It’s Humbling… You Are Never Prepared…

Shit!! I hate to admit it but my ex is the most interesting person I talk to. Well, what’s there to hate?? He was first my friend before we dated…then we metamorphosed to exes. And now we’re back as friends 🤗. 

With us, it’s usually a ‘call this person at your own risk’… Calling Obie means all other activities on hold because it’s always a long-ride conversation.  Nah, not some love talks about trying to rekindle a fire that’s lost. I like to believe we’ve found our true fire, a fire that’s forged from a telepathic adventure of knowing so well about each other and knowing what’s uniquely best for each other. Obie is an ingenious young man, talking is really not cheap with him.

I once suggested we turned our conversations to a podcast as they’re very enlightening (folks on Naked Minds can relate) but then there’s every chance it’ll get diluted per the camera effect.

But I’ll be sharing one with you today. Obie sent me a voice note, detailing his most humbling experiences in life. A humbling experience in my opinion is one that makes you realize that the other side of the coin you less cherish can knock you off in split seconds and there’s really nothing you can do. It’s one that opens your eyes to actual realities about yourself and others. It makes you understand that it’s okay to not be seen as important as you think you are. Things will not always go your way no matter how in charge you perceive yourself.  Sometimes, a humbling experience can involve a life on the line.

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When push comes to shove, there are lessons to learn. Following is a transcribed VN of Obie’s humbling experiences. I’m sharing this with hopes that it triggers your memory to recall yours and importantly the lessons.

The Squid Game Evoked Weed Nightmare 

So Uju yeah,  I was relaxing and watching Squid Game and there’s this episode I just saw which was like a win-or-die game and people had to choose partners. Some died, some made sacrifices and you could see people with good intentions trying to trick their teammates just to survive. It was crazy because I could imagine their fears which kind of made me think like “What was one of the scariest moments of my life?” I think maybe it’s something else, I don’t know… but the surface level is when we were dating and we had that whole weed and I mixed all those drugs and we cooked it in the indomie and you were overreacting…Jesus Christ…*deep sigh*

I don’t think I’ve ever experienced something like that in my life, I don’t know whether it’s because for my own part, I was equally very high or I was scared as fuck mehn… Jesus Christ! I was scared, I was like “what’s up with this girl?!” You were in fact mad, you were speaking in tongues, you were doing all kinds of things, I was like “this is crazy!”. I remember how I had to call my secondary school biology teacher, who was like my best friend, to tell him what I had done and ask what I could do… phew!! 😓

You were running around knocking on people’s gates, I was like “God what have I done!?”  And then I was so high and what was coming to my mind were these Nollywood movies where people do shit and the next thing their girlfriend ends up dying. Omoo I was scared😭. 

Also, that was the most jealous moment in our relationship because you then called this Uche guy and were resting your head on his legs and to think that I’ve always looked at that guy with suspicion all the times you both flunted the whole ‘bestie bestie’ tag. And then in your scariest and most vulnerable moment you run to him, placed your head on his legs and you didn’t even allow me to come close and I was so fucking jealous.

Read: Weed killed me on our First Date… An Unforgettable Experience

Maybe because I was high too, but then I don’t trust guys so when I start seeing guys flocking, I’m like “who the fuck is this guy!?” But I used to hide that part from you. Mehn that night was crazy, I don’t think I’ve ever experienced that kind of thing in my life.

Obie’s Response to the chat:

You saying you wish we handled it better, mehn… that’s not how I see it. The way I actually see it is so far no life was lost and no serious damage was done, it’s okay for me.

It’s not like I want to relive the experience but I just cherish it so much because it’s something I look back on and smile about. I don’t hate the experience because it has happened. I can’t hate what I can’t change so I just have to value it.  I value humbling experiences. This one reminds me that in this life ehn omoo, anything can happen. It also reminds me of the time in my life when something was happening and I can’t believe I was that scared and that someone was probably going to die, and I was so confused and extremely high. 

Read: A Tormenting Ride You Wish You Could Quit

The whole process of trying to find a solution in the middle of the night, trying to call my biology teacher friend, and all of that doesn’t make me sad. I mean, it humbles me. Like it’s just the kind of thing I’ll want to think of when I am acting out or I’m being crazy. It just helps me hold on to the fact that anyone can lose control at any time including myself. The lesson actually helps me act more responsibly. It’s not something to feel bad about. I don’t feel bad about it at all. It’s just different. 

No One Is Super Human

So another humbling experience is something I always reflect on. I don’t know if I’ve told you before, one time I was coming back from work and it was crazy because I was supposed to go back home with my colleague. Usually, we go home together, it was either he drove or I did. So this time around I had lost my patience, he’s our head accountant and that day he was busy balancing the figures late so I just left him and proceeded to Lekki to just go home on my own. 

