I used to hand out to comics to my friend Mike to illustrate. He was a skilled artist and when he returned the books, I used to gaze for long with wonder and admiration at the images he had created.
I rolled out comic after comic every week. Though the books themselves were a cross between a comic and a novel. My parents encountered my works and pronounced a compliment or two and I glowed with pride.
A vision was forming at the back of my mind, young as I was. I dreamt of becoming an acomplised writer when I grew. This vision took more definite shape when I gained admission into the secondary school. On certain days I'd visit the library and spend long moments perusing the works of famed writers, like Shakespeare, Dickens and the others.
I had encountered Shakespeare's incomparable literature when I was browsing my father's library. Of course it's written in old English, or the thee-thou English, as some people would comically put it. Such people avoided literary works written in old English like a plague. But I enjoyed them. I understood them too. The more I read these books, the more my aspiration came alive, and my imagination roamed.
The literary fire in my belly burned even more fiercely when I entered senior secondary school. I found my literary output became more refined. My teachers, especially the ones that taught English and literature, took note of that. My name was often called out at the term's end as one of the best performers in both subjects.
I remember a time in my senior secondary school, I was chatting with my classmates. Our class test results had just come in and we were engaged in jovial discussions about our performance in the tests.
“You are indeed the best in our entire class in the English language subject.”
A classmate said beaming at me.
My shoulder seemed to swell. I shrugged them and smiled.
“That's right. But I dream of becoming even better, maybe the best one in the country, the continent, or even the world. That may seem like a tall order but I'm confident I can achieve it.”
“Maybe you'd even be greater than Chinua Achebe.” Someone voiced.
I had imagined this particular scenario before, ousting the foremost literary mind on my continent, and the thought had felt very pleasant, nigh esctatic.
My skill with the pen elevated even more in my second year in senior secondary school. In the third term, I was singled out as the best performing English student. Even more, my essay was the best of all essays that term. My lofty dreams were becoming somewhat more tangible.
I remember a time we'd just finished an evening lesson. I was looking out the window and glimpsed a classmate who smiled at me.
“You resemble Shakespeare!” he shouted.
I smiled back, even though I knew I didn't. I somehow felt like an apprentice who'd just received a glowing compliment after achieving something extraordinary. Being put in the same frame as the world's foremost dramatist felt exactly like that.
But my expectation of becoming a celebrated fictional author when I finished higher education hit the rocks. I was hit by a severe medical condition in my last year in school. It badly affected my psych and my literary capabilities seemed to have gone with the wind. I was devastated.
Because of this, after graduating secondary school, my admission into the higher institution was hindered. I stayed home up to 7 years before I gained admission into the higher institution. By then the medical condition which had led me to chronic depression was getting a little better, the meds I'd been given at the hospital was working. But, mind you, the literary brilliance that had burned in me was now also off. After that medical condition, I became a completely different person. It was like my temperament had changed and the talents I had before weren't there again. Plus I fell into chronic depression for which I had to pay the doctor a visit.
My expectation had been to begin my higher education after secondary school, get my degree, then go on to get my second and third degrees. And maybe venture into research and publishing and become a professor and famous author in no time. But I missed the mark by a wide, disappointing margin.
But I kept hoping. And dreaming. My dreams may have been halted, my literary skill may have been sabotaged by the medical condition I encountered, but I still look forward to the day when my first book will make it to the top of the bestsellers' list. To be honest, that's the least I hope to achieve. And since I'm still alive, it means it's still possible.
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