Come for the wit, stay for the lessons.

First off, apologies to those I’ve offended by the singular reason of choosing this title. Those that have some bit of struggle articulating the ‘th’ sound, worse if you have ‘rhotacism’ – the inability to pronounce ‘r’. Even worse still, if you’re from Eastern Nigeria, with deep mother tongue interference, you might want to sit this one out entirely.

Prease plonounce it in your mind.

For the freshers, MIP is a year note I write to the 1% of the 1% who love a good read. This edition of MIP might be a bit profound because it makes a decade of writing MIP and it is borne from a heart-wrenching phase I went through.

Did I just casually gloss over the fact that I’ve been at “this MIP thing” for a whole decade? It’s MIP10 people!

I won’t fall into the trap of pretending I have powered through every edition like I know exactly what the year holds out, really, you don’t want to know the story of each year. This year’s rather interesting because my website got shot down, caught in the middle of the domain hosting and all that Dollar payment conundrum. 

It was a really sad realization for me, because I had put 9 years of hard yards into MIP and it got wiped off just like that. The contents, comments and responses? For context, when I’m writing a new edition, I go back to read all the previous ones, including reactions to them all. This time the silence was loud!

I was beyond despondent, and after continuously kicking the can further down the road, I had to bring myself to experience the full circle of grief.

Time and again I get messages from readers who say they’re going through some stuff and remember I’d written something about it but they couldn’t because the link is not working. I couldn’t bear to tell them the full story, but I’ll just say: “it’s down for now, I’m working on rebuilding the site.”

But in actual fact, I kept kicking the can further down the road.

Mulling over the spilled milk for the longest, I nearly packed it up altogether. I thought I could do without the mental bug everytime August is around the corner anyway. But I told myself I’ll be worse off knowing what could have been, or if someone asks “You used to write that year, really cool stuff, whatever happened??”

I might actually cry.

Would the pain of regret about what could have been, be greater than the pain of powering through this challenge? Hell yes.

I remembered I’d faced a similar scenario. In MIP2, I wrote about how after an impromptu encounter spelling out “SEPTUAGENARIAN” in class, birthed my love for reading and literally transformed me from the class dullard to the unbeatable student in Primary 5, especially in English. Well, what I didn’t write about was that I read so much English/Literature texts and got insanely good at English but hilariously poor at Maths. In fact, there was an exam where I scored 99/100 in English OBJ and 10/100 in Maths OBJ – WAEC mock in 2009.

My Maths and English abilities were two polar extremes.

I remember my teachers at school couldn’t fathom why I averaged 95 – 99% in English but struggled with a paltry 15 – 25 in Mathematics. Well, the imbalance followed me into secondary school until I failed Maths in O’Level.

Then the worst happened.

My Dad made it clear to re-sit or go learn a trade. With the help of my Mom, we made a deal, yes, resit, but another school.

This was where THE ONLY TRUE WAY IS THROUGH, came into full circle. Not around, not above, definitely not below, THROUGH.

Come June 2009, I resumed the new school with 6 shiny New General Maths textbooks – JSS1 to SS3, about 3 orange coloured Mathematics past questions; I meant business.

Coincidentally, my seatmate Olaoye Princewill, also resumed that same day and had also just failed Math from his former school. It was a bit awkward resuming in a class with folks one year behind you, when your mates are flooding Facebook with matriculation pictures, and “AMA KIP KIP” shirts in class.

So Princewill and I registered with a Physics/Maths guru teacher to escape to his office at every break and free periods. We also paid for extra 2 hours daily after school, for Mathematics alone.

*in front of Mr Maths teacher’s office

We drew up schedules that involved long hours at night studying the entire Math textbooks from JSS1. Yes, from JSS1.

From LCM, HCM to Surds, Word Problems, Ratio, Proportion, Rates, Variations, Algebras, Linear Inequalities, Mensuration, Plane Geometry, Chords, Probabilities, just name it.

And no, it wasn’t easy nor anything fun, it was about the most tortuous period of my life – having to do that one thing you despise to do and for long hours too, just to pass an exam.

I could give anything to let this cup pass over me. But it was life’s lesson to me that THE ONLY WAY IS THROUGH. Not around, not above, definitely not below, THROUGH. [ˈθɹu]

As the exam neared, Princewill and I had established our authority among the class elites, and we had gotten so good that once our Maths teacher wrote a question, we could tell him what year and what question number that question was, then of course, what the answer was without lifting a pen to solve a thing.

We were the Invincibles!

This continued until “…everyone except Princewill and Paul” became a thing.

You know you’re elite when the subject teacher exempts you from every question. Now Art class students going to other departments to teach them Maths?

We were gods.

Our tutor, Mr Atagbogha, (the second ‘g’ is silent) still wanted more and gave us tougher, longer workload every evening; leading to longer nights studying in the dark.

I went from solving complex problems like a breeze every other Monday morning to my Maths notes being the most hunted for homeworks and classworks copying before the dreaded Math teacher walked into the class.

LESSON: IT’S WHAT YOU DO IN THE DARK THAT PUTS YOU IN THE LIGHT.

Needless to say the exam came and went, but left me with a valuable lesson till today: THE ONLY TRUE WAY IS THROUGH. A lesson that caused the rebirth of MIP, when it was almost slipping away from my heart and mind, then my fingers. This is a story of how I grew through a really tough period that could have put an end to MIP altogether.

I hope this inspires you to make challenges meet a bigger version of you, till giants stretch their necks to catch a glimpse of you.

For all they’re worth, (everything, really) I got some of my files back. While I lost a huge chunk of reactions/comments in some, I lost all reactions from the last 3 outings, which unfortunately happen to individually bag the highest numbers in reach and impressions ever. That’s why you’re reading this on what’s left the WP blog (now the backup page, with this haphazard arrangements) while I truly work on building back the main website.

And for worthy mention, I had a Distinction in Mathematics while they gave themselves (can’t be me) just a Credit in English Language – make of that what you will.

Oh, yes, I left as the Best Graduating Student in the Department!

On that note, while I’m hopeful for what the next years bring and how MIP would evolve – podcasts, audio notes are viable options, but I would love to have your thoughts on what you think we can do better to evolve, please share, since we might not be doing this reading thing forever.

Also for research’s sake, indulge me – what’s your fav MIP edition, and why? I’ll like to know.

Regardless, I’m deeply thankful for 10 full years of consistently doing this – writing for those who seek a kind of growth history reserves its front pages for.

Here’s to God in whose palms I’m eternally engraved.
Here’s to you, the rose that grows right through concrete, thorns and thistles.
Here’s to you powering THROUGH THE ONLY TRUE WAY.
Here’s to you, building your mental fortitude per challenge.
Here’s to my brothers, Rock, Petr and Adeshina – your influence is influencing.
Here’s to My Best Girl – thank you for allowing my laptop share a bedspace.
Here’s to those who seek a kind of growth history reserve its front pages for.

Pizzout! Or whatever the cool kids say these days!

Oluranti Akerele
01/08/23
T: @Super_Akerele
IG: @superakerele
3:06am.