When I fall in love, I like the ocean of love to carry me anywhere, I mean anywhere at all. I don’t struggle, I just move with the tide! I thought that was how it should be, I thought that was how we should just allow ourselves to be carried on the wings of love…but was I wrong?
Ruth was a classmate while I was at the university but not until we were in our third year that I started crushing on her. It all started when she and her closest friend Tosin approached me, they wanted us to study together for the coming exam. This was a girl I had crushed on who finally came to ask for my company. It was too good to be true. Would you have said no to such an enticing offer? Quickly at that spur of the moment, we drafted the time table. This allowed us to see everyday and within weeks, the sparks were already mutual.
I had started a publication back then on campus which centered on achieving your dreams as a youth. The second edition was to be published few weeks after valentine’s day of that year and my lady had treated herself so well with a couple of pictures on the valentine’s day. I believe love should be expressed and I wanted to tell the whole wide world how madly in love I was. I had this crazy idea of using her picture as the cover picture for the second edition of my magazine. No one was going to talk me out of it because everyone knew we were in love. We read together, walked together, ate together and if not for the fact that boys and girls were not allowed to live within the same hostels, we would have gone that far. I mean, we were in love and we could not hide it.
Exams soon came and we passed but her friend did not. I published my magazine and it was the talk of the whole campus. Little did they know what more I had up my sleeves? Well technically I didn’t plan it but it just happened. If I didn’t plan it and it just happened, then it will give you a glimpse into how much love was locked up in my heart for her.
It was the annual college dinner and I was the class representative of my class. I had not attended any of the class dinner parties until this time. My girlfriend wanted to attend and she said we should go. No problem, I was just going to sit at a table of five and pass the time with friends. She was on a different table with other colleagues. All of a sudden, the MC of the dinner called out all the class representatives and asked them to come forward. I was the last to respond because I didn’t even want to attend the dinner in the first place. Well I got up and matched to the front where the MC was doing what he knew best.
All of a sudden, we were to spice up the dinner by showing our talents. What? Immediately those who could dance were already digging it and showing their dancing prowess. I was at the back of the line, thinking of what to do before it got to my turn. My assistant class rep had taken the microphone and had started rapping. Then it dawned on me that I was next. Ogor, a colleague had taught me a love song a couple of months before then and suddenly I remembered. I confidently took the microphone and walked towards the keyboardist asking him to play me on key F. Then I gave the drummer the sign of what genre I was going to sing. Then I turned to the crowd and did what I had never done before. I made an announcement! Oh Yeah! I made an announcement that I was singing a song and I was dedicating the song to the “Love of my life!” With that, the whole hall was electrified. As if that was not enough, I asked for a chair to be brought and then asked Ruth to walk up the aisle to take her seat while I sang for her. As she walked the aisle, I met her halfway and brought her to her seat.
She was all shades of happy and excitement. I started the song and everywhere was turned upside down. I kept singing, the crowd kept shouting! I could hear some shouting for me to hold her hands. Some cried, some screamed, some could not stand anymore, some clapped and I was just there thrilled and filled with so much awe of accomplishment. It was the best love expression I had ever done!
For the rest of that week and many weeks after, we were the talk of the campus. My girlfriend even wrote it in her secret book how I swept her off her feet. It was a very glorious scene…you can only be there to know how amazing it was. Some of her friends told her I had already proposed and that she should not even expect any other proposal from me. Truly, I wanted to marry her. Ours was a love that would abide until the Atlantic Ocean was no more. I had used her picture as the cover page for my campus magazine, I had celebrated her in front of the whole faculty declaring my love for her. What else could I have done?
But two months after, precisely in June of that same year… the Atlantic Ocean dried up! I cried! They say men don’t cry! It’s a lie, men, great men do cry. I cried and I wanted to do everything possible to heal the broken wall. But she was gone, she was no longer interested in my love. Invariably, I was the one who loved her, she was the one receiving the love. I had loved her too much and she had taken it for granted. She is married now with a daughter and I am also married with a son.
It’s been years since that happened, we both have moved on and it no longer hurts. Sometimes in life you cannot explain why certain things happened, or why they happened to you. You learn some lessons and you move on. I didn’t know I could pull that up, I mean what I did at the faculty dinner; there are really nothing you wouldn’t do for love. I have not repeated such feat with any other lady, you may say maybe because I was burnt. But I don’t think so, like I said earlier, I didn’t plan it. One day I sang for my wife while I played the keyboard and while I was at it…I cried! It was deep, heavy but sweet too, I could not even finish the song. It was not amidst a crowd, it was just the two of us but it was deeper! In life, I have learnt that you cannot always have your way. Having your way sometimes is not the best for you. I have had prayers that were not answered and looking back, I was glad they were not answered. Life is what it is!
