I later came to learn the real meaning of that phrase when I tried to roll with the high school big girls, and what I did was to run for my life.
Since high school, I had left home to the boarding school, and the funny thing is, all the strictness of being away from home at a boarding school soon went on break. Why? At some point, we had our housemasters and mistresses resigned, and we were left with catering for ourselves.
We had seniors who would go out of the hostel for meetups and would link up with some of the teachers in return for a very good score in their exams. As for me, the only thing I had to exchange for those grades was hard work. Read hard, and get the results is what I strongly believed in, and it worked for me, because to an extent, they couldn’t fumble with my result because of the reputation I had build from class 1.
I thought that would be the end of it until I finished my diploma, and I needed an internship placement, mainly to earn some money and learn in preparation for a further study, but I was met with a shocker.
I was just twenty-one. Tall and slim, well-dressed, and all covered and off I went for that interview. I should’ve suspected when the location of the interview was a hotel. In fact, the top and the most expensive 5-star hotel in my community at the time. I didn’t think too much of it because the person that referred me for the job said, the owner of the farm is a top politician, and he only meets up at places like that.
On getting to the venue, I had my handbag on my side, walked confidently to the waiting room where my potential boss was sitting waiting for me. I entered, greeted the two men on seat, then I sat down waiting to be interviewed.
At first, he said, “you should calm your nerves”, so he bought me a drink after which the interview started.
The interview was going smoothly until he said, “are you matured at all?” The confused me looked at him and responded “yes, I am”. His next question would be, “how matured are you?” and I responded, “like an adult should be”.
“I would really like that you work for me, but you know what I want right now with the questions I asked you. So, if you’re willing to give it a try, give me a call”. He handed me his business card after that sentence.
I smiled, looked up, and said, “thank you for your time, sir”.
Life, I’ve come to realize has a way of desperately putting people against what they’ve sworn not to compromise on, but we really don’t have to compromise on those values we hold dear.
Immediately I left the interview centre, I trashed the business card and returned home. Even though his job would’ve given me all the experiences I needed, and the plenty money involved, I wasn’t ready to exchange his asking for a job, and the punishment for that was that I stayed at home for another three months before getting a job as a class teacher.
We really don’t have to do the things we don’t want to do after all. It only takes a little control over our mind and the desperation brooding up within. Then, we can channel that desperation into looking for other alternatives, even though it may take time.
Images are from MetaAi.
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