Love Of A Father For His Beloved Daughter — A Tribute

He would tell me at age 13 – ‘your mates are ministers; why are you timid?’

Oh my goodness, memories of him always come, some in my dreams that are flogging me and sometimes just nostalgia. I was known as Daddy’s wife. (I started cooking delicacies at the age of 13, burning the house down literally, and he never beat me for that, but thank God Almighty I was alive. Times I left the boiling ring on and melted the plastics overnight—ha, Olaitan! You see, you try, I tell my younger self.

At times, he would give me lots of money as a teenager to buy very expensive fish and goat meat from markets and Dominos supermarket Sabo. There were times I made moi-moi and served it sour for him to eat after spending a lot of money to cook it! Chai! – Olaitan.

There were times he spent a for­tune on private teachers who ripped him off by charging him per hour to lecture me and my siblings! There were times he asked me once, that, would I like to repeat a class? He was so civilized, and when I said no, he obliged me immediately (some par­ents use canes and forceful words on their kids in such situations). Hmmm…it’s well till we meet at the feet of Jesus. In another world, I would like to meet you again.

I celebrate him as an artist who mentored me unconsciously. He had a radio program for over a decade at FRCN, known as Golden Hymns. As a child, I followed him to the studio, and the first cemetery I viewed was the Ikoyi Cemetery (very fine sepulchers—where the rich are buried), where he also had homilies (which had big grammar I was never taught at Queen’s Col­lege, Lagos). I was his editor (an amateur one at that) as I had to sit with the typists at cafes from ages 13 to 16 before I gained admission for mass communication.

My dad’s handwriting is the best calligraphy I have ever come across; one of my sisters got it nat­urally, while another copied it in­tentionally. My dad taught me how to receive calls with our landline, the knowledge which I shared with my friends then. He would say, ‘Be courteous, be very nice over the phone’. 862266 was our dial number with which I called my friends too; on one occasion, Nneka called me, and my dad picked up. When I got back to school, she asked who was the Oyinbo man that picked up the call. My dad was that suave!

But he would thrash me vigor­ously – one time I didn’t know he was receiving the call in his room too, hearing my friends dialogue with me (I guess he had been doing that and I wasn’t aware…!)

To add, I have some koboko marks on my body, especially my legs. I wonder if they would ever fade. He would descend on you like a tsunami when your cup is full, or you sweep and he still felt dust or sand under his feet!

Hmmm…an autobiography on him would be really long…memo­ries upon memories.

But the sweetest part is the time he made his driver wait for me al­most a whole day with the car when I visited the General Hospital in Lagos with the usual long queues. This was all in a bid to stop me from branching off to a friend’s place be­fore coming home (if I had known better, one needs to be very wary of friends no matter if it’s male or female)! I got so used to a person­al driver that I made up my mind that I wouldn’t get a car till I had a driver because of the street wars/ fights and stress my dad’s drivers faced, plus the car servicing they had to handle, which I witnessed, and I found too stressful for a wom­an. Consequently, to this day I don’t drive myself!

He would tell me to stop going to the community library to read. He insisted I use our study (we had a standard library where I read about classic romance, ancient wars – name it. I was really exposed to some extent for my age. He said that he didn’t want a pregnant teen­ager in his house (now I understand better what happens in the society where everything goes…).

He eventually left me as a biolog­ical virgin and a graduate (and told me to pick up law as a second de­gree) in a very turbulent world, oh yes! He did a fine job as a parent, as I believe if he were still alive…haba… things would be better for me. This is in loving memory of Rev. Dr. E.A. Abiodun.

Abiodun wrote in from Co-authors’ Inter­national Abuja.