Continuation of My 37 Year War with satan - Part 1b

In those days, I used to love to take long walks like I did in Nigeria, just to get out of the house.

When I first arrived in America, after a couple months, before I started applying to colleges for my masters degree, I tried very hard looking for work. I went to places like McDonalds and KFC thinking it will be easy to get such jobs, Filling out the applications, I put all my education thinking they will be impressed and I will surely be hired. Nothing. Eventually I was able to get a good response, but it turned out to be telemarketing. I went to the location and saw a very big room with lots of people sitting at desks each with a big phone book. The supervisor lady explained what was expected, that I should go through the phone book, calling abitrary numbers and trying to sell some product to them ( I cant remember what the product was now ). Already I knew I would not be so good. She assigned me to a desk and I just sat there, looking around, how others were doing the job, maybe I’d get an idea how to approach it. One guy in front of me was so hyper and zealous in doing it. Like he was born for it, he would call someone he doesnt know and immediately start overwhelming them with his sales pitch. Exaggerating, lying a bit and very much hyping the product. I said to myself, I can never do this. I made an effort to call one or two people and the conversation didn’t last 8 seconds each time. Once they gave any hint they are not interested, I would say goodbye. The supervisor lady noticed this and came over and dismissed me. I was relieved.

In those very early years in America (New York City), in the days I was still trying to land a real job, I went for an interview with a company in Manhattan. I believe it was to be an office assistant. I dressed very well for the interview, in fact I remember some of what I wore. On top was a very light blue work shirt, and then a deep purple sweater on top, the kind with buttons on the front, and I left the top buttons undone, which revealed the shirt in the form of a “V”. I knew I looked *very* handsome, and was counting on that to help entice them into giving me the job. I entered the office, and it was a middle aged black (medium complexion) lady. I was happy, as I usually feel more comfortable or at ease with women. We started chatting and it was going *very* well. About fifteen minutes in, an older white man, maybe late 50s, came in. He was tall, and medium build, a little wider at the waist/belly. They said he was the head of security or something. He asked me for my social security number. I was happy, knowing I’m a full citizen, and he was probably expectin immigrant status. I was delighted to show in flying colors that I am a full citizen, so I even gave him my social security card. He took it and left the room. In about 4 minutes he was back, and with a harsh voice asked “where did you get this social security card from?”. I told him, I mysteriously recieved it in Nigeria, not long before I came to America ( that was true ). He asked which state it was issued from. I said I was not sure, but I thought it was from the south somewhere ( I forget why I knew that much ). He started attacking me verbally, and treating me like I was a convict. The black lady was sitting there looking helpless. I was almost trembling a little bit with that sense of unexpected confrontation, and was still protesting in a peaceful voice, while he continued in his harsh voice of conviction. I forget exactly how it ended and I left, half traumatized all the way home. At home, I was still fuming I think for the whole day. I had not yet encountered such things in my life. My anger grew to the point I had to call him up the next day and confront him on his treatment of me ( I had their number anyway ). When I called, I spoke with him directly and started asking him why he treated me that way. It was only a job interview, why such hostility, like I was a criminal. I remember saying the words specifically “ you had no right to barrage me like that “. All his responses were extremely arrogant, and never backed off from his completely unjust stance. I got angrier and began to let him have it, and he just hung up on me. This made me even angrier, but I had not choice but to find a way to dissipate the anger.

The next job I got was as a security guard at a security company called RAV. They assigned me to the Jacob Javitts convention center after a short training. The first thing that hit me hard was that I had to remain standing all through the 8 hour shift. I had never done such before and it was torture. I remember one Jamaican guy who was much older than me then, looked happy. I complained to him about the standing for so many hours and he replied back with a big smile “I can stand all day mon” bouncing on his feet as he said it. One time they had an art convention. Artist from all over displaying their works. I had to stand much longer than usual and not even in normal working hours, I had the overnight shift, which extended until the participants for the convention arrived in the morning. I was assigned to one big showroom on the ground floor and was standing in the middle of the exibits. I was so tired and sleepy, I remembered standing up straight and then nothing at all and suddenly I was concious again but very close to hitting the floor. I had fallen asleep while standing and woke up just as I was about to hit the floor. I quickly saved my fall and stood up again. Looked around and no one even noticed.

