My relationship with Nokia 3310

One fateful day (or more) in secondary school, I took my mum’s phone (Nokia 3310) to school. This was around 1999/2000, and for anyone who schooled in Nigeria back then, there is no way you missed the hype of actually having a phone if you were a teenager.

I believe the adrenaline was higher for me because I was in a school where it was not allowed and if you were caught, there is a 99% chance of suspension, and sometimes, we all know the things we are told we cannot do, are the things that excite and challenge us the most.

I was in an environment where girls would bring their phones to class, use it as an oppression accessory and mehn! Having guts to bring a phone to a no-phone zone, could be the determining factor to if you were cool or not…

So my peer-pressurized self, took her mum’s phone to school..(Thinking about it now, I don’t think I took it, it must have been more in the area of kidnapped it)..And that day, hello everyone! I made it a point of duty to have that phone as an accessory in broad day light. Yes! I have guts! And yes! I have a phone!

Everyone in my set had a general class in one of our general halls, and I sat at the front (because that is just how I am wired) to listen to the teacher, and for some weird reason, I brought the phone alongside with me to that class (this is highly to the fact if it gets stolen, I might lose my surname). I had my friends around me as we all loved front row in classes, and we were paying attention as the teacher spoke..

Until

Until my phone rang.

Please tell me you can remember the Nokia 3310 default ring tone! The phone rang!

I was sitting in front, directly under the teacher’s nose and the phone rang in all its glory and glamour and I froze. Everyone got quiet.

The speed at which I reacted to killing the phone was in slow motion but faster than the speed of light! I could not get any faster and yet I put that phone off and was shaking, waiting to be called out and disciplined with a suspension letter.

At this point, I saw where I was headed... I would not only lose my surname, I would lose my family because my mother would kill me! I would then not finish secondary school and end up as a drop out and then my father would kill me some more! And then in one sentence I muttered to myself ‘I am gone’.

What happened in one of the most deciding seconds of my life?  The teacher looked at me and said, put that phone off and never bring it back to school!’

I never did!
I say the most deciding seconds of my life because in all honesty, what would I have turned out to if the full length of the law was acted upon me? Truthfully I have no idea. At an impressible age, anything would have happened.

Why did I share this story above?

Because the Nokia 3310 that could have made me a dropout in secondary school, is nowhere to be found now. In fact, I cannot fully remember its features apart from the fact it had big text and the screen looked like brown mud. I also think it had just 4 or 6 key pads, and yet that was one key that wanted to shut the door of my life.

Now:

There are so many things that are in vogue now, it is just a matter of time they would become vague. So many fads, trends, material items that we want to possess, so many things we are in a rush to have sometimes at all cost.  For some it is gotten for a cost in which in a few years’ time, they would have no idea what it looked like, felt like, tasted like, or even what it is but what they won’t forget would be the after effects.

Have you ever felt that if you didn’t get something you were going to pass out? Did you?

Let us take a look around us. Sincerely, just look around you. What do you see? What must you have at all cost? Looking around me I see things I would like to have, places I would like to visit, clothes I would like to buy, a certain way I would desire to look, houses I would want to buy, the good things of life I would want to enjoy, some amazing businesses I long to kick off the ground and into the air, charities I want to be involved with and committed too, lives I want to bless, speeches I want to impact, books I want to write, stages I desire to climb,  a career I literally want to dream about, associations I just don’t want to be a member of but on the board of directors, buildings I want to own, blessed kids I want to be a mother to, a godly great man I want to be a wife to, godly home I want to be a mother of and a godly home I want to be the neck to and my list is endless  and I am so sure that yours is as well.

My thoughts:

Check within you, there are things you might want to have at all cost and you know what they are.  I think that most things we should need to have at all cost often times do not come with a cost. They do not diminish in value, character or significance. They are not always physical or material but more of mental and invisible but giving birth to the visible.

Am I saying do not desire or go after the things of that you want? No way! Life is yours to enjoy, explore and impact.

 If we are truthful with one another, we would know that 10 years from now, the things we would ‘kill’ to have, have been murdered with passing time, and all that remained was you, I, and our beloved friend called  ‘time’ moving on to the next thing to put in ‘vogue’.

I cannot remember one single text message I got in that phone 13 years after it almost kicked me out of school. 10 years from now, that thing we so desire to have, would we remember the impact it made in our lives or the impact it made ‘with’ our lives?

I remember the impact the Nokia phone made with my life.

My Prayers

I pray that God’s wisdom would continue to direct us all onto the things that would build us into better persons and not break us into bitter persons.

I pray to choose wisely positively lasting effects and not negatively lasting defects

Most importantly to know what to do with the right choices!

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