The blessing of staying together as a family in difficult times

Growing up and surviving in Nigeria is fondly said to be award deserving as we are constantly bombarded by troubles both at home and work, at least for those that have a work. Difficult moments have become a routine, sometimes overshadowing reasoning and comfort. I didn't know what a silver spoon was while growing up, I played with sand often and built play houses using sand. The wheelbarrows were our cars, the tyres were our toys. Life began and ended around me, it seemed as if I was content with that which we had, a simple and common life that we lived.

Trouble came knocking when I returned home from school while I was in high school . I was in high school and thus, old enough to know the roof over our heads was threatened. I was in a boarding school in faraway Suleja which was roughly 7 hours drive by road. It was a mid-term and I missed home. I wanted to enjoy the comfort of family. Well, the lawyer to the house served us a quit notice but went beyond that. He engaged the services of some men who flung our loads out of the house. We had had similar experiences but oftentimes, the loads were kept within the compound and the shame and embarrassment was less pronounced. This very incident was different, our loads were thrown right beyond the fence. Tears freely flowed from my mom's eyes as we all pleaded with the lawyer to no avail.

It was painful as we were stranded, hardly able to get a solution at the trouble that ravaged us. The lawyer was a dad to my classmate and I hoped a reconsideration would be given. Little did I know that that would be the last time we would sleep in that house. While in the state of confusion, hurt and hopelessness, God in His mercies sent a helper our way, a cleric of blessed memory, Revered Ishola. The cleric hastily packed some of our items to his house and immediately secured a room in the church's guest house. My dad was given a separate room while my siblings and mom stayed in a room.

It was crazy having having five people stay in a room full of loads. We were grateful we had a roof to sleep at least for that night. Some of our loads were laid right beside or front of the secured room that we managed for both rain and sun to beat. We stayed together as a family, we bore the cross and prayed together for a miracle. We stayed in that guest house for about a month, oftentimes experiencing transfers of aggression yet, holding onto one another as the family that we were.

God heard our cries and some allowances were paid to my mom at work which was in some hundreds of thousands. We quickly secured a 4 bedroom bungalow apartment and used some of the money to buy land. Thankfully, we began laying blocks for the house from that year. It was 2005, about two decades ago. Gradually, the house we call ours now was built over the space of four years and just when the index landlord was about to threaten us with another quit notice, we moved out of the house into ours even though it was not yet completed. We appreciated the house as our own and made many efforts to make it conducive to reside in.

IMAGE CREDIT IS MINE

The year 2009 was the last time we had encounter with landlords as a family. I wished to have my house before I get married but that doesn't seem to be coming through yet, my mind is working hard to own my house. I have secured some plots of land even though the location is a bit distant from my workplace. We passed through the storm and shame as a family and eventually, we triumphed. We are far much better than we were and our children would certainly only hear of the pains and hurts but never endure that which we did.

Thank you for reading. I would love to have your comments and contributions.