Soon after I got laid off from RAV and joined Wells Fargo security company. During the training period was when I applied to City College of New York for my masters in Computer Science. It was in that time period I first had a bit of a sharp pain under my left foot, but it wasn't enough to really bother me. When training was complete, they assigned me to a homeless shelter in Styvescent Brooklyn, called Sumner House. They gave us work assignment papers and instructed us to go to the Sumner House location by ourselves the next day to relieve the security guards currently working there, as they are now being replaced by us. I thought this was known to those security guards, but found out when I arrived the next day they were really being fired. They were very angry with us. The guy I was supposed to replace was a big hispanic guy. At least 6 feet 2, and very strong looking with one small braid of hair at the back of his head. He shouted very loud and angry “My name is Jose Contreas and I don’t go home for nobody” ( I can’t remember his real name now ). On hearing this, I realized this guy needs this job a lot more than I do, so I quietlly left and went home. I decided I would not go back to that job anymore. They called me the next day begging me to come back but I refused. Shortly after that I recieved my acceptance letter to City College.

Just after I had started my comp sci degree at City College, Enitan had moved to a new apartment in Bradely Ave (Staten Island). I loved the apartment, and stayed a while with him there. Because I loved so much to play table tennis, I bought a table tennis table, which we kept on the patio. I went for a while to stay with my sister in Brooklyn, and by the time I came back, Enitan had moved to yet another apartment in Styvesent, close to the SI ferry. I asked about the table tennis table, and he said he threw it away when he moved. I’m not sure but it was a folding one that did not need that much space and there was enough space in the new apartment if we wanted to play indoors (unfolded). I then stayed with him there while still attending CCNY. One day, I came home from school and the apartment was locked. I could not get in, and I knocked and knocked but there was no answer. I was desparate, so I went to the next door neighbors place. A lovely Korean lady I had become good friends with lived there. She played the piano very well and I always loved to listen at the wall of our apartment to her playing. I told her our apartment was locked and I could not get in, maybe I could wait in her place till my brother comes home. She suggested I go out the fire escape and check if our apartment window was open. I did so, and it was open, so I climbed through the window, and immediately I entered the apartment, there was Enitan, lying on his bed wide awake with his then girlfriend Amede next to him. They were not having sex or anything, just laying there and it was obvious to me they could have easily let me in. They said nothing at all, and I kept quiet too, like nothing had just happened. In those days, my total focus was on my Comp Sci degree. All the while in Nigeria, I knew my eyesight was not too good, but I never bothered to get glasses, but now I was determined to take my schooling very seriously, so I found an optometrist and got a pair of glasses. I was amazed at the difference. I had been going through life without really seeing anything around me, but now it was all so clear I was really amazed that first day I started wearing them. I cared about nothing but my school, so even though my trousers were quite loose and needed a belt, I did not care to buy one, but used a piece of cellophane from a shopping bag to tie one belt strap to another, closing the gap so my trousers will stay up, performing the function of a belt. It worked perfectly and I did not want a real belt at all. Enitan one day expressed how he felt sorry for me doing that, I could not understand it at all. We were both nowhere at all in life. What does a belt mean at that point? Shortly after that my cousin Niji came to Staten Island too and stayed with us, and then one day suggested to me we go together to Jackson Heights in Queens as he had landed a new job there and had an apartment we could stay in. As he said it I detected clearly and atmosphere like he did not like the way Enitan was acting toward us and wanted to save me from that situation.

So now to the next significant thing satan did in my life, to this point, while in Jackson Heights Queens, I had never watched porn videos, but one day alone in the apartment I shared with my cousin Niji, I just happened to be exploring and found a porn video, called “hot pink and black”. Out of curiosity, I popped it into the VCR and started watching. Within one or two minutes, I was jacking off to it. Wow, I enjoyed it so much I began watching almost every day. I felt a new kind of feeling in my body from that time on, but ignored it. I felt it mostly in my left foot, and after a while, the sharp pain in the bottom of my left foot sheath got really bad. It was so painful, I could not walk normally on my left foot, but had to turn it a little to avoid the pain. Somehow, I knew porn was bad for me, but whatever the danger was, it was not high enough to overcome the pleasure I felt from it.

