The shrinking of my space or so he thought

The day he was born he got up and howled, “Da mihi locum standi, et ego movum movebo.” We knew he was speaking Latin because we asked a five-day old baby who translated for us. Nobody argued with the babies; after all they have just returned from the land of the Innocent.
He’d better hurry up and pick his place or all the available places will be gone.

At the age of nine or 10 they decided to go away from home. The logic was clear. He had had an argument with his grandfather about going to the farm on Sunday. The agreement between him, his mother and himself was clear. He will go to the farm on Saturdays and on public holidays, Sundays he could do as he pleased with his time.

That Sunday, the old man insisted I must go to the farm. I refused, and he said that we would have to wear one pair of trousers and same house would not contain us, which meant that one of us will have to find a place of his own. He could stay with the Demi at the petrol station in the motor park and make a little pocket money for himself.

But something more interesting took over his mind. He wanted to go to Ado-Ekiti. Next to Ondo, he had not been to Ondo. But there was more to going to Ondo. His classmate had recently left with his father for Ado-Ekiti. What if he could drop in on him and say hi.

The others refused to come along and it was he alone who raised the money and he got into a passenger lorry bound for Ado-Ekiti.

There was another secret reason for going to that for which the town was famous: Osiun Ado. He was like the king of the town in his way and dispensed his wisdom in his way.

Thirty mile only and we were in Ado-Ekiti.

It was not difficult to find Bodunde’s house because the houses were numbered. The father frowned that we were not welcome in his house. His friend made his father to realise that we had come to see someone else. It was decided that he would go and see the person before leaving for Akure. Out of curiosity, Demi asked who else they hoped to see before leaving the town. Shy and speaking slowly, he said Osiun Ado. Demi’s father smiled. You have an appointment with him? You need appointment to see him. He is a government worker and his time is precious. Where is his office? That’s part of the problem; he could be anywhere in the town or the forest.
All that was left was how to go back to Akure. He had to walk back to Akure.

Were there kidnappers on the road at that time? May be there were. He did not know because a few people were kidnapped at the time.
He set out on the lonely road. Nothing prevents a person for daring the lone road at noon; the danger is at night. Suddenly a lone stranger appears, Demi breaks into a run as if someone was pursuing him. Little by little, he got home in Akure.
You must be hungry, my son. Yes, he is hungry, for some serious canning. His mother did not pay attention to any of his uncles, who each had elected themselves as the disciplinarian of the family.

He did join his mother but he did not touch the pounded yam in front of him. She spoke at length of dangers of the roads, the snakes, the wild animals that can make small meals of small boys. He also made his case because his mother said he had a case.

After her long spearheaded speech and her son’s reply, the pounded yam was cold like yesterday’s own. She went back to the kitchen. In no time at all, another set of pounding was coming from the kitchen. It was now that her son ate and was welcome home. He slept.

The uncles argued with his mother, Titi insisting that she was wasting her money, wasting resources that could be better used. But she would not agree. Finally, they left her.

Somehow, the boy began to improve; he began to pay attention in school; he helped teachers with their notes of lessons to the house of the head master. He ran errands for everybody who needed help. Suddenly, he was the best-behaved boy in the school. Best of all, he comfortably occupied the first position in class.
The boy’s case became something to arguably make a celebrity case for it.

There were teachers, old from St. Andrew’s. They had insisted from their first year that the cane was a waste of energy. But there were others who would not agree. The good book had said it and who would doubt the good book?
At the end of the year, the teaching staff came to a dead equal numbers. They picked the alternative boy as head boy. Yet, fate was working its own tale.

That morning, before anybody was in the school, somebody went into the store of the library and stole a number of schoolbooks for the following year. Investigation was quick and fast and the boy, that the staff had agreed upon as school prefect for that year was caught as the thief. He confessed and returned the books.

The staff had a hurried meeting under the chairmanship of the first deputy head, and the son of the mother of the day was unanimously elected head boy of the school for the year.

Not that it stopped the argument between cane or no cane. Those who caned continued to cane in obedience to the word of God. Those who did not use the cane refused to use it.

Years later, when memories had faded, that almost head boy was lined up among highway robbers to be shot. What happened that morning long ago at school of decision and judgment?