“Call Mama, she is not well”
That was the last thing he said before he hung up and my guilt wouldn’t allow me to call Mama immediately. The last time I saw Mama, I promised her that I would be calling at least once every two days…*story for the gods*… 2 weeks had come and gone and I had not bothered to speak with her. Even her ‘missed calls’ were never returned.
Why am I such a jerk? Why can’t I spare a minute daily to talk to the old woman? If it were to call Girl Friends…..# sorry, I think I am deviating…lets go back to the story#
So I picked up my phone, opened the contact folder and scrolled to the name ‘Mama Onyedika’, then dialed the number; I paused to rehearse my lies… I would deny seeing any missed calls (that one is for sure) but what excuse would I give for not calling for 2 whole weeks?
I patiently waited till she picked the call.
“Ojii Baba” she said in a firm enough voice… her funny way of calling ‘Ozii Baba’ a childhood name given to me by her friend ‘Mama Chio’; I sighed…a relief. If she could still call me ‘Ojii Baba’ then we had no scores to settle.
Me: Nwanyi a, what is wrong with you again
Mama: Nnaa, it’s waist pain
Me: That’s just the after effect of given birth to 5 children, you would have stopped when you gave birth to me
Mama: Isi adiro gi nma, I wouldn’t have given birth to you
Me: Then how would you ever be happy in this lonely world if I were not your son?
Mama: I would have been happier without you. You are ‘nwa osa aka’ and my only headache
*I assumed that to be a joke…lol*
I tried all I could to make her laugh…sure, she did. We talked till she started her unending prayers…after the prayers, she softly said “I am having serious pains”
Me: Mama, O ga adi nma o
Mama: Amen. ka omesi a, thank you.
# call ended #
“…I am having serious pains…”
That’s the only line I picked from the conversation… I remembered the last time I saw her in the hospital, how weak her eyes were and the way she talked.
“Man up” I encouraged myself while I was in the hospital “if you show emotions, it will solve nothing. Man up”
I nearly succeeded if not for her question “Ozioma, are you crying?”
…no point again Manning up, the caged-cat had been let loose, somehow she saw a crying me, so I did the necessary…I slowly descended my 30years old body to the floor of the hospital, sent my two elbows to rest on my knee and like a 4year old I covered my eyes…and refused to be comforted.
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But today was different, I told myself. I played back our conversation in my mind and I laughed out loud… never knew I was an unwanted, a prodigal and my mothers’ headache.
Nwanyi a sef, I soliloquized, she can never stop persecuting me…
I remembered memorized verbal wahala I had gone through in her hands, how I had in return spared her not and I took a pen and a paper and dropped some lines I read every passing day.
I wrote:
I NEVER HAD A MOM
I was raised by a woman I call anything dat comes to my mind, like ‘This woman’, ‘Mgboo’, ‘Oby’, ‘Nwanyi a’, ‘Atulu mulu ebulu’.. and she responds.. A woman I make sure she thanks me after eating any food she cooks… She squeezes my nose, calls me ‘imi oja’ and whenever she wants to wear rumple clothes, she would say, “let me dress like Ozioma”..
I never had a mom, I have a FRIEND I call ‘Mama’
Mind of An Essayist 