One day in the Jackson Heights Queens apartment, my other cousins (Niyi) adopted daughter (Kay) was visiting, She was maybe 6 years old. We were playing about in the apartment, and Niji had gone to work. At one point I was lying on the bed and she came up to me and was at first just play fighting. Next thing she began to make some provocative moves on top of me. I was confused. She still looked very innocent like she had no idea what she was doing, but I thought to myself, if she continues this, I may start to get aroused, so I quickly took her off me and got off the bed, and from then on only normal play. So today I realize that was the third significant thing satan tried with me.

One time in Jackson Heights Queens, there was some kind of festival going on that started in the Queens area, and went all the way to Brooklyn. They had a number of large trucks with flatbed area on the back, where a bunch of people would be, as well as stereo equipment and very large loud speakers blasting music. I was so joyous to see it. This is what we came to America for - dancing in the streets, and so I went out to join them. I enjoyed myself thoroughly, dancing behind the trucks which were going slow enough for people to follow on foot, mostly dancing. I was anticipating I would encounter lots of pretty girls, and indeed there were. I danced my best, and was just being moved naturally by the music. I was a really good dancer in those days, and liked to show it off a bit. I was so into it, I did not want to stop, and so I danced with them from Jackson Heights all the way to some place in Brooklyn. It was now late in the evening and they decided to pack it up, so I found my way back home, haven had the time of my life. I did not get to talk to any girls, but just seeing them was enough.

After completing my Masters program in 1992, I started looking for work all over. I was still in Jackson Heights at the time. IBM had just sent me a letter of rejection, after 2 weeks of interviews in their site at Poughkeepsie NY. They had given me “guarantees” that I would be hired and were seeming very enthusiastic, so I was kind of surprised when they did not even call, but just sent a cold rejection letter. Some time later, out of nowhere someone left a voice message on my home phone, and said he was from AT&T, and had recieved my resume, and wanted to know if I would be interested in an internship position. I was so excited, I called back and jumped at it. It was maybe the happiest time of my life. I started the position in April of 1993. After the internship was over in about three months, they offered me a permanent position. I was even happier than when I got the internship. I started to work full time at $45k per year. This was a *lot* of money to me back then. The person who had called for the internship was Bruce Varnerin, who ended up being my mentor, from the time I started. Bruce was a really GREAT mentor. I was so honored to be working for him. I never figured out how they got my resume, but what came to mind was, I had joined the National Society of Black Engineers club at City College, and around the time of my graduation, I went along with other members of the club, to many career fairs, some hosted by the national branch of the club. I remember particularly meeting a very beautiful black lady, called Nichole Mussenden, and we chatted quite a bit. It was 100% professional. She worked for Brooklyn Union Gas at the time, and took my resume. Something in my mind kept telling me she was the one who forwarded my resume to AT&T, but I may never know.

In about my second year at AT&T, Bruce had introduced me to some of the higher up managers in the organization. One of them was a man called Andy Lakatos. He seemed a bit friendly at first and there were no real red flags, but my dad came visiting in Bethlehem and one day, we both went out, and ended up at one of the stores in the Allentown mall. We were surprised to bump into Andy there. My father did not know him at all, so I introduced him, saying “This is my managers manager at work”, Andy seemed friendly and was like “Hello how are you?” “I said to him, this is my father”. I think he now asked my dad what he did. and my dad replied that he is a visiting prof at St Paul University in Minniapolis. The next thing out of Andy’s mouth was “I hear they have a good basketball team”. Both my dad and I played it off like we did not notice the racist spirit of it. I personally was so ashamed of Andy and wondered what my dad must think of me working for such people. We did not discuss it at all. In the long run, it has turned out to be a case of “I’ll be wrapped around your finger ( in the beginning )”. Andy never impressed me to be honest, but I did not judge him till that moment. Often I would go to his office for one thing or another, and he would be drinking a glass of wine. I think I even heard one of the fellow managers say he should not drink before going to the important meating they had, because he doesn’t make good decisions when he’s tipsy. Andy waived him off and drank anyway. He really looked like a weak person to me. I’m not saying out of spite. Watery dilute behaviour, with no intensity, even when intensity was called for.

