"Life is not a bed of roses"

“Life is not a bed of roses”…

If you grew up in Sierra Leone, like I did, someone must’ve thrown this expression across your path at some point. Whether it was a parent or probably a teacher because it was definitely a favourite amongst my teachers…someone, in authority, must’ve uttered that line to you at some point, I guarantee it. I never liked that saying though, because it always meant I didn’t get what I was looking for and there was scarcely anything I could do about it. In hindsight, I could’ve argued that life is indeed a bed of roses...pretty to look at but a huge challenge to get through…


Growing up I’ve always been frustrated with the lack of clarity when I’ve asked for advice on how to proceed on certain things. “Well…you know…it’s difficult to say…these things aren’t precise…”…There was a shrug of the shoulders, a story about an era with which you could never relate, an old wise saying that you never full understood etc etc you get the picture…with time of course those sayings made sense, what was vague became crystal clear and all of this happened, of course, after the fact. When the shit had hit the proverbial fan and I was standing there amply fertilized...

Age teaches us that clarity is best confined to childhood, Mama and Papa may not know everything and there are times when no matter how close we are to family, we feel all alone. There are times when we have a million questions, yet the only answers we have to make do with are vague at best. We come to the unsettling conclusion that nobody really knows it all…that I think is the moment everyone starts to grow up.

My “holy shit” moment as I like to refer to this point in my life came when I was in my late teens just about to get into University…Given all this, at some point or the other, we all ask ourselves what’s the bloody point? What’s the point of sitting there and listening to all these people reminisce about the “good old days” when they were your age…

The answer I settled on after years of pondering through my teens is that listening to older people is not about getting the exact road map to life’s successes…nobody can offer that. It’s about gathering from those stories and experiences the strength to keep on going in life, the strength to pick yourself up when you’ve been let down…the kind of strength that allows self-belief to flourish and resilience to become second nature.

Growing older, It's harder to maintain a youthful zest for life and all its wonderful times when all you seem to face in life is troubles and deceit… cynicism becomes a solace for some although I personally refuse to give in. That strength to hang in there and persevere is weak or non-existent if those stories and experiences weren’t shared with you earlier in your life...

Beautiful B.C