DEAD BUT SLEEPING

Sometime in 2004 I met a young lady in Stockholm we became very close, later that year we both came to Nigeria to attend her sister’s wedding in porthacourt. I stayed with her in port for quite sometime.

I was standing at the balcony one Sunday morning when I suddenly noticed a young girl of about 14 years old, she was shrugging on d road with visibility of pains written all over her, she was wearing a rough and unclean gown, she had a tattered holy bible under her armpit, she was a mentally retarded, her foot were twisted and as she shrugged on d road, her foot kept pilling, she has a long untreated hair do.

Immediately I saw her, I was shocked and called my friend attention, she told me her name was Vanessa and that she was going to church, I asked of her parents and she said they must have gone to church and that they lived next to her own street (my friend).

I began to wonder why the parents went to church living her behind, when they even have their family car. Throughout the night, her thought dominated my mind. The next morning, I told Francess to take me to her house which she complied without hesitation.

When I got to her house, she was sitting on a long bench alone, looking really really dirty. Their were used smelling plates under the bench, I sat close to her and asked of her name, she couldn’t really talk because she was also a dumb, her body was full of saliver dripping from her mouth each second.

I got to later learnt from her neighbour that she wasn’t really taking good care of, during my stay in port hacourt. We took her on a shopping, we took her to our house fed her, we preached the gospel to her, and we changed her hair do every 3 days.

I was determined to enrol her in a special school at my intended second visit to porthacourt. Because of her, I cancelled my flight to Lagos twice and people were beginning to feel uncomfortable with my closeness to her, I insisted she attend the wedding with us.

Now this is my basis for this write-up: her parents didn’t really care for her because she was an M.R. Once it is morning, they lead her to the bench outside where she most frequently had her breakfast, lunch and dinner, she was always left in the scorching sun, no other member of the family related with her, and they were shy of her and never mingled with her because she was because she was disabled.


Two days to my departure precisely a week after the wedding, I knelt before God and prayed that God should encourage me to come back for her, I also prayed that God should remove every pain from her, among other points I couldn’t really remember.

On Saturday morning, I and my girlfriend did a little shopping for her, we drove to her house but for the 1st time, Vanessa was not sitting outside, there was uncommon quietness in the house that day, no one to talk to, this prompted me to enter their room.

Believe me, I met her mother weeping, her father sober, her elder brother was trying to read a novel, while two elder sisters were also grieved.

I looked at the bed and I saw Vanessa lying in the bed. She was dead, I moved to the bed and sat on the edge, she was actually truly dead but an inconspicuous look at her shows she was smiling and I smiled.

I looked at the mother who was weeping and her father who was grieved and I look at the entire room as quiet and sober and I said ‘so you could cry’? You laid her dead body in the bed, the bed she never lied while she was alive’ after my words I exited the room. I was happy that God has eventually removed her pains by sleeping in the
Abraham’s bosom.

The point is, if they loved her that much, why didn’t they care for her while she lives? We don’t always appreciate how special one could be until we lose him.

IF WE COME TOGETHER TO CARE FOR THE SICK LIKE WE DID FOR THE DEAD, THE DEAD WILL NOT BE DEAD.

You and I will pass through this world but once , therefore if there be good thing you must do now please …………

tokunbur@yahoo.com