7 DAYS BEFORE I CAN BE DAD

My mind was young and innocent once. In fact I believe that it always will be. I am a father and not really yet a dad. They are the same thing, but different experiences when you see my side of the words; dad or father. I have 7 days before this is possible. I feel this will be a long lonely time while I wait for the verdict of the world hidden in the justice system. I have come to a sudden crossroad of pondering. I find myself in a sudden travel in a time machine into my youth worrying about what my youth had really meant to me and to the world around me. In my mind I still do not grasp the “fountain of youth concept”. As much as I recognize that one’s youth is plentiful with unharnessed ideas, raw but untapped talent, and filled with creativity that corrupts the future if improperly directed; still I do not understand the concept well. I had such a plentiful youth filled with opportunity and such. However, now in not so young a time that I am in, I wonder whether I had done the things that were required of youth in other for one to refer to it without regret? I wonder if the creativity I had and sort of still do, had changed the lives of the people I knew and loved in ways that will allow me to remember my youth in fund memory. I wonder if I am not still trapped in youth in another time, questing to know what I already know but without the understanding of a future age. Yes! My mind is me and I am my mind. Had the fountain of my youth prepared me for these next 7 long days before I can be a dad too? Had the talents of my youth; wit, academic dynamism, charm, physical superiority in the martial arts, good looks and the skill to fascinate all ladies brought me to this point where I must wonder about my youth just to console myself for the next 7 days?

People have said that when one could harness the advantages in their youth; that they would have at the same time defeated the process of age. I feel that if youth is constant and age is ever bearing, then what a whole load of bullocks such a thing will be to say. Here I am a father, yet I wait to be told whether I can be a dad in 7 days. I feel as though the opportunity of my youth was corrupted by several instances or factors in my youth. I feel that the most severe factor was my family’s obsession to have a structure that replicated an idea of a past that was truly nonexistent in the present that I had as a boy; being my youth. I was asked to believe in a hierarchy that literally sustained a status quo for the present then, yet now nowhere to be found in the present of my adulthood. Shouldn’t such hierarchies that one depends on for mentorship in youth, be maintained throughout one’s life? Such a flaw in my upbringing forced me into holding in the highest esteem facilities of philosophy that did not necessarily satisfy the circumstance of my experiential growth. What it lacked was an understanding that a child’s environment constantly evolved with the world in which he lived in. What it lacked was an understanding that the future can be anticipated on the platform of a past, but it can never be foreseen for a fact. I held things that were similar to the experiences of my elders dear, and not the things that I found to be dear myself. Hence, I negated those who did not think alike as me and or met the expectation of my family, thereby depriving myself from boundless exposure and wealth of knowledge that I believe now, seats me hear waiting to know if I will be a dad in 7 days. In the end I feel as though without the riches of education, granted, given to me by the same establishment that has now limited me, that I will not be able to find the dignity in my heart to write down this sentiment of a true longing. In the end, the best friend of a youthful mind is an education. Without it, all talents and all raw ideas in youth are void of the true beauty of life. First of them is achievement. Second but not the least, is the beauty that surpasses everything, and it is respectability joined with the feeling of belonging where you belong. There is no other beauty that I recognize to be higher in my now so old of a youth, as I anticipating a new age; which beats the beauty brought upon a person like that’s of education. Because of this realization I am able to appreciate with a little sophistication as if am indeed not always youthful. Because of education, I can weather the times with the understanding that each day is a time to learn, that every clock tick is an opportunity to recreate one’s self, and that every new experience was a guarantee that one was always young and could not hold the past too liable. And that every wait was a sign that a new age was in the making. Still, I am only one day toward becoming a dad. I have 7 days before that is possible.

