YOU ARE THE ONE!

Hi there, hoping that you have had a more productive week & that your weekend is looking much better, relaxed & calm. Alright, let us now take a moment I pray for you

Our father who is heaven, we come before you as your children. I bring before you the reader who has had the opportunity to grace this page, may you Lord touch his/her/their lives. May you open up doors for them where they have closed shut & teach them to rejoice & praise in the corridors. I do pray everlasting Father that you shall be in their everyday living, guiding, protecting, leading, caring, healing & watching over them. May your will & blessings be upon their lives. I pray that our God, our Lord that you shall be with them every step of their lives. They may not see your actions but God we know that you work in mysterious ways. I do pray this, believing & trusting in the name of your son Jesus Christ. Amen!

Good, now let us see what we have for today that can intrigue your mind. I don’t want to make it sound like a cliché as it is but this revealing times have been one of a kind. A good number of people who back then had their phones ringing off the hook, all of a sudden it has now been quiet like a tomb. Even someone jokingly said that they had to tell their wife to call them just to check if their phone was still working.

Why you ask this act was taken, well, before the times we are in, phones used to ring after every few minutes or so. Now, it is like the survival mode we have entered into has made people forgot that the modern technology still works. People are rarely getting in touch with each other to see if their friend, colleague, family member is doing okay or just taking the time to chat them up just to remind that person that you still care & that they are still in your thoughts.

We have now resulted back to our default settings in which it is out of sight out of mind. This is quite saddening & it has come to many as a surprise that those whom used to talk, call, chat with them no longer do so. How the mighty have fallen & those who used to come to them because they had pockets filled with coin will no longer recognize them as they have fallen into hard times.

Right now the social feed streets have grown cold as life has taken a turn that was not anticipated. I am here to tell you, I hear you, I feel your pain & I understand you. Let me ask you, do you have friends? Let me ask it differently. Do you have true friends? What I am asking is that if the person who you call your friend is a person you can rely on when things are good or bad, can hold you down when you have gotten it bad, can be there for you even when you are facing your worst fears, can be there for you when you are beyond repair, can be there for you when you have nowhere to go?

I am not trying to make you scrutinize those whom you surround yourself with but I want you to question who is it that you call your friend. There has been a number of curtain falls where people have realized that those whom they called their friends were only fair weather friends (those who are there for a season & time). It came as a shock, you are there knowing you have friends who you can count on when things are thick but when it suddenly is dark everyone has scattered from your presence.

You call them to help you in getting some financial assistance so that you can pay part of your rent/buy some food to feed yourself or your family/have some fare but their phones get disconnected quickly like as if you have electrocuted them. You try them a second time & the line goes like, “the number that you are trying to call is no longer in service”.

It has been a showdown of sorts where the true nature of people has been unveiled like the peeling of an onion. You go knocking on the door of your ‘friend’ to get some help only for it to be shut closed on your face without even getting a second glance. This has now become the new normal & the realization that it was all a lie.

I had the privilege one afternoon of taking a cab back home, from a day full of all manner of happenings. When I struck a conversation with the driver, asking how the going is like. The driver told me that during this time she realized that even those whom you call your blood family can leave you to suffer. Thus, having clung onto the phrase, “blood is thicker than water”.

She told me that no one in the family has tried for the past several months gotten in touch with her to see if she was still alive considering the mood of the pandemic has been having. Taking no prisoners & clearing the path of humanity with no remorse. This got me wondering, when we say that we are friends does it mean that we are only there for a short defined period of time or season or is there a different meaning to it.

We cast away those who view us their close & true friends in an instant. The ones whom they can rely on & know that no matter what we have got their back. My friend indeed things are thick, are we truly our brother/sister’s keepers or we are just imposters leeching on them. I am blessed to have a few true friends, who I have known for more than a decade.

They have been with me through it all, the good, the bad, the scary, the lacking, the having & it has not been easy but they have got my back. We all need to look at those whom we surround ourselves with. If you find out if there are no wild parties at your house, nights out, no money handouts, no alcohol, no drugs, no favours, no freebies are those whom are around you going to still stick around.

Even for yourself, if you are only a friend to someone because of what you are gaining in return from that friendship you need to check yourself. We may be deeming ourselves as a friend to so & so, but from the look of things we are leeches. Sucking at every ounce of opportunity that we can get to selfishly benefit ourselves.

A friendship is meant to be a two-way street & a blade that cuts across both ways. If you have not checked up on that colleague, friend or family member start easy by just simply texting or chatting them up. If possible, go visit but follow through with Covid-19 guidelines. You can even do video calls which have now become part of our everyday lives.

If you see one of those whom you know is in need don’t wait to be asked to assist, just chip in. Uttering a kind word to someone can really go a long way than you can imagine. On my phone I have a screen saver with these words across, “smile is the most beautiful language”. It makes me wonder if I smile enough or am I always having my usual stone face. I want you as go about your day to reflect on these words, “sometimes you will never know the value of a moment, until it becomes a memory”.