Red skies and mudpies

The late 70s and 80s are often romanticized by so called “laudotore temporis (lovers of times past) …

They are quick to forget that any snapshot in time is an amalgam of what is good or bad about society. Romantics live in an ethereal world detached from the rest of us who are earthbound. Fixed to mother earth by gravity. Like neonates to their mothers by the umbilical cord.

As a child I remember stealing over to Roe Park, Ikoyi (now Park view Estate) hunting mudskippers and making mud pies with my closest pal of the time, Sola. We dreaded the reddening and darkening of the summer sky because we knew dusk meant the end of our play and an exit of limbo’s paradise to the restrictions of a parents and older siblings dominated home. Those were days of a blissful existence but I do not desire to go back to them because they were no more than train tracks on the progression of time. They are past.

The past is in the past. We can revisit it like a scrapbook or photo album but we can never relive it.

The past can be a reference point or learning curve but without a commitment to treat it as such we are doomed to navigate the perilous seas of life without a compass or rudder.

Know your past. Know your history. Focus on your present never losing sight of the future. Comforted by the fact that the journey to next tomorrow’s yesterday is a sunset and sunrise away.