JUST YESTERDAY

It was just yesterday, yeah! just yesterday.It was just yesterday that Mama used to tell me to go and borrow garri from Mama Iyabo's house.It was just me and Mama; one thing she never knew was that her eyes filled me with hope each time I gazed into them.Her kind words were just like a guitar; each note resonated on every string of my heart.Although! I can never forget the shock in her eyes when I told her I wanted to be an "actor." wide-eyed, her face bore an unspoken "Kunle, how do you intend doing it?"Not that she didn't believe in me, but it didn't just seem possible.It was just yesterday! The rainy season was a time we hated so much because it didn't seem to like us either. The rain spluttered angrily on our perforated roofs, soaking our threadbare beds and properties.It was just yesterday, or a little farther than yesterday, that I was called "one trouser, ten holes" because of my blue trousers that had seen better years. Why did I think Efua, the prettiest girl in SS2A, would say "hello" to me? I had always wanted to be her friend. When she smiled in my direction, I thought she was smiling with me, so I decided to seize the opportunity. Thirty minutes after she had left the scene with her friends, echoes of her words, "Get lost, you pig," still rang in my ears, accompanied by ripples of laughter. That was how I lost the name "one trouser, ten holes" and became dubbed "the class pig." And yes, they lied. My blue trouser didn't have ten holes; it had nine. Mama had successfully patched one hole but couldn't patch the rest because the material had already faltered.When Aunty Caroline gave me money and I managed to buy biscuits in school, I was flogged for stealing because it was an aberration for me to buy anything in school.It was just yesterday, or a little farther, that Mama couldn't get drugs for her severe stomach pains. Instead, she resolved to drink the extracted water of bitter leaves and scent leaves so as to save for my SSCE. Thank God she didn't die!We had "water soup," as Mama and I would call it, for days. It was called "water soup" because it was made with very few condiments and plenty of water.I'd wake up to Mama's hand firmly placed on my forehead, whispering words of prayer for me.It was just yesterday that I decided to go and hustle as a conductor and came home late to my wailing mama. She immediately jumped on me the moment she saw me screaming, "Omo mi, oh, don't kill your mother!".Now that my life has become colorful, like a rainbow adding color to the bleak skies after a torrential downpour, now that I'm standing on this big stage with the award of 'best actor', which other person should I dedicate it to, if not my mama?