WHAT REMAINS?

I can hear the birds chirping. Yes! The one by my window reminded me the earth is still fascinating. As it sang, a reminder that music was the earth’s and all creatures, this idea popped into my head. Humans had no exclusivity over it. The lockdown, due to the pandemic, is creating a new normal or should I say awareness of what life used to be like. The birds by my window reminded me of the lovely green feathered birds that visited me around the afternoon while I was in boarding school. They were always perched on a big tree with scanty leaves and sweet-smelling purple flowers outside my hostel window. They sang to me while I laid in bed after our weekly Saturday inspection, our beds, toilets, and hall all cleaned up. Saturday mornings were for cleaning our hostels and after that inspectors, who were actually senior students appointed as leaders or “prefects” as we call them, would come by and check that all was spic and span. Those late mornings and early afternoons were beautiful solitudes with my chirping friends. They were melodious companions as my mind wandered and I lay in bed, waiting for the lunch bells to ring. That was over thirty years ago. Today the birds at my window bring back this sweet memory. When this pandemic is over whatever happens, I hope this remains. The ability of my mind to be present and my ears pick the chirping sounds by my window again. What beautiful aspects of life to still hold on to.

I want to hold on to the loss of traffic jams. The past couple of weeks have seen a reduction of cars on the road and planes in the sky. Lagos, my city, is the center of buzz in Nigeria. Where a commute to work could take an average of two hours, as cars lined up in the highway neck to neck endlessly waiting to move. Lagos now is a far cry of what it used to be. It is now a city where there is no traffic. I am at a loss of words, as I step out for grocery shopping. What happened to all the cars, buses, and trucks? Where are they hiding? My city has become a place where neighbors greet saying “Hope you are keeping safe.”, “How the lockdown?”. No longer “How are you.”, “Bawoni?” Neighbors reach out on the phone, using messages and video calls. No longer visiting each other. We have devised a new way of checking on each other asking that each person “Keeps safe”.

Keeping safe is now a reality for us. I spent thirty minutes in my car waiting outside a grocery store for my turn to drive in. The store was not allowing crowds within or in the parking lot. When I drove in I spent another twenty minutes waiting on a queue to get in after my temperature was checked and my hands sanitized. I was wearing a face-mask, obviously. Safety was a high priority. As I parked my car in the parking lot, I saw a cock, glazed beautifully with the feathers, flaunting it’s brown , red, and black blend of nature. I saw it crow. I heard it! A reminder of my teenage years spent in the village when I could hear the cock crow at dawn. A sign that it was time to get out baskets, hoe, and cutlass ready to head for the farm. A call to raise up and commence before the rising sun in blazing glory saps all your energy by midday. I used to hear the cock crow, and now I could hear it at the parking lot of a store twenty years later. My earbuds have been cleaned by the pandemic. I would like to hear more! I would like this to remain.

What remains? This was what we asked ourselves as a group of females that have become friends deliberated on what would become our lives after the huge crisis caused by the corona outbreak. We gathered on a zoom call, all top executives of different multinationals, high flying career women. Most of us now work online or remotely. For those with young children, our kids are at home attending online school. Those with young adults had their kids living apart in a different state or country. The need for social interaction, companionship has become so evident with the isolation. Some of us could not even make it to the stores because our ages were declared vulnerable to the pandemic. We wondered if we could still keep in touch as we are doing after this outbreak. The crisis has brought us together in a different way for very busy women. We dialed into a zoom call every Sunday to check on each other and discuss how we were coping and managing the situation. Before the crisis we had very busy schedules that could not accommodate this. Now we wanted to be sure everyone was okay. This love and friendship we now show, I want to remain.

Consequently, as I reflect on all these, I recognize the call for a new normal, A slightly different kind of commitment to what I am used to. Not for aggrandized career goals or activities to acquire additional material wealth (I am not undermining the importance of these!). A call to spending more quality time with friends and loved ones will now be part of the oxygen of my soul. Seeking out the cock crow, the setting sun and sound of rain will be a permanent reminder that there is more to life than chasing career goals, hustling, and bustling through life. A huge contemplation for me is the traffic aspect, how can I spend less time on the road commuting to and fro work in Lagos? Every day I am becoming more confident that my new normal will be different post-COVID -19.