To speak of youth and then ignore loving or love will be unjust to youth and my course. For when I was young I was in love many times too. I am in love now. Not with any adult woman per say. I am in love with my infant son. The one I wait to know if I can be a dad to in 7 days. For the first time I feel that my love is no longer youthful. I know that I love my son not because I need to love him. Neither is it because I need to reach his mother. I know that I love my son because I need him in my life. It is for him that I have found maturity in the idea of loving. I hope that in 7 days I do not revert to a love that exists because of need. Because I know I love my son because I love him. I will dwell in this new found sentiment of mature loving. I feel that it is the purest form of it that I have exuded in all my life so far. It will stay in my heart so that when my 7 days are up; that I be able to start giving from my heart to my son what he will hold dear forever. I will give him what no father can replicate to a son who wasn’t his. I will give him love that needs him to be. My love will teach him that life was void without love. I will teach that a heart that hasn’t a love tenant in it is weak. For him I will manage my weakness, only to have goodness survive in my heart for the next 7 days. Without it, I fear the 7th day from today will matter not to me or to him. When he was born and I saw him, I knew that I needed him because I love him. As I raised him every day before this day, I knew that I loved him and that he had begun to deeply love me. Every twitch and every scream, and every sound from his sweet little soul; I knew that I needed to protect him because I love him. Being loved back by him was the spell he casted upon me as he grew. Finally it casted a steely shield all over my heart and soul. From his gaze I gained a fierce and deliberate strength. It is a strength that could not be given to me by youth, or by any martial arts under my belt. And because I love him fiercely I have become courageous. Courageous and bold enough to wait 7 days in hope and calm. Just only to know whether I can be his dad at last. Alas it is sad to admit that none of what I feel would sound the way they sound if I hadn’t made a mistake somewhere. Of course I have made mistakes and many of them where avoidable. But because I had youth, and because youth is continuous, I am consoled with the understanding that I have to make mistakes in other to grow into another age. To grow is to learn and do new things. And to learn and do new things is been prone to mistake. One who makes no mistakes tries nothing new. What fun is there in being the same old youthful you?

How attractive would such a person be in any world? Alas my adventures and many mistakes have led me here upon my belly and humbled. Literally, I am waiting for the next 7 days to know if I will be my son’s dad. I feel that my experiences have failed me when it came to making good judgment. As much as I know that all failures aren’t always mistakes. Some of my failures have simply been the best I could do in the time in which they happened. However, I feel my mistakes have been a little more than failures. For example I knew when I used the foul speech I had learnt from a past incorrectly with the many lovers that have crept into my arms seeking love. I knew when I refused to take responsibility when young untainted life was given to me so many times. I knew that eventually hating others for the simple principle of being like one’s own family wasn’t going to cut it. And I knew that eventually enough offense upon innocence will force innocence into a defense. My real mistake was that I knew that all these could only serve me with unhappiness in the future, and yet I stopped trying to grow and become less youthful. I wish I had tried a little harder to undo the harm I was doing to myself and to those around me. Mind you this thought is only true because I am 7 days away from knowing if I will be my son’s dad. I guess it takes a great mistake not a failure for one to see how much one needs to still grow. I have learned in these lonely first hours that I must do something about myself to even qualify for consideration in this new norm. I must teach myself to manage my words for a first. And I must manage the temper of youth that dwells in some more than in others even as they transition the ages. I must be myself and ignore all these expectation that have now blinded me from my own self. I must see this wait as a period of trial in which to gather myself. To become better at growing from a youth into another age, and I must learn to help myself the way myself requires. I must be the best that I can be with what I have at my disposal.

There is nothing one can need in times like these but for the power of one’s own self and mind. I feel as though facing this coming 7 days has already thought me reflection. And I will learn from the mistakes that flash across the eyes of my soul. I will learn from them, I will hold myself strong, and I will move forward into another age with hope or regret. I simply am waiting to be my son’s father in 7 days. My struggle has allowed me to recognize my mistakes and to be proactive about them. I cannot correct all of my mistakes at once. Some are to grave that I will need intervention from the heavens. But for those that I can fix at once I will. I should apologize to those whom I have taken even when I did not want them. I should do the same to those that I have disrespected because I did not recognize precedent. I repent for those things I did that I knew were wrong but continued to do just because I could. And I regret ever loving so many and not being capable to love that many so well. I apologize to my wife. I feel that somewhere I had to have been wrong even just for a little. I apologize to my parents because somewhere I had to have ignored their counsel. I apologize to my faith and I because somehow I have put us both, right here, in wait. I must do what I must during this wait, in spite of what I fear or what I wish. I must grow from my weakness in anticipation of another loss. And I must never consider the challenge of 7 days as if it were the end of the entire world. Yes I love my son and I will not stop to do so. I love him because I need him. That alone fortifies my hope in this hard time. The pressures that surround me will not taint that newly found strength and love; because true love is the basis of all morality. The walls around me here can encroach on me as much as my mind will let them, but I will survive 7 days waiting to be a dad. I conclude that I am responsible for the things that now hunt the peace of my life. As not so long ago I felt loved by my wife, accomplished through my family, and rejoiced as I had made a family to last through the ages; in my mind. Not long ago I felt as if I had brought together so many families under one roof. Now I see that the picture seemed perfect but that the story wasn’t as perfect as the picture. I am solely responsible for this falseness that has resulted in a divorce suit from my recent past. I am solely responsible for the pain I have given my pets. I am responsible for the distance that now lies between my son and me. For all my life I will remember a thing I have only just learned now. I have learned that the consequences of all my actions, and words, and thoughts have always been unique to me and to no one else. And that I must refer to them forever as a method of looking forward in hope and without too much regret. I will move on through these 7 days with all myself gathered in a bundle of consciousness. I will be totally present in all the things that I am involved in and in all the places I have to be. However, if I find that where I am is a stem to happiness then I will stay to grow. But when I find it to be a place where unhappiness chases me in, then I will not tolerate it and I must go beyond. I hope that god gives me the opportunity to be a dad to my son. I am already his father but not his dad. I have 7 days for that to be possible. So far I am working hard lying here on my belly beneath the living room floor. Physically I don’t want to be here but I really have no other choice. So far the discipline of my upbringing has afforded me tolerance for a rather unwelcoming circumstance into an unprepared yet inviting family. Whose right it is to be uncomfortable with my transit here becoming their burden to bear without warning. My sister’s husband does his fair share of self reservation by avoiding me or by engaging me ever so scantily. I am happy that he tries and that my sister has yet to flare into one of those many unnecessary tantrums against me; just like in the not so far past. I am at the mercy of my relatives and I am grateful. Without them, where would I seat to wait in these dire times during this growth in my life?

