Notes on Living is a column of considered points of view about how we are co-creating this life. What stirs our hearts? What feeds us? How do the challenges that animate our most frequent thoughts move through us, individually and collectively? What has life shown us about itself? How are we finding belonging and making meaning/healing in all this?
Here, Stella Inabo, an Abuja-based writer, talks to her late father about their separate but alike desires.
You stare at the camera, a slight squint in your eyes. Could you have been facing the sun while your photographer's back was turned to it? Because I too, squint in pictures whenever the sun is glaring at me.
Your brow is furrowed, why so serious? Was it because you knew you needed to get a new job to support two brothers, a sister, several nieces and nephews, a wife, and four daughters? Or did you take this passport when you still had the job at the Airforce? When were you “Wing Commander Stephen Inabo” and not just “Stephen Inabo”?
I remember how leaving the Airforce broke you. You fought with Mummy a lot. I understand your anger and fear. My job is also my identity now. If I am not Stella Inabo, content writer at Float, then who am I?
Your eyes. I keep going back to them. At my fifth(?) glance, I noticed that they look tired. Or is that defeat? Mummy told me that you were supposed to be a pilot. But you got airsick a lot and got relegated to a desk job. I get airsick too. Did you know that? I don’t think so. We never flew together when you were still here.
Did the loss of your dreams delay your death? I ask because Uncle Aniemeka flew his airplane too low and got tangled up in electric wires. He was your best man and best friend. Would you have been in that plane if you had passed all your flying lessons without wanting to hurl up vomit?
I don’t know.
Maybe you’d still be alive because your career would have gone differently and you would not have been passed up for promotion so many times that you had to be retired from the Nigerian Airforce.
Salma, Ni’imah sister is a pilot. Ni’imah told me that she always got airsick when she started at Aviation College in Zaria. But their father’s friend was one of the instructors and he’d take her aside and encourage her to keep going.
Did any of your instructors believe in your dreams?
Benny, your grandson has your face. He has a frown just like yours. Yet his face is chubby just like yours. Hardness and softness coexisting. You met only four of your grandchildren before you died. Do you know that there are three new younglings now?
Enyo-ojo, almost 2 years old.
She was alive when you were alive, but she never got to meet you. You were in a coma when she before she became old enough to travel. I think she has your temper. What would you say about her tantrums.
Ojonimi, also almost 2 years old.
He was born a few months after your death. Stephanie told me that she was sad that he never got to meet you. I told her that I was sad that you wouldn’t be at my wedding.
Ojochegbe, almost 2 months as I write this. His name means God has done so much. I think of what God has done, especially when I think of you and my eyes start to burn.
You see, after you passed, I fell into darkness. I wasn’t angry with God. I just wanted to be alone. I did things the way I wanted. Then Stephanie called me and I saw the light.
Now I pray like you. I don’t have your Mountain of Fire prayer books though. I just tell God what I feel and how much pain I am in and how He has to be my father now that you are gone.
Your passport photo reminds me of the picture of you in your cassock. I’d pay money to get that picture now. I think it must have been in your old phone. When I took your picture, I had no notion of what the loss of a person would mean, that pictures and videos would be all I had to hold on to in the future. If I did, I’d have saved that one.
I can’t remember much of the time you were ordained as a pastor. But I know your health was already failing. But you had responsibility and recognition and that made you happy. I am glad you were happy, Daddy. I really am.
Do you know that I can’t quite find the right colors to wear in my passports. I tried black, the opposite of what you are wearing and I looked like a cultist. A mean cultist. Someone you wouldn’t want to give a visa to. So that picture never made it into my application. From now, I’ll wear white.
Another thing I struggle with is my ears. Unlike yours in this passport, they are not visible. They are often covered by wigs. I use a bit of tissue to push them out. I wear wigs because I inherited your family’s hairline and Mummy’s thin strands. Do you know that I am as much of you as I am of her? There’s a picture of her. It is black and white. She is younger and skinnier than I have ever seen her. She is wearing a white dress, the hem falls just above her knees. Just like me, she has cropped hair. But her afro is much higher than mine. She is smiling. I wonder if you had met by then and if she was thinking of you. Maybe you made her smile the way Femi makes me smile. I am glad that she was happy.
Stamped across your passport in purple is “ATIVE STAFF COLLEGE OF NIGE”. Was it the place you were working when you took this passport? Did you like your job? Did your colleagues like you? Did you care how they regarded you? Because I care how my coworkers regard me. They are all white and older and more experienced.
I am so sad that we never got to talk about my work.
I remember one day, I sat beside you on your bed. I told you that I had a good job now and I would take care of you. Did you ever imagine your children taking care of you?
I don’t know if I did enough of it though. I made a promise and I think I failed you. When you passed, that afternoon, my body shook as I cried. I told Ni’imah I would give all the money I had if it would bring you back.
When the consultant at ABUTH refused to give you the letter recommending that you be flown to India for treatment, Mummy came home crying because he said you’d be a vegetable all your life. Do you know that I worked harder and harder just to make enough to treat you?
But I never flew you to India. I got so caught up in work, that I forgot that I told Ernest that one of main motivations was to take care of you.
I am trying to take care of Mummy now. I redid her room. I buy her supplies and gas every month. I am flying her out to see her grandchildren.
I can’t do all these things for you. So I write things like this to remember you. I carry your picture and your cufflinks so that everywhere I go, I am reminded of Stephen Aduku Inabo.
- Stella Inabo, February 2024
Beautiful beautiful read
Amen. This was so beautiful.