A memorable Experience That Gave Me A Purpose To Live Again
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We have an experience that brought a lot of change to our personalities or made us do the things we are doing now. Not minding the age, level, class, race, ethnicity, or continent, we always have a significant experience to discuss and reflect on when we come across such scenarios.
An experience that gave me a second chance to live.
It was a glamorous and cool Wednesday morning. I and my eldest were set for our usual morning chores when at the villages. Our role is to fetch water and ensure every empty bucket or gallon is filled with water. It is always fun to do. Because village life is always sweeter than city life. We are allowed to go wherever we like to fetch the water. Nobody cares. They believe the communities are more secure than the city lifestyle. Which I do then. But after this incident, no place is well secured or protected, and death can come anywhere, not minding your age grade.
So that day, we decided to go to a stream that is further away from us, that we rarely go to. We intended to meet other city boys from different places, exchange contacts, and compete on the fastest swimmer. After we planned it, we set for the journey to the other community to fetch the water. Reaching there, we discovered they have a neat and better stream than ours. I was triggered to dive immediately inside, but people were swimming at different paths, according to height and size. Carried away by this spectacle and arrangement because it is not done in such a manner in my community stream. I concluded that I still will swim in the stream even when my elder brother insists on swimming. Because of my undying desire to swim, I waited until we finished fetching the water and was about to load it to the truck. I know full well at this time that his attention has deviated from watching me. I insisted on swimming, then dived into the water with my clothes on. I went deep down, as usual, to pick pebbles and park fine sand. I came out, and my leg was balanced but not that deep I decided to move further by diving deep down into the stream, swimming across several rocks. After some few distances trying to go back to the surface, I knew my leg was no longer reaching the depth of the water. Swimming upward to the surface was very devastating. I have lost a lot of energy. The next thing is I lost balance, trying all my possible best to regain it. I keep on trying to come up for four consecutive times to call the man sitting at the rock towards me to help me, but he keeps laughing at me. I came up again and begged, and he was still laughing until I lost all hope and started going down to the depth. Here, I know my only hope is in God. Only him can save me.
I asked if this should be the last moment, may it never cause my parent to weep. May he forgive me all my sins. And if he will give me a second chance, I will live my life to adore him forever. Here I made a covenant I can never forget. Still inside this water, not breathing yet. After losing all hope and about to drop my hand to give up and exhale the last breath, I saw myself being lifted by a group of five boys. I never believed I could see the end of that day. The only thought was, what will my parent do? How will they feel to hear their son was drowned in a stream. What will people say? A different opinion was roaming through my mind also, asking God to forgive my sins.
Immediately I was lifted out of the water; the man that was laughing at me asked me:
How many cups of water did you drink?
I was astonished by his attitude. But I could not say anything but was filled with pain and agony. I thanked God for using those guys to save me that day.
My elder brother was searching for me the whole time on seeing me. He was filled with bitterness and scolded me, reminding me of what he said before not to swim. Because they do drill sand from this community stream but are insisted and still went ahead to swim. He thanked the guys who helped me out. I was speechless many people came to advise me, warn me. The whole day became my topic. I could no longer work freely without people pointing fingers at me. The boy who got drawn for five minutes still never collapsed or became unconscious.
After the incident, we traveled back to the city.
I told my mum that I desire to become a Christian and a religious person to fulfill my vow made in the shade of death.
Every time I remember this incident, I thank him (God) for the second chance to live again.
It was the only pushing stone to my salvation and living upright life.
We all have this experience, these forces that made us act the way we do. We live not just because we do, but circumstance has made us do what we are doing now. You do not expect to wake each day and say I can do it without a pulling force to draw you back to rethink.
Parents do well to redirect the kids and teach them the right thing to do.
We are also human like you. Your story today can make a change in our life. We all have our darkest times be it a boy, girl, man, or woman. Everybody does have a driving force. If not, check yourself and ask yourself some questions; What is my driving force? What is that experience I cannot forget, and why can’t I? It is for you to solve.