But if things become more desperate and desolate for me after these 7 days, then I must remove myself from here. I must change the environment in order to have a new feel of my new circumstance indeed. I will not accept any new lecturers of life in my life. Especially when there is a hint of inconsideration about how desperate I am for my son. I must either choose to remove myself from here, or change my situation, or accept the one that is before me. Gladly I have 7 days before that is possible. No matter what the end proves to be after these 7 days pending, I pray to be strong, and to be bold to face the consequences of a growing life. I have come to terms with the many scars and errors in my life that have guaranteed that I suffer this today. I do not blame the quality of my youth but I blame myself for not stretching the offerings of knowledge that I was given. I do not blame the people in my youth, but I blame my inability to harness those aspects about them that could have time shifted me from this place, here, today. I blame myself for not mentoring after true loves until now because it was all about me and what I wanted love to be. I have usurped the greatest gift that god gives; 3 times, and I wonder whether he will give me another chance. But my son’s birth has given me courage to accept my flaws and face my weakness’ with self reflection and with self preservation in mind. After all what has happened has happened, and to move forward I must overcome the consequences of my misfortune. I am excited about the possibilities that lay in the 7th day from now. I must dream far with ambition, and I must imagine large so that I can appreciate variety. Dreaming is a form of strategizing in anticipation, and I am excited for what October the 2nd has in store for me. I will remain disciplined and attentive to the details of my condition. I will be prudent with my steps so I do not offend the norm and chop my chances. I will show mutual respect to my adversaries and challengers, mockers and supporters alike, and I shall display a pristine pride and a humble confidence. It is important that my spirit remains positive especially if I hope to be a dad in 7 days. I am practicing caution and organization to the max. I am learning to be passive when the times require it. Now I know the value of a higher discipline in life. It will be a discipline that I plan to make a part and parcel of my habits these days and onward. Because of my new found discipline I seem to feel more like a moral man, and because of it, I fear no failure. After all, all failures are not mistakes. I will remain as calm as the good lord will afford me in these dire times. I will look at each coming day as a blessing, and service each day one day at a time. I hope that the reality of the environment around me wasn’t so set in rock. As it is obvious to me that the floor above me harbors these; an unhappiness that is so profound to bear, a lack of joy in their successes there above, yet that is all around they themselves to enjoy, and there is too a profound guilt about something I cannot place my finger upon. Because when I look around I feel the excitement and anxiety that comes with that lack of joy, and I feel the nerves that serrate a dissolved soul into nothingness. Because of these phenomena above where I must live until

October the 2nd, I know that I have to wait with strength for these 7 days before I am a dad. I feel as though I will develop a drug in my writing or through it. I feel as though I must develop a passion of expression in these times in order to harness from the creativity of this time. I feel youthful only because all these thoughts are new to me in logic, indeed. I will focus my obsession on my buttons, just so that the excitement of becoming my son’s dad lasts for the 7 days that I must wait.

Edmond A. Arrey©

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