Conversations

When my dad passed on, it was the men who have always been there for me that I called.

My call to them was not just to inform them; it was to fill a vacuum the loss had automatically created.

It was then I understood that life and all that it is made up of can be distilled down to conversations.

Conversations with my dad were always lighthearted. No matter how dark the day was or how thick the clouds, my dad always had a way of making the sun rise.

I was going through a really dark phase in my life at the time he passed, and I had not yet shared the burden with him because I didn’t want him burdened by it.

I knew that though he carried on with a spring in his step, his back was bent from the burdens he had had to take on from many.

I sometimes regret not having that conversation. And that is why conversations are everything. It is in the conversations we have or do not have that joy and pain reside.

I made that call to the men not because they would be able to have the words to fill in for his conversations. I made that call because I knew they would listen. In that moment, I needed to have one more conversation with my dad and ears that would listen.

I am grateful for those men.

– Osasu Oviawe