My heart is still pumping a little bit harder from the rush of adrenaline this evening, but I’ve got to share this story, and you’d see why as you read along.
So this evening, I went out to Jabi lake to cover a story for Yolar. Since Yolar is an adventure, travel and lifestyle magazine, I decided against the story I initially had in mind, and I decided to do another right on the spot.
There was a canoe about conveying people to a certain region of this large body of water, so I called the young boy manning the canoe and I said to him, “I want to go farther. I want to go to that end,” and I pointed to a really far place. “Take me there,” I said. The price was more than double the usual rate but I didn’t mind. I even asked some guys around to join me. The more, the merrier.
I’ve travelled a good number of times on water. On a particular occasion I traveled on water for nine straight hours, but I’ve never done it on a canoe, so I was excited.
Everything was perfect. The sun was just about to set when we began our journey, and just when we got to the middle, the sun began to set. It was magical. I’ve watched the sun set over Jabi lake from the safety of the shores, and it was beyond beautiful, but watching it right in the middle of the lake on a canoe while being caressed by the lake breeze had me feeling like Alice in Wonderland. I stood on the canoe and I screamed, “I’m on top of the world.”
We still had a good distance to go, but suddenly the boy with the paddle began to turn. ‘You can’t spoil this moment’, I thought to myself.
“I’m paying you well to take me to that end, why are you turning?
He kept silent and kept turning. Boy, was he turning so fast. It was looking like a scene in a James Bond movie. I became pissed. Dude can’t spoil this moment for me. The water was calm, the sun was setting, I even caught some birds gossiping about us as they flew past.
The boy saw how I was reacting and simply pointed towards the sky, but kept paddling hard. I looked up. It was clear to me. So I thought to myself, ‘You’ve had enough fun, man. You can’t paddle this canoe, just let them do their thing.’ I sat back, but I was still not happy. Suddenly, the sky became dark. It was though someone just pulled a switch on the sky, because the change was dramatic. Then the wind came. It came so strong, it took my cap from my head. Now I becoming scared. I looked at the boy paddling, and he was laughing so hard. By this time we had become a spot for the water boy, and he seemed to be having so much fun watching us overreact. The dancing of the wind was getting more fierce, the water under us was moving the way water moves when it’s boiling. Our canoe was dancing from one corner to the other. It hadn’t rained in Abuja in a long while, the rain was about to pour with anger. We were experiencing a storm, though a very small one.
‘Relax’, I told myself. These boys know what they’re doing. I wish it was that easy. I was looking calm, but my mind was fighting a war. It would have been easier if the canoe wasn’t dancing like there was a prize at stake, but it was. I could swim, but the distance was too much. So I just sat back and hoped for the best.
I was so elated when we got to shore again. It felt like a privilege having my feet touch solid ground. The boy came to me, “Oga, if I hadn’t turned the time I did,” he began, “the canoe would have capsized.”
I looked into his eyes and I knew he meant every single word he said.
Now back to why I really had to share this story that happened to me this evening. It reminds of God. Sometimes, things may seem to be going alright for us, but then suddenly the boat begins to turn to a direction you don’t want to go, and you begin to ask why, but then, it seems He isn’t listening. Probably you had the ‘perfect’ relationship (of course, there’s no perfect relationship), or the perfect job… or anything at all you held so dear and wouldn’t want to let go. Perhaps God is preserving you from future disaster. He knows more than we do, and when we begin to throw tantrums, He smiles, sometimes, He may even laugh, but if only He could open our eyes to see what He had just prevented.
And no matter the storm, just trust him. He has all the answers.
PS: Since you’re here, this story is brought to you courtesy of Yolar, a travel and lifestyle magazine owned by my company, Primedux Ltd. Could you please be kind enough to follow us on Instagram? It will just take moment.
What are your thoughts? What would you do on this situation?
Sincerely, thank you for reading.
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