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You know how you can be in Lekki and flag down private cars going your way, so I stood waiting. I had waited for almost an hour, no vehicle came. So it was just a second option to go back to the office, but you know how you feel reluctant when you’re going back to where you just came back from, so I kind of just moved out of the road to another spot. I still felt reluctant but gradually walking back and looking at the road slightly. 

It was barely two minutes, and before I could say jack, a bus had run across and cleared the two people that stood by my side initially. Jeez! I was at that spot before, God! I was in shock. One of the victims, the guy still had the tyre compressing his chest and the victim girl was under the vehicle. Immediately people gathered, screaming “Hey hey hey… see the driver o”, alerting those close by to catch the driver. Everyone was concentrating on the driver and from where I stood I saw that there were people that were going to die. And I’m thinking “Why’s everyone going after the driver!? Is that what’s important? Can’t they see the people that are almost dying?” 

A few weeks before, I had just lost a phone, so I was also being conscious of my properties but immediately my instincts started to work. I put my phone in my bag and placed it in a location where my left eye can always find it. 

There’s this brewing hysteria, people just trying to save and not save, people trying to be busy, busy doing nothing, and most of them going after the driver as that’s the easy target because nobody really knows how to handle an emergency. I and a group of men try to lift the vehicle up to rescue the guy who had the tyre pressing on him. We succeeded but I could see the guy was dying. About two people tried to resuscitate him with CPR, I stood watching, believing they knew what they were doing but shortly, I could see that the guy was not coming alive and then it dawned on me the CPR had gone on for too long. 

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A lot of people don’t know what to do next after CPR so immediately my instincts said “look, step in!” More people had started to gather, the LCC and the police too. When you don’t witness an accident, it’s easier to safeguard, even if you go close, you really would not want to help most times because you don’t know how it started. Also that feeling that the people already there are in control comes to play. I felt a lot of people who came felt this way, it yielded an unhelpful crowd, I got pissed at the people bringing out their phones to video and then one woman who knelt down to pray. Like what the hell are you praying for?? I reached out to one of the LCC representatives about their protocol and asked if they could call their medical unit and tell you what, he was totally clueless, but not as clueless as the policeman I asked same. 

Omoo it dawned on me that I needed to act “look we can’t continue to do this, let’s take this guy to the hospital!” I said to the group beside me and of all suggestions to give, one of them said “call 911”. WTF are you calling 911 for? This is Lekki for God’s sake!! Lekki has tons of hospitals, why don’t we just go into any of them?

Shortly after, I observed people checking out of the area stylishly. It’s understandable, no one wants to get involved in anything that looks technical. So I start to carry the victim alongside one other guy who held him from the leg and we started to move towards the gate. I got perplexed the moment I realized I had no car, “What am I doing? What’s my next move?” I get lost in my thoughts for like five seconds and the guy carrying the victim with me looks at me, it was a look of confidence drifting. One of those moments when you know that someone is sure of what they’re doing and you bank on their confidence but the moment they lose that confidence you’re like what’s up? Immediately he sensed my confusion, he left me with the victim and walked away. 

I was left with a dying man, I looked at his legs, blood all over with no one to carry the other part of him. I was going to leave but then I looked at how helpless he laid. You know when you see someone alive and can tell they want to say something but they can’t  talk. For some reason I stared at his eyes, and the only thing his eyes could say was “HELP”...numb eyes yet they screamed at me. I felt a deeper connection at that point. I looked away and saw about three guys passing by, they looked interested in helping but then needed a push. So immediately I beckoned on them for help, two of them carried the victim, and then I instructed the third to stop a van. Long story short, we were able to rush the victim to the hospital. The next day I went to check up on him and the nurse informed me that he’s been transferred to Igbogbi hospital. She also thanked me for saving his life.

What’s humbling whenever I reflect on this experience is that we are all humans. All these people working in offices, carrying their chest up and acting like they have a solution equally have moments they don’t know what they are doing. Imagine that whole crowd, nobody knew what they were doing. Had it been I didn’t take charge, it’s very likely that the victim would have died. It’s crazy. Sometimes we just have to cut people some slack because omooo it’s not every time we can have things completely figured out. The way I’m human is the same way the other person is. Nobody is superhuman.

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Like I wrote earlier, I’m sharing Obie’s experience with the hope that it triggers your memory to recall your own humbling experience and importantly, the lessons. I really appreciate it if you shared yours in the comment section and perhaps any reservations you have about Obie’s. And tell you what, I’ll be sharing mine too. So leggo 🤗👇