Failure. A word no one wants to associate with. What does it mean to fail? To lose all hope? To think that there’s something wrong with you because of consistently failing to achieve something. Here's my story.
I was one of the brightest art students in secondary school. You hardly see art students being almost begged to study science by teachers but that was my story. My dad is a mathematician so most times, even before a topic is taught in Maths or Physics, I’d already know it. The science teachers kept scolding me that I was wasting myself being an Art Student since I had such profound knowledge of Science subjects.
I wasn’t even remotely moved because I loved Literature and English so much. I was literally in love with those subjects and each time I considered studying a science-related subject, I’d shudder with revulsion. Nope, not for me.
Then JAMB came, which is practically your ticket to a tertiary institution and I passed with great scores. Admission time came and I became restless. My friends, one by one, kept posting their successful admissions into the university and I was yet to post mine. I knew I had high scores so I didn’t worry. I kept checking every day but kept seeing ” You’ve not been given admission yet.”
And after practically everyone had gotten admission, I lost hope. I didn’t hear anything else about it for a month or so. Then one day, I just decided to check. For checking sake. And I found out I’d been given admission, but I couldn’t accept it. I clicked on the ‘Accept’ button several times to no avail.
I alerted my dad and when we went to see the Director of Admissions. His simple reply was that I’d actually been given the admission a month ago but because I didn’t accept it and Law slots were much sought after, it had been relinquished to someone else. I almost fainted. What did that even mean?
Meanwhile, the JAMB registrations for those coming in next had already been concluded and I hadn’t registered. This means I was going to be staying home, not one year but two. Two full years! At the time, everything in my mind was “I’m going to be two years behind my mates.” “Everyone would mock me.” It felt like I was seeing the headlines: “Self-Acclaimed Brightest Student Dragged From Her High Horse.”
It was terrible. I wanted to relapse into depression. But my father’s words kept ringing in my head. “There’s no rush in life. It’s not in him that starts first…..” And he’d conclude by telling me stories of a classmate of his that repeated class twice but is currently the governor. Words like that consoled me and I stopped feeling like so much of a failure. I threw myself into learning things like Forex trading and improving my writing skills.
Fast-forward to 2022 and I sat to write JAMB again. I had good scores and I applied to the University I wanted to study. I relaxed and waited, knowing that those who got admission would start in September of this year.
Then in February, I heard my school of choice was starting in April, not September as I’d thought. But if they were starting in April that means I should have started seeing ‘Admission in Progress’ on my caps but I didn’t see that. Upon enquiry and to my utter mortification, I found out that there had been an exam as far back as November of 2022 to qualify people for admission into that University and I hadn’t written it.
All the people I had requested to keep me updated on information regarding the school did not inform me and I hit my head on the wall for my carelessness. And resigned myself to the knowledge that I wasn’t just destined to go to the University then. But luck, I guess has shone on me as I was informed that the University in my state that I’d been dreading to go to still has its admission portal open.
And so, without delay, I changed my institution to it. I know you all are probably waiting to hear my success story on how I’ve successfully gotten in, but no, the admissions are still set for September. So, I’ve doubled my prayers and I guess I or we, just have to wait. I know deep down I’ll be successful this time. I know also, that the number of times I’ve failed is not a yardstick to measure my worth as a person. And I know, no matter how many times I fall, I would definitely rise again.❤️
This is my entry to the Inkwell Creative Nonfiction Prompt.
