to friends and family, eat special Christmas meals and watch different types of masquerades and cultural dances at the roundabout where every show will take place.

It was the most exciting period of every child's life then during my growing up days.

When the expected day finally came, we all woke up very early without having our mom do the usual routine of waking us. We will humbly go brush our teeth, have our bath and special Christmas breakfast before thinking of wearing our new Christmas clothes as we avoided putting it on earlier to avoid any kind of stains but instead we opted to wear something else. It was quite fun.

After breakfast, mom will get us ready to go to church for Christmas day sermon, before we even think of going anywhere else. After the church service, we will then go visit other family members that live closer to us, eat more delicious food, have fun at playing different types of games, watch Christmas movies, eat again and then march out in a group to have more fun at the roundabout where the show will take place.

During different displays of actors in the show, mom will take us to different stands for souvenirs and every other displayed goodies, after the strolls, we will go back to the show and enjoy the displays to the end then we All drive home talking excitedly about the next thing we should do as family to make our Christmas day more fulfilling and fun.

Mom will graciously ask us what next we will love to do and we will scream, movie!!!!! in unison as if it was planned. Dad will drive us to the local cinema in our neighborhood to see Tom and Jerry cartoons, other cartoons and children rated movies.

My childhood was very interesting and I always find myself missing those days, reminiscing on them and thinking about how safer and peaceful the world was then. Christmas still remains a special day to me but is it more fun now? I don't think so, though I wish it was.

I really miss those days, and I am always telling my kids about the joyous childhood I had. I have tried recreating it with my children but still never got close to it. I wish I could and I won't stop trying to bring up new ideas to make each Christmas special for them so that they can also feel the excitement to talk about it and reminisce on it with their own children.

As a child then, innocent and still hidden in the protective wings of my parents. Living in an ideal peaceful world and being taken good care of. I will never take the memory of my childhood days for granted, nor my favorite times at Christmas. It was a blessing to be born and bred in the era when lots of things made total sense…

Oh! Sweet childhood days, I miss you…

Oh! Sweet Christmases during my childhood days, how I miss you.

We have all grown to see life and no longer through rosy lenses.

Sweet Christmas!