All this while, my left foot and ankle had started twisting, and I was getting more and more into porn. I found an adult store where I bought many porn videos. I was like a kid in a candy shop in there. Because the twist had gone up my ankle and to my waist, I found it hard to indulge in sporting activities like I used to, and so put on a little more weight. I remember one time I visited my brothers and sister in New York and we were driving in the car, and the topic of my foot came up, and I told them “my whole leg restructured to accommodate the misallignment in my foot”. There was a very akward silence after I said that, nobody said a word. As the twist continued to get worse, one day I was walking in a cubicle area in the offices at AT&T and as I was about to turn a corner, I heard some people (3 or 4) discussing something around the corner. I could hear one man say to the others “he’ll never get over it. his foot is locked…”. Just as he said that I turned the corner and saw them, and they looked a little surprised. I thought to myself “could they be talking about me?” but then dismissed it. If it was me, then how is it possible I cannot get over it? Any way as the years went by it was there but didn’t affect me too badly. I was still able to do back flips ( I loved gymnastics and used to be able to do front summersaults, back flips and back summersaults.). I could also still do the break dance move they call “windmill”. I even recorded myself around 1998 doing it in my basement. So it did not slow me down too much.

In 1994, I discovered MIDI music keyboards and how to connect them to a computer and using music software you can easily create songs with different instruments on separate tracks. I was soooo thrilled, and started playing with it night and day. My songs were terrible, but I was inspired by the demos that came with the keyboard or software, how nice they sounded. Not long after, I had a very vivid dream, very beautiful music playing in my dream, people dancing to it. Something told me when I woke up, that was my music ( in the future ). And so I was inspired even more.

I remember one incident while I was at AT&T, which had now trivested into Lucent Technologies, NCR and AT&T, which was now only services without hardware. I stayed with the hardware branch called Lucent Technologies. I was discussing with my very good friend then, Aristos ( A Ghanian ) and my 401k with Lucent was about $60k. I mentioned that I wanted to sell it off and pay off my house, which I had bought for $100k, but now I had less than $60k left on the mortgage. I figured the amount I would save in interest payments will be well worth it. He immediately said “No no no, don’t ever do that. Dont ever sell your 401k”, and proceeded to give arguments. I took his advice. This was in the days of the .com bubble, and within 6 months, my 401k was now worth about $3k. I felt terrible and wished I had followed my intuition. I learned a very important lesson from this. Don’t ever let anyone or anything override your free will and intuition. If you do, then you have lost your free will to that thing. I mean not even the Bible or a so called “man of God” should tell you something you don’t believe in your heart. Even if God appears before you, but is telling you something you think is not right, do not follow (satan is the master of disguise so he can look exactly like anyone, including God, save for where he is trying to lead you). Take your shot, and even if you turn out to be wrong, at least you made the call. Satan will definitely change the outcome of some of your calls, to prove you wrong sometimes, so dont sweat it. I call this “illusion of failure”.

All the time I had been in America, I still had not had any sex at all, except one time I met my younger brothers room mate at the university of Amherst Massachusetts. She was really beautiful and we hit it off. I ended up in her bedroom and we kind of did it, but because I did not have a condom, she never let me insert. So I did it externally. Immediately after that, she draged me out of her bed kind of like someone leading a goat and took me to the hallway, where I spent the rest of the night. I had a even more raging "hard on" while I was outside there and really wished I was still with her. We later went to NYC and spent a good deal of time together with Kole and his Then girlfriend Kamela. I kept trying to convince her (the roommate girl) that we should start dating but she completely shut me down and I knew it was time to stop. There was another incident during some interviews with IBM I had at the ending of my Masters program. Another really beautiful girl who was studying Computer Engineering and her dad worked there at IBM (Poughkeepsie NY). We really hit it off and made out a bit, but she said she would never have sex before she was married, so we left it at that. She had to go off to her school at Syracuse NY and I started working at AT&T, so we just kind of fell out of touch.

In my first year at AT&T, I visited NYC and met up with my good friend from City College. His name is Boris Iriarte, and we were very close in school. We played chess a lot ( he was so much more advanced than I was ) and did a lot of things as friends in college. When I visited him one day from Pennsylvania, we went out in my car and then it was getting dark. He guided me to a certain area of NYC, around 42nd street, and I began to see lots of really beautiful women walking on the sidewalks. They were dressed in lingerie and you could see their very sexy bottoms and the rest of them. I began to get turned on just from seeing this. He called one of them and negotiated a price. I was kind of in a trance and just watching all this, when he requested that I should leave them (because I was still sitting in the drivers sit, a bit confused). I got up and walked 2 or three blocks down. Waited some time, and then came back when I assumed they must be done. He may have asked me if I wanted to try one myself, but at that time I was totally averse to the idea of sex with a prostitute. For one thing I considered myself not so desperate to resort to that.

