Que será, será. It is what most people believe, and I do not object to it, but I do not believe it.
Source
I loved to sit in the quiet of my house, or anywhere else, and ponder on what the future held for me. I would take out a pen and paper and write down my options then rearrange them in the order in which they are most likely to play out.
Sometimes, I would seek the opinions of the mature people around me, seeking to know if the choices and plans I had made for myself were not just sensible but also feasible.
It takes me days sometimes, even weeks, but never had a decision taken me years.
I took in a deep breath and released it slowly, tapping absentmindedly on the sticky note I had earlier placed before me. There were tiny droplets of water splashing into my room from the window because of the rain that pelted consistently outside.
I was supposed to crawl under my sheets, close my eyes, and drift off into slumber as the rainy season was my favorite but at the moment, I couldn't.
My mind kept betraying me, bringing up flashes of images where I was wearing a white t-shirt and a pair of cargo pants complimented by a pair of sneakers. There would be people flocking around me, ready to scribble their signatures on my t-shirt with congratulations ready on their lips.
I would then ask myself, “After all the drama, what next?”
What would happen after I finally drop my pen and announce that I am done with the higher institution?
What am I going to become in the near future?
I had a number of options which I noted down some years ago, but there was no way I was opening an organization of my own immediately after school for example, those foolproof plans I once made now seemed to be most feasible in the far future.
I took in another deep breath and released it.
The poser was not set before me alone, I had asked my close friends what they wanted to do immediately after school too,
“I'm going for service,” Jane said, creating a large bubble with the gum in her mouth.
“I don't know if I want to go for service,” my best friend, Treasure, said. “I want to go to a flight attendant academy immediately.”
“And who is funding it?” Jane asked. Treasure fell quiet for a while before dropping her shoulders in a shrug.
“What about you? What do you want to do after school?” Jane turned to me.
“I think we should begin this question from where you want to major in the final year,” I said quietly, that was one of my biggest challenges. If anything was certain, it was the fact that I didn't want to join Nollywood simply because I was studying Theatre Arts in school.
If I went in for acting in my final year, it would automatically push me into the acting field, I would need to attend a movie school after university.
If I went in for scriptwriting, the focus would be on writing for the stage and not necessarily movie script writing which was what I should learn if I wanted to learn writing in school.
If I went for Children's Theatre, it would be fun and amazing but most opportunities with that line of study lay abroad.
“I'm going for acting,” I heard Jane say. We all knew she would go for acting. She was the most dramatic one amongst us. It would be a waste of her talent if she didn't act.
“I don't know what I want to go for yet, but Choreography is on my mind,” Treasure said.
“There are three things on my mind,” I began.
“Scriptwriting,” Jane guessed. I smiled at her.
“That's one, there's Children Theatre and Acting too.”
“You should go for acting,” Treasure said almost immediately.
“I'm still thinking about it, but Children Theatre is at the top of my list” Treasure turned surprised eyes towards me.
“You want to become a teacher?”
I threw my head back and allowed myself to laugh for the first time since the conversation began.
“Indeed. Children Theatre is all about creative dramatics, only we don't have much of it in Nigeria”
“Then you want to go abroad?” Jane asked, an uncertain look on her face. I had said it time and again that I wasn't in for leaving the country on the grounds of relocation.
I shook my head from side to side, once more the topic had come up to bug my mind and like every other time, I had ended up at crossroads. I couldn't seem to find the most suitable answer to that particular poser.