Matt

WELCOME, MATT

Each time she went up, the yellow-billed magpie carried dry twigs from the ground diligently onto one of the shoots of an oak.

There were only a handful of tall trees within the vicinity and it was one of them.

The oak tree was only a stone’s throw away from the little brook by which I stood.

I initially enjoyed observing the movement of the water but somehow my attention was drawn to what the bird was doing.

It was a Saturday morning going well already. My phone rang. It was Tony.

“Hello Chris! How was your night?” “Great how about yours?”

“Mine was awesome. I’ll be coming around in an hour’s time. Would you be okay with that?” he asked.

“Yeah sure. It’s fine by me,” I replied.

I had to rush home to have my shower. I had stolen away from the house in the early hours of the morning in order to get this beautiful experience and it was indeed worth the while as usual.

After a couple of FIFA  gaming rounds, Tony and I began discussing. We spoke about college which was obviously the next phase of life.

I didn’t have so much expectations from the higher institution I would be attending, just wanted to get a degree and kick off with my career.

While I intended doing my first degree programme in Trentwood University, Tony preferred to move to the UK for his university education.

I had one more month to spend at home, After pondering over what I would do within that period I decided to take a job so i could get some extra bucks and also keep myself busy.

I took a job at a cafe about two hundred metres away. 8 was reporting time while work ended for me everyday by 3pm.

It wasn’t a bad schedule at all as I had the rest of the day to relax or do a couple of other things. I was enjoying it.

Some evenings I would visit my endeared brookside just to have a good time with nature but other days I would either sit back at home spending time with my mum who was with child, or go on a walk with my dad.

However, I never missed the going to the baseball park every Tuesday and Saturday.

I was at the park quite earlier than usual one day for some reason and at the time of arrival, no one was in sight so I pulled out my macbook and started a movie until the coach arrived.

After the training session I left without my laptop and not until I was home had I noticed.

I quickly drove back there and went straight to where I kept my bag.

Lo and behold, the laptop was gone. I knew the device was quite expensive but there was a bigger problem. I would lose a lot of important files that I had failed to back up.

Having ransacked the entire place to no avail, I went home, somewhat regretful. I shouldn’t have forgotten to take it along with me.

The following week I got myself a new one but I never let my parents know about all of this because I knew they would be displeased as it was them who got me the Macbook.

My first days at Trentwood University were full of obscurity.

Again there were many things I hadn’t figured out but I rested assured that I was going to have it all figured out as time went on.

My confidence about outcome of situations had always been top barrel right from when I was a kid and it helped me a whole lot.

I was now a student of Accounting, a field I always had passion for especially after trying out several disciplines in high school and finding Economics and Math the most interesting.

 Mum was now three months pregnant. I hitherto called her almost everyday but subsequently I got so occupied that I could go some days without speaking with my parents over the phone.  

I found a good way to manage my time in such a way that I seldom missed classes. School was fun, meeting new faces.

Some of the professors were quite annoying but I had to deal with it. The most annoying of them all was the man that handled Statistics.

He was always fond of randomly picking on students for no just reason and I had fallen victim a couple of times.

The fact that he would be teaching us for the next one year was a hard pill for me to swallow.

Days rolled by, then weeks, then months and the first final exam which was to come at the end of the semester was just a week away.

I had to spend more time reading my powerpoints and books, in the process of getting ready for the tests.

I would go to the library in the morning and return to my dorm at about 4pm.

Some days, I preferred reading in my room but whenever I started getting distracted I went to the library.

The exams came. I wrote the papers to the best of my ability and expected to  perform quite well in all of them.

Still a freshman, I wasn’t accustomed to the quizzing style in a tertiary institution but most things I saw in the questions were familiar to me.

Done with my exams, I didn’t plan to go home immediately. I wanted to stay behind in school to study ahead of the next semester. It was a Tuesday night. I was out with some friends and had just barely returned to the residential hall.

As I was on my bed going through my f******k feeds I got a text. It was Dad.

‘Hey Chris. Your mum is currently in the LDR. Please say a prayer for her.’ I jumped off my bed excited but with overtones of anxiety.

First I was excited that mum would finally be delivered of her baby but I was uncertain about whether I would be having a sister or a brother and this made me quite nervous.

I called my dad almost immediately to ask how she was doing and he said she was just fine at least according to the nurses’ report.

However, he said she was still in travail at the time.

I said a prayer for Mum and went to bed, quite reassured that I would wake up to good news the next morning.  

I overslept simply because I felt there was literally no classes to go for, neither were there any texts to prepare for, so literally there was nothing at stake.

My alarm initially woke me up by 5am but I snoozed it and it did wake me up again by 6am but yet a gain I snoozed it and I kept doing this till 9am. That was when I got up.

I felt tired although I was just waking up from sleep.

After my quiet time I picked up my phone and saw a text dad had sent to me about 9 hours ago. “It’s a boy!”

Instantly, I was filled with a great measure of unspeakable joy.

I spent the next fifteen minutes repeatedly saying ‘thank you God,’ pacing about my room happily.

Next I called my dad to ask if mum was back from the hospital yet and his answer was in the affirmative.

Immediately, I called her to check on her. I even requested a video call with her on Skype so I could see my baby brother but she said she needed some rest and pleaded we do that at a later date. I was so happy and I called my dad to tell him I would be coming home to spend the rest of the break with them.