I had several more trips to NYC and saw more of the prostitutes but never indulged. In fact one day, while I was heading back for Pennsylvania, while still in NYC one prostitute just opened the passenger door of my car and jumped in. I had to gently tell her to leave as I was not interested.

One day, while I was in NYC with my older brother Enitan and one or two other family, we decided to go to my cousin Nijis place. We were in Brooklyn and he lived on Patchen avenue, which was a ways away. I knew Brooklyn well enough and the way to his apartment on Patchen ave. As we were on the way, out of nowhere, my elder brother said, “ok let me tell you how to get to Nijis place”. I was surprised, but told him right away, “I know the way to Nijis place”, and we continued on. When we got to the general area of Nijis place I started to go the way I usually do to get there, but Patchen ave was not where it used to be. I thought I must have taken a wrong turn, so I started to drive around a bit to get my bearings. The tension in the air could not be cut by a knife. I could feel him in his silence waiting for me to admit I don’t know the way. I refused to do that but continued trying and then in a strange way I just saw his eyes yield and suddenly there was Patchen ave. I had no clue in those days, but now I do, that satan can totally rearrange any landscape and what you are looking for will not be where it was. I was just glad I had proved I knew the way. I made nothing of it really because my brother never really tried to dominate in this kind of way before, and he did not do so after that (for some years). I say “dominate” because he was not speaking to me in a friendly or brotherly tone of voice. It was rather the tone of somebody wanting to take command, not two people trying to figure something out of mutual interest between them. Thats why there was such an air of antagonism when it looked like I really did not know the way.

Around 1995 or 1996, I finally decided to try to see a doctor about the twist in my body, including my left foot, leg and waist. I complained to him that it had left me somewhat compromised physically and walking with a slight limp. He took X-rays of my foot, leg and hip. When the X-rays were ready on my follow up visit, he told me everything was fine, and pointed at my hip X-ray, saying "see it is all in alignment". I was very angry, and knew he was lying because I knew there was obviously a problem. At the time I was thinking there may be some kind of conspiracy, and he was part of it. Later on, I then went to a foot specialist. I told him of the severe sharp pain in the bottom of my left foot that caused me to walk on the edge of the foot, taking my leg out of alignment. He diagnosed me with "Plantar Fasciitis", and said there were two options. One is go for surgery, which is very risky and may not even solve it, or two, get a customized insert for my left shoe, that will move the pressure points from the arch of my foot, making it bearable to walk normally. I decided not to try the surgery, and also did not get the shoe insert. I felt I could keep on going without it, and things would turn out fine. Sometimes I look back and wish I had tried the shoe insert, maybe it would have prevented the twist from getting worse, which it did, but at the same time, I now believe the condition is spiritual, and neither physical nor logical, and can only be fixed when my war with satan is 100% complete.

One day at an AT&T department outing, I was getting some of the food spread on a long table outside, and, one of my work colleagues said to me "Hi, newbie". There was another colleague close by, who then said something like "Newbie cannot run, jump or play basketball anymore". I pretended I did not hear him ( his name is Jim Hansen ), but I knew he was referring to the twist in my ankle and leg that had compromised my ability to do such activities. Because he was a white man, I started to think it may be a racial conspiracy, but the jury was not in on that belief, so I just let it go.

