CODE OF HONOUR

It was a sunny afternoon. Time was March, year 2009. I remember I have gone to the computer village at Ikeja-Lagos to buy a fairly used desktop, so I can keep myself busy typing my write ups, since I have just finished NYSC and didn’t have a job yet. The last thing I remembered was buying the Pentium 3 desktop I could afford then. I didn’t even know how I got to the hospital, from where I woke up, the third day.

After asking questions like, “Where am I?” “How did I get here?” “What happened?” I was told…

A keke napep (tricycle) had driven me to the place where I reside. (Only God knows how the tricycle knew where I live) I came down, knocked the gate, the security opened, and I entered. But the security noticed a change in me. I was walking staggered like a drunkard which was unlike me. “When did Olumide start drinking?” He asked himself. Thank God for his curiosity, I had gone to the boys quarters where I stay, not knowing that I existed anymore. But he went to the main building to tell mummy what he had seen.

“He doesn’t drink o!” Mummy screamed. And by the time they all got to my room in the boys quarters I was already unconscious! What the doctor told them was that I was fasting too long, which was true, but they never knew it was an attack. Even I never knew I would be a victim, being one of the four people who saw that revelation before I left the base where I served. All I knew was that when I broke my fast that afternoon, the water I checked and saw was clean tasted sour in my mouth and I later saw particles in the remaining volume. I just waived it off my mind; perhaps because my mind was pre-occupied with the pc I wanted to buy.

Yet it was not the revelation that inspired me to write this “Code of Honour”; it was the reputation I have (apologies, I am not claiming to be holier than thou). What if they have known me to be a drunkard? (Meaning I have not been living an honourable life) They could have said, “Oh, he has started drinking again?” And they would ignore me, not knowing that what I was experiencing was an attack.

Every one of us has one Code or the other about our lives: it’s either an honourable Code or otherwise. What do people know you for? What do you stand for? A time will come when these things will speak for you. Though the truth is that nobody is perfect and you can’t have a good reputation in all aspect of your life, do you know those areas people can vouch for you on? If you do, never let go!

Yeah, some people make the mistake of letting it go, like the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). Nevertheless I know you can reclaim that Code again. Remember the prodigal son came back home? The most pitiable of all life is that one whom nobody can say they know for anything. I don’t want my life to be like that; and I guess you don’t want yours to be like that too.


[Thanks for reading my post again. Please feel free to share testimonies of how your own Code of Honour has saved you before with me. Also watch out for my next Poem, on my facebook wall, titled "Nobody".]