I always used to remember as a 2-year-old how you would pack your clothes in your little bag and run to my car to follow me home anytime I came to visit you in the tiny first mini flat at Bariga
I had given birth to you in very controversial circumstances but was determined to not only keep you but stand by you.
You were a beautiful baby. Full hair, I think they called u a Nazarene in your mother’s white Garment Church and your eyes were so beautiful that I cried the first time I saw them at Onikan
I remember one day when I and your mother weren’t fighting and I slipped and fell and she sat on me and you cried and cried that she had killed your daddy
You ran to your grandma in trauma that your daddy had died and even the fact that I was standing there looking at you didn’t stop the tears until I hugged you and you felt my warm breath on your cheeks and you now kissed me
You kissed me on my lips for a long time. I think until you were 10 when your ma and grandma started saying – ohh she is a big girl now u can no longer kiss her on the lips
I remember the first day I brought Alvin to u. Alvin was of a different mother and he was just one year old and you were maybe three
I had stolen him from his mother in Ogba and ran towards you in Bariga switching off my phone so I could not be tracked
That day, you showed me what they meant by blood being thicker than water as you grabbed him on your little lap and hugged him tightly.
You cried and almost fainted when I had to take him away
Annette, I hear you are 19 or 20. I have seen you grow into a phenomenally beautiful lady with extra brains
I saw you walk away from me at the International airport on your first trip to Canada to start a new life and felt a yoke in my throat
Your mother stood far away, your grandma and Nonso all staring at you.
I hid the tears. I could not cry in public but I cried internally cos my Koko was now a woman
You showed no fear, but a lot of courage as you navigated international lines towards your destination
We waited for your call and it came. I’m in Paris, you said and I am in Canada and I am in School
Annette, you do not come from a normal family. U have stepmothers and other brothers and sisters and most of all you have a mad father
You must grow into being a leader. A weapon of unity and you must come to the realisation that the mantel of leadership will fall on you.
You will see life differently cos you were born under different circumstances
You will not live a life of entitlement. You will struggle and strive for every morsel you eat.
You stay in Canada with your uncle and his family in close proximity but you have not depended on them and not asked them of anything, not that they will not be glad to support you but because you were born with a fiery independent streak that makes you a survivor
Fight Annette, fight, you must fight for your life is different
I love you like crazy and have never regretted for one second bringing you to this world
Your life further convinces me that I have never been wrong not allowing myself to be boxed into a hole by society
Imagine what this world would have been like if I had listened to the world and said No to your birth.
The world would simply have lost your glow.
You are worth living for. God bless you
Duke of Shomolu