I bought a house in Bethlehem PA, just 10 minutes drive to work. An older lady was living there and her husband had passed on a few years earlier, so she decided it was too much house for her alone. She decided to move to DC to I guess a condo. As soon as the sale was complete, the realtor lady started to rush the former owner, and gave her a couple days or so to be out of the house. I was shocked at such treatment of an old lady. I spoke directly to the old lady that she can take as much time as she wants, I’m in no hurry to move in. It was an introduction to the cold way people just act in a business manner instead of being human in such matters. The house was fully carpeted, and I like hard wood floors. I pulled up the carpet and saw the wood beneath was in pretty bad condition, so I decided to replace it. I bought some really nice hard wood from home depot and replaced all the old wood myself. I was really happy with the result. It really was beautiful, so I decided to go further. The bathroom also had carpet and I did not like the kind of flooring beneath, so I bought some beautiful white ceramic tiles and replaced that too. At some point while remodeling the bathroom, I was lifting something quite heavy. I still had the condition created by my left foot twist, which went as far as my lower back, but I felt very confident to lift heavy things. While lifting, out of nowhere, in a flash like at the speed of lightning, it felt like my back broke, but at the same time the whole structure of my lower back and waist completely realigned in a scary way. I quickly went to my bed and lay down. I thought I may have damaged my back, but within an hour, I was up again and fine. Even after that incident, I was still able to lift relatively heavy things.

I loved my house so much. It was not big at all, but perfect for one person ( maybe even too big ). One day, Kole and Enitan came to visit, and Kole had seen the house before, and LOVED it. He was very happy showing Enitan around it, and Enitan was looking very unimpressed. At the end of Kole’s tour, Enitan remarked “we will manage it”. I kept quiet, because through the years he had made quite a few very jealous remarks that I was now used to. I did not hate him at all because of that but felt somewhat sorry that he was in such a place mentally ( in a way I also thought he deserved it. It made no sense to me ). My sister Oruene was not too far behind him too, as one day in the yard, she said “Biodun has a trailer park home”. No effect or surprise on me again. I knew her well enough. Many years later, Enitan bought a big house in New Jersey. I saw it but sincerely liked my small house much better. Even more years later, Oruene bought a $1Million house in New Jersey too, on a teachers salary. I never saw it nor cared.

One day our very good family friends from Nigeria came visiting America, and were staying in Rhode Island. We all went to visit them as we were really close to them. While visiting, our aunt Mercy mentioned that it would be a good idea if we sent some money to our dad in Nigeria, since they would be going back soon they could easily give the money to him. We decided to put some money together, so I figured $1000 was a good sum for me to put. I figured my brother and sister would do something similar, but they could only contribute about $100 each. When they saw I was giving $1000, Enitan got upset and said “he who gives more loves more”. On hearing this, I explained that it was just that I could afford more, as I had a job that payed more. I told them we would put all the money together and no one would know who contributed what, and so they were happier and agreed to that.

My very first car was a Toyota Tercel, which I took over the payments from my brother Kole at the time I started working at AT&T (1993) when he moved on to another car. I loved it so much but around 1998 I decided to upgrade to a Nissan Maxima. I loved it even more, and decided to give the Toyota Tercel to my sister who was still in NYC. She was happy but within a couple months or so, it was totalled. I had no sense of loss or sadness, unless that she no longer had avail of the free car.

Another time I visited Enitan and Amede in NYC. While hanging out with them, I found an old pair of platform shoes we used to have. Playfully, I wore them and started to walk around. I told them “look at me”. Enitan said “wow, you look so good and tall”. After a while I removed them and Enitan remarked, “now you look like ordinary Biodun”. I thought “look at this fool, maybe he now expects me to go around wearing high heels.” My shortness is something I always loved, and because I had reverence for my dad, who was even shorter, I liked it more.

