My First 'Writer's Club'
I managed to post this using a different email add as opposed to what i registered with, thus the need to re-post it again...
We were meant to be ten members but only seven managed to turn up and the whole thing was a success. This was a group of people of diverse backgrounds and between the ages of 28 and 32. The meeting went on well into the night and was a total success.
The topic was on Vision and it was to be presented in either a short story form or whatever came to mind...below is what i wrote...
VISION
If asked, I would say a vision is a dream, it's a desire, it's a foresight, it's the distance between where we are and how we want things to be or what we want to achieve.
I have a vision, a vision of all people living in harmony as brothers and sisters. This may sound far fetched, but I believe it is attainable. Only if people decided to change their evil ways and to some extent beliefs, which are brought about by evil thoughts that eventually lead to evil acts, incitement, anger, jealousy, just to mention but a few. This can only be possible if children are taught the value of love from tender ages. Not just love of the nuclear family, but love towards everybody, treating one another as brothers and sisters. If this is instilled, then they grow up with that virtue and wouldn't therefore wish to harm, anger or betray others, instead they shall always be there for one another just like brothers and sisters.
Normally during the weekends, I used to walk home as opposed to taking a bus, merely out of fun watching people and as part of exercising the body. So, on this day ahead of me, was an old lady, old enough to be my grandmother who was walking with a slight limp and had somehow managed to balance two bags which from a distance looked heavy. I noticed how people walked past her without a care of how heavy her bags were and that's when I decided to quicken my steps to catch up with her and lend a hand. She was skeptical at first, and I did understand where she was coming from because in the world today, we can never be so sure when it comes to strangers, but I insisted on helping and took the heavier of the two bags.
We proceeded with our journey and had some conversation in between, in which I did most of the listening and enjoyed every moment of it. She told me about her children and her struggles with life and how things never worked out for her children who turned out to be nothing a parent would ever expect and, I told her some of my experiences so as to levelise the grounds and make her feel that everybody has got their share of problems in different ways. I asked her how come she didn't take a bus considering her age and the amount of weight she had to carry, it so happened that she didn't have any extra monies left after the shopping she had done for her orphaned grand-daughter whom she had so much praise for, and herself. Her limp got worse and I could read strain written all over her face, that's when she told me that the problem was not with her legs but it stemmed from her chest and she hadn't accumulated enough monies for the Doctor's fee. Basically, all her problems were as a result of little cash or none at all. From her talks I figured out that she was such a hard-worker because everything in her life revolved around her fourteen year old grand-daughter whom from her speech, was an excellent pupil and well behaved and that since her problems moulded her to a responsible individual, she felt compelled to give her the best that she could.
I realized she was not telling me all this to win my sympathy, for I also had a choice of walking past her, but maybe it was because she needed someone to talk to. I believe talking things out has got some form of remedial healing, and maybe that's what she was feeling at the time…like a heavy burden easing out with every word she uttered. It hit me that I'd gone well past my destination, that's when on impulse I got out my wallet and gave her some little cash which I had estimated would be enough for her medication and her upkeep for some days to come. To say that she was humbled may be an understatement because of how she lacked words to even express her gratitude. I did what I did out of love for another being, a stranger whom I knew nothing of, not even her name. Surprisingly am telling this story for the first time as it is what came to mind when I thought of the word, vision.
