A Table for Lost Things

I guess this would have been pretty easy to talk about if it weren't added that we could also talk about dead people. Oops, where are my manners? Hello, amazing ladies. Trust every one of you is in peachy shape.

So, the Ladies of Hive Community has asked another beautiful question this week which I’ll be answering.

If you could invite any five people, living or dead, to a dinner party, who would they be?

Now, if we talk about strictly living people, I guess that would be a struggle because I don’t even have that many friends or people in my life, but there would be a queue, lined up with several people I’d want to pick. My table of five people will become a table of twenty real fast.

So, I did some good thinking and quick Math, yeah?

The question said I could invite any five people to a dinner party, right? But it didn’t say that I could be part of the dinner party. That invariably means that I can make room for one more person, and exclude myself.

This means I’m going to be organising a party for six, and I know just who to call. First, there would be my parents. My Mom and my Dad.

For my Mom, I’ll be bringing in Late Uncle Lawrence, my Mom’s immediately older brother, who didn’t even get to see my birth, and Late Aunt Rita, my Mom’s immediate younger sister, who left behind my three boy cousins, and whose departure left a vacuum like no other in my Mother’s heart.

I know they will talk, and my Mom will laugh in that loud, raw and nearly child-like way she reserves for her siblings and for us, her children. I know they will talk about how beautiful they’re all looking, and tease my Mom that she may have forgotten her language and culture since she married from another tribe.

For my Dad, I’ll be bringing in his immediate old brother, who my Dad still talks about even though it’s been nearly three decades since he died. I know they will laugh and tease each other, and would probably ask if my Dad is still a spoilt boy.

I guess that’s because my Dad keeps talking about his big brother doted on him till he was spoilt. Bought him his first car at the age of eighteen, and didn’t let him work, because according to him, he could and would give my Dad everything. My Dad’s best brother, that I also never got to see.

And then I’ll bring in my Dad’s eldest brother, whom we will be laying to rest three days from now. Whose death still feels like a dream to me, since he was my favourite uncle from my Dad’s side, and who may make me break my promise of remaining unseen, and peep for two seconds to see him one more time, chide him for leaving me when he made me promise that I’ll come visit him the very day he passed away, and who is the cause of my tears running free as the ocean right now. I’ll also ask him if he’s happier now. If he sleeps easier now. If he’s surrounded by more love than he was given here.

Then, I’ll leave. And watch the siblings laugh, eat talk, banter, get all teary-eyed and pray together. It’s going to be beautiful because I helped set it up, and because I know this would make my parents extremely happy, howbeit for a limited time. My perfect dinner party, that I’ll enjoy...by proxy.

Jhymi🖤

P.S: I didn’t mean for any of this to sound depressing. It just happened that way. But yeah,I guess we can blame the luteal phase, lol.

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_{Image is mine.}