Around 1996, a new guy suddenly appeared at AT&T where I worked, in my department. We had converted to IBM employees by then, due to the outsourcing of Lucent Technologies (AT&T part after they were forced to break into three separate companies). They introduced him to me in a sneak attack way. I was the UNIX team lead for our project, and one day I went to a meeting, and there was this new person I had never seen before. A black guy, and he had some documents with him, like plans for our UNIX project. He was just talking in the meeting like he was in control of the whole thing. I kept quiet as it seemed as I said, like sneak attack. Why was he not introduced to me in proper natural common sense way? I couldn’t figure it out, so left it alone. As time went on though, he started trying to dominate me, and I kept resisting in a passive-aggressive kind of way, meaning fighting him without obvious signs I was fighting him. I did every thing very tactfully and twarted all attempts at domination easily. I already knew from some signs I had seen, he was no match for me, but I had no interest at all in trying to dominate him. His behaviour was very abrasive, not only to me, but to everyone else, including the overall project team leader Nelson Fernandez. Eventually he started asking our IBM Unix team manager for a significant raise. He threatened to leave if they refused. Our manager confirmed with me that I could handle the Unix project fine without him, I assured him it would be even better without him. They refused his raise and he left the company, saying he had got a very high paying gig in Singapore. Because I never really felt threatened, and did have some compassion for him, I remained his friend. Everybody still has at least a few good qualities, no matter how bad. We kept in comunications, and he lived in Allentown, and one day even invited me over to his place, and showed me the movie “Toy Story”. I enjoyed the movie very much. He had a dog called Bugsy. Very cute and friendly golden retriever type breed. Because he was going to Singapore, he asked if he could leave his car and dog with me. I was happy to help. He left and I was taking care of Bugsy. I was so young then, and carefree, I did not really know how to take care of a dog, especially in America. We had a dog in Nigeria, but never needed to walk him. He stayed in the house most of the time, no collar, no leash, and went outside whenever he needed to do his business, we never even noticed. It was a very natural situation. I did not walk Bugsy, and he did his business in the house, on an area carpet in one of the rooms. Thats when I knew I had to start walking him. I did, but was not very regular or punctual. Just a side note about Bugsy, for some reason whenever it rained, he would freak out. Also, when I would be singing in my music room on the microphone, each time I sing something, he would howl, and that was quite endearing. Anyway, one day, I was just playing around in the house with him, and at some point he growled at me very agressively ( I think, I’m not so sure now ). Whatever the case, I had a play rifle, that just shoots nothing, and don’t know why, but I pointed it at him. He stopped where he was, but there was still tension between us. Some anger came up in me, like how dare this dog confront me?, so it overcame my self control, and I pulled the trigger, just to scare him more. The gun shoots nothing but makes a “Klack!” sound when you pull the trigger. The standoff continued, and I pulled the trigger one more time. He moved a little confused, putting one of his front paws forward, as if not sure if to go forward or backward. It was trembling a bit, and I felt a surge of compassion for him, so I put the rifle away. I felt bad, and even to this day, wonder what overcame me to do that (satan). After a while, I think it rained, and he ran away from the house. Once I realized he was gone, I was very worried, and also felt it must have been because of what I did. I went looking for him everywhere, and also had the pressure of knowing his real owner is a bit of an asshole, and would have this excuse to come down on me. I searched everywhere and could not find him. I did not sleep well that night, and went searching again the next morning. Suddenly, while passing a street electric pole very near my house, I noticed a white paper flyer pasted on it. I stopped to read it, and it said “Found, golden retriever dog. For more information call <a phone number>”. I was so elated, and took the flyer and ran joyfully home. I called the number and found it was my neigbour Cindy and Jim Godovin, who lived 2 houses away. I went over and met them, and we had a wonderful discussion and reunion with Bugsy, who had become friends with their own dog. I took Bugsy home, and the next day, Cindy’s daughter who was about 8 years old at the time, came over to my house and asked if she could walk Bugsy. I felt a little guilty, but she convinced me it was OK, and that she wanted to start walking Bugsy every day. She started doing that, without asking for pay or anything. WOW! Some months or a year later, Don Smith (thats the name of Bugsys real owner) came back from Singapore. I told him the story, and we went to Cindy and Jims house to let them meet Bugsy’s owner. It was a very pleasant time. Don was very charming in social situations, and a very smart guy. Just some really bad qualities were holding him back from being a more complete human.

Once I was driving around I think in NYC and I came to a stop sign, and right under the big STOP, were the words “eating animals”. It shook my conscience again, but I still did nothing about it.

Still working at AT&T, one time we took a trip to California, to visit the offices of Sun Michrosystems, who was the primary unix (Solaris) hardware vendor for our site. One of the days of our visit, we were all sitting in a room of sorts. I was sitted on a kind of stool, and suddenly we had a surprise visitor. It was Scott McNeally, the founder ( he founded it with some Indian guy who had taken his cut and left the company ). He stepped into the room and I thought. ok, no big deal, but every one else got up on their feet and started clapping. I thought thats nice, but I did not feel the need to get up and applaud myself. I hardly knew anything about him, so I remained sitting, hoping no one would notice me, and it appeared no one did. 

