In my country, many things can lead to temptation, depression and eventual death. It’s up to the citizen to devise ways of staying afloat, sane, healthy, strong and alive. As narrated in the last two entries, the way to go is expertly guard and guide one’s mind and ears and eyes from people and thoughts and things that subtract rather than add value to life and living. Everyone must learn when to shut out certain details of the economy, politics, education, leadership, sport and sundry fundamental aspects of life.

Ignore any news that takes a toll on your health. For instance, this writer is crazy about Arsenal Football Club. When its perennial poor run in English Premier League began to hit below the belt, the only other choice was to carry on for a while as if the club didn’t exist. Ditto with politics, politicians and their propensity for you-all-know-what.

Dear People of God, don’t allow anybody or anything kill you just because you love them. Instead, ignore them, run away in your mind to live to fight another day. While away though, never allow your mind on idle mode so you don’t keep wandering back to stupid love. That is the reason most people return to useless exes and are later left worse off or dead.

Furthermore, after you have walked away physically or mentally, force your mind permanently to feast on beautiful memories only. There’s not one person alive who doesn’t have a sweet memory or two. It could be of a brief encounter, a dream, a gift or something or nothing that lights up your mind and face every time you remember it. If the memory is evanescent, reset your mind to put it on long-play.

You see, the human life is a storybook. The stories range from the sublime and the weird to the ridiculous. Most of the stories remain untold because we never realise their hidden capacities to spark up life especially in low moments. This writer discovered this trick a long, long time and therefore smartly keeps a long list of sweet memories to which he resorts intermittently to feed his mind healthy.

Enough of the preamble, let me share one of the weirdest encounters I have had in my 50-year life. The event brings so much laughter to my soul every time I remember it. It happened well over a decade and a half or so ago. At the time, Pastor Richard Dickson served as Head of BUSH HOUSE NIGERIA, Uyo Office.

About 9.30pm, this fateful day, he called to remind me of a particular event at which I needed to ‘show face.’ It was the wake for the grandmother of a friend of mine. Pastor Dickson was gracious enough to accept to drive me thereto. He arrived about 10:30 and we drove off to Nsit Ibom Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom state in his 504 four-door saloon.

Suddenly, at Nung Udoe, headquarters of Ibesikpo/Asutan Local Government Area which empties into Nsit Ibom, on the route we took, we ran into a downpour. It rained so badly, visibility was reduced to zero, even with full headlights and all. Seeing the two external wipers had been reduced to mere toys by the weather, I provided manual internal backup: nothing for us. We were on that 20/25 minute trip for two hours or more, toing and froing looking not for whom to devour but the small street that connects the main road to my friend’s family compound.

Calls were not connecting, electricity was not supplying. Everywhere was dark. We would drive so far, turn back only to find ourselves again at Nung Udoe roundabout and turn back again. Then, heaven at last, or so we thought.

Somewhere in the Nsit Ibom part of the motorway on our umpteenth attempt, the headlamps picked up the shape of a man standing in that rain by the road. We stopped, reversed and I asked the man if he could direct us to ‘the vigil place.’ The angel(?) offered to take us there. We were too overjoyed not to have asked him to quickly hop in behind.

Remember, it’s so dark we can’t see ourselves. It should take us five minutes to destination. Alas, an hour later, we are still going up and down -with our helper sitting pretty in the owner’s seat. Exasperated, I ask turning to him: ‘it seems even you don’t know your village well enough?’

He responded that the rain had made things too dark. However, it wasn’t the answer for me. At that juncture, I became desperate to get the chauffeured angel-turned nuisance out of the car. To make matters worse, I couldn’t communicate what I had noticed to Pastor Dickson with whom I sat in front.

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Thoughts began to flood my head. What if this man went for the driver or me. What if something happened and the man refused to leave the car and people would form ideas about our intention(s)? What if this, what if that?

Then, that small something came upon me and, I said a bit too aloud; for effect: ‘Manager, please stop the car. And, you, Sir, thank you o. Goodnight.’

The man opened the car and made to disembark. In that nanosecond, I whispered to Pastor Dickson to steal a glance. He too froze. The man had no clothes on!

We had all along been chauffeuring a stark naked, mentally deranged brother. And, I, Michael BUSH, sitting there directly in front of the man had for those 70 minutes been his security assistant! Life not only has a mischievous sense of humour, it also has a way of humbling everyone. Welcome to inside Life.

We eventually found our way about 2.05am to that night-long ceremony. That event deserves a Guinness World Records permanent place as the nearest destination that attracted the longest journey. What an experience! For storylovers who always want closure, we spent just about ten minutes and started to head back to the state capital!

Stop poking fun at Pastor Richard and me, please. Rather, see the true life story for the metaphor it presents vis-a-vis our Nigerian experience. Lift up your hand if as sane as you claim to be, you’ve never obeyed a clearly, mentally challenged man directing traffic in Nigeria. Lift up your hand, if you have never chauffeured someone as bad as or even worse than mine; lift your hand also for the future.

See? All hands are up. You may dismiss it as a joke but Nigeria is in psychiatric trouble. Nigerians, all two hundred million of us and counting, need to go for that big test today.

The challenge though, is: who would conduct the psychiatric tests? That poser, came as a reaction to our piece on the matter penultimate week, from Mr Essien Ndueso, Special Assistant to Akwa Ibom governor, Mr Udom Emmanuel, who by the way may become president of Nigeria next year. I understand Mr Essien’s concerns. If the psychiatrist is a Nigerian, how insanity-free and trustworthy would both the process and results be?

Clearly, Nigeria has many rivers still to cross. No envy at all. Meanwhile, Nigerians should start helping ourselves and the country by reducing the chances of people questioning our sanity status. Our big people should lead the way by outright stopping how they engage in children’s play and in the sand.

The rich few too should stop taunting the poor masses. Our undergraduates are at home but people in a system said to be bedevilled by no money comfortably cough out a hundred million naira each for a mere piece of paper. Above all, our young people and indeed all of us on the ground floor must rise and grab our fate. Enough of chauffeuring and playing personal assistant to naked and irresponsible so-called leaders.

God bless Nigeria!