ATTITUDE,SOMETHING WE CAN'T LIVE WITHOUT

“Overgrown baby” is an english expression which i have come across in my readings and it is used to refer to an adult who has matured either in age or,and in size but has,by choice or nature not been able to grow up equally in mentality.This means that you could address,i don't know if in polite usage, an adult as “overgrown baby” if he is big in size and age but dim in wit and common sense.
Where i now live(i relocated from another part of town to this place which has a closer proximity to my office}is a semi-urban part of town and therefore still has a great deal of rough and untarred road network.Infact.the road is so much a nightmare that whether you trekk, ride or drive,you must need a pain reliever as you get to wherever you are headed.And you certainly must need hot water and disinfectant so as to not get itches and rashes from the bad muddy splashes from the puddles on the roads and potholes.
Needless to point out here that everybody in the vicinity share this nigtmare.Bike riders shuttle passengers across the roads and the people who own cars park anytime there is as much as a drizzle,unless, ofcoure, you have a floodbourne apparatus.The bike users(okada -as it is called in this part )could be private,commercial or a combination of the two,and they are the last hope of the people,unless if one could trekk home in the muddy puddle.I belong to the combination category.I use my bike to go to work and on some days ,i could pick a passenger as i go.I might or might not collect payment based on my mood and disposition for the day.
It was on one of the days when i was returning from work,a terribly rainy day,that i saw a lady from afar trying to negotiate a most arduous part of the road.She was attempting to test the muddy waters with her foot to see if she could risk walking along.On a day like this,the road becomes dangerously slippery.My pity for her stayed and i approached this woman with the intention of assisting.As i got closer she hailed me down"okada,okada!" and i stopped.She told me the street she was going to and i told her the fare.The normal fare of #150.00.She,at the hearing of my reply caught fire and shouted and hit me on my shoulder "stop,stop,stop,stop......thief.idiot useless thief,even as i have trekked some distance from the junction.Get away!,foolish old man. Useless man,thief.God punish you............"She had angrily alighted even before I'd had the break to reply.I was so surprised and embarrassed and let her be.If she had given me just a breathing time,i wanted to tell her that i was ok with any bargain that pleased her.She gave me no chance as she went on cursing and raining more abuses.
About seven plots away,i got stopped by another young lady who told me she was headed to a street just opposite where the first lady was going.I still told this one the same price,#150.00 which was the normal fare even if i had met her further down the road.This lady just walked closer to me and,folding her hands the way people do if they want to pray,quietly said "please,my husband,i have only #100.00.Help"I was so touched and i asked her to ride with me.I rode her to her destination and i did not care to collect her money.We were chating as we rode and this dear old lady told me that money is not everything,She even narrated another anecdote of hers in which she let me know that she was of the school that humans could be more responsive and helpful outside money terms,and that attitude could take one to places and avail one assistance which money could not harness.
I experimented with retracing my way back the way i had come,and to my amazement,i still had the first woman wave me to stop.I did,and she told me where she was going not recognizing it was me.She had at that time walked about four times the previous distance from the junction and she was looking like shit with mud and muck and tiredness.I was wondering how many bikers she had abused before getting to this spot.Yet i told her the same price#150.00 and true to type she flogged me with a killing stare and snarled"if you won't take #100,go"i laughed and wondered if she had walked the rage and bad manners out of herself.I let her ride with me.When we got to her destination,i told her to keep her money and informed her i was the biker she was abusing and let her know i already intended to assist her if she had asked politely.I rode away,leaving her there ,agape.