One day Enitan visited me in Bethlehem, he was lying on the sofa, I think we were watching TV. Nothing important was on, so he started to talk. Initially when I came to USA, he was a social worker in NYC. I spent 3 years in NYC and got the job at AT&T in computers. I think Enitan felt they were left behind in social work, so he went to Devry and got a certificate in Microsoft (Windows I guess). I was kindoff happy he was trying to move to more lucrative work. He bagan to talk about the technologies like ISO OSI networking model, and the things he was saying were somewhat indepth, like things I did not know or care about. Part of the reason is that we only used TCP/IP at work and almost everywhere and because OSI came too late, very few converted to it. But still I was thinking it was out of character for him to be talking of such indepth computer theories, and had the feeling he was trying to show, maybe he is not all I had figured him to be. I said nothing because there was an air of sneak attack, which I did not like. If you always had such knowledge or whatever, why would you be hiding it and then just sneak it in or ambush like no one should notice or what exactly is the point of that. I did not go indepth with him cos first I never found such theories interesting, and was really doing computers as a way to make money till I could get to where I really want to be ( I wasn’t sure where then but never thought my whole life I would be working computers ). Who knows, maybe he was giving a clue that I should think more carefully about what I think of him. This to me is the spirit of someone who just wants respect and is not happy at all with just love. Does he think I will respect him more if I thought he knew more? I just don’t understand that kind of thinking and instaed it brought his image down in my mind. Sneaky like that is a snake. Who cares how brilliant you are?

The movie “The Matrix” came out. In those days, Aristos seemed to have an air like he knew things I don’t know. He would make comments here and there to that effect, but I just ignored them. With some things that were going on with me, at one time he suggested I try to go outside the Matrix. I said “what do you mean Matrix, thats just some fantasy thing”. He said something like “Neo did not know there was a Matrix initially also”. I thought it was ridiculous. First of all, wherever I am now is not so bad, and I have not finished exploring it, what am I going to do outside it? I need to keep going where it seems I’m going here.

In 1997 my father came to visit from Nigeria. He stayed at my house and my siblings also came to see him. One day we were walking on the road in front of my house and just talking generally. My dad was way ahead and out of ear shot of us. It was me Kole and Enitan, and the conversation was all normal until Enitan, complaining about something we were trying to accomplish said words like “that is if Kabiesi here would do as he’s supposed to.. “ I’m paraphrasing, but Kabiesi in Yoruba (our native Nigerian language) is King. It was another sneak attack I thought. When had I ever behaved like I think I’m superior to any of them? where is this coming from? It was the kind of statement I could only reply with silence.

After I discovered MIDI to link my electronic synthesizer to my compuuter, I introduced Enitans then girlfriend, Amede to it. She loved it a lot too, and was very interested in music. She used to come over to visit me in Bethlehem, to do her music. She was trying to make some demos, in order to submit to a music producer, who could bring her on board in the music industry. Nothing strange happened between me and her, as we were just friends, since before we came to America. One day, however, when she was visiting alone, she complained at night that she was afraid to sleep alone. I agreed that she could sleep in my bed, but we are still keeping things platonic, until in the middle of the night, she made a move, while looking like she was not aware. She kind of rolled over and put her arm around me. I politely removed it, just to be sure there is nothing going on between us, than just good friendship. We both played it off like nothing happened. The next day, she even made a comment like "sex can destroy a good friendship".  Some years later, my sister Oruene, mentioned something while we were all gathered, like they had all arranged that incident (including Enitan), sending Amede there to tempt me.

Concerning my singing voice, one day while Amede was working on a song, she did not want to sing to it herself, because she felt her voice would not do it justice. Remembering how she had heard me singing long ago in Nigeria, how good my voice was then, she decided to ask me to sing it. Knowing that my voice was no longer good, I declined. She kept persisting though, and eventually I thought, maybe if I just sing, it will come out alright, and so I sang to it a little. It sounded horrible. She commented "it sounds like a burst clarinet". I felt terrible, but inside, I knew my voice would return someday, so I did not sweat it.

In 1997, my father came to visit us in PA, and at some point in his visit, he began describing a new play he wanted to write, and hoped it would be on broadway. It was generally about a man who would be in the center somewhere, and people all around him raining curses on him, while his body keeps twisting to the power of the curses. I thought it sounded really crazy and way off the path from anything he has written before, but today, I believe he was talking about the end to satans reign on earth, how the whole world will be cursing satan.

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