LESSON LEARNT BY CHANCE

             

          It was a fine day at school when the time keeping prefect rang the bell to signify the end of a class and the beginning of a new one. I checked my time table and argh! It was time for fine art. Everyone gets excited about fine art except me, it is boring to me. Our fine art teacher walked in as usual in his baggy trousers and big shirts which makes me wonder if he lays his bed with it, how well is it going to cover the bed?. 'Hello students?', 'hello teacher' we responded, 'I know you all are curious about what we want to do today, we would be doing something new today; now everyone bring out your poster colors', we all brought out our poster colors, he took a pause and looked at everyone's poster colors.  

         Most of it were incomplete, we all are supposed to have six colors in all but some got missing, finished or probably stolen. Then he said, 'I want you all to draw a big object and I want you to paint it with these colors'. Then he started listing them, I was expecting the usual red, yellow, green, blue, white and black but none of these colors were in our poster colors. I thought to myself, as if that wasn't enough he said 'I want you to do this within thirty minutes' in his usual authoritative manner, he went to sit on a table; wore his ear pod and started playing video games.

        We all looked at each other sheepishly; confused, then we heard 'twenty minutes more'. We all proceeded to draw, some of us scrambled for pencils, while some hurriedly sharpened theirs but the orderly ones like me already had everything in handy. In the course of doing this, we heard 'time up!', 'What the hell!? We don't even have the paint, although I never liked fine art but I think our fine art teacher at that moment was rather unreasonable'. 'I'm sure you all must have been done with your painting and drawing?' we exchanged looks among ourselves 'where is this boring man driving at I muttered under my breadth' with a scornful look on my face. 'He's probably looking for an excuse to flog us,' my seat partner said 'you're right' I supported. He went round to look at our works but non of us got it painted he didn't look disappointed from the way he looked at them as if he was expecting it. 

        Then he asked 'why couldn't you all get it painted?, you guys drew very well but it lacked painting', 'are you blind? can't you see we don't have the colors you listed here I thought to myself but maintained the same scornful look'. 'Can you all tell me why', he pressed further, 'we don't have the colors here we chorused, 'really?' he asked 'yes!' we replied, although my "yes" sounded more like a yell. 'The truth is you all have the colors I listed just that you can't see it', 'It was then I concluded to myself that my fine art teacher might probably be having a mental issue'.

        'Look children all it takes is for you to share the colors among yourselves and mix it together' was his reply 'now I don't understand him anymore including everyone'. But he continued further 'truly you don't have the listed colors but you can get it from one another. I listed pink, all you need do is to just mix a red and a white paint to get a pink color,' 'but I don't have a white paint? one of us said', 'Then get it from someone who has' he replied. So we did; we mixed it together and we got color pink, then we went for the next color which was 'brown' we mixed 'red and black' together and we got the brown we needed; those of us who didn't have these colors collected from those who had, we repeated the same procedure for the other listed colors and we were able to achieve them.

        There after, we couldn't help but look amazed at how we were able to achieve such a beautiful painting. Our fine art teacher continued and said 'CHILDREN, WE ALL HAVE EVERYTHING WE NEED. ALL WE NEED  DO IS TO SHARE IT. THERE'S ENOUGH COLOUR TO GO AROUND. ALL WE NEED TO DO IS SHARE IT TO HAVE A BEAUTIFUL PAINTING CAUSE NO ONE HAS IT ALL'. At this I couldn't help but give my most hated teacher a standing ovation and everyone joined me, I just learnt the greatest lesson of my life that day, and it became a mantra for me everywhere I go. It has helped me not to lose my humanity. "words become treasures when it is said to impart lives".

         Immediately after class, I went after my fine arts teacher. 'Thank you for today sir' I said, 'and why the sudden thank you miss?' this is what he calls me cause he knows I'm not fond of him. 'I've just learnt the greatest lesson of my life from you today sir, I know I would be graduating from secondary school very soon because it's my final year, but can you please help me with a few things?. He stopped walking and looked at me for a few  seconds thinking about it 'hmm okay come along lets discuss it'. On hearing this, I immediately collected his old bag and textbook and raced into the staff room; hurriedly greeted the other teachers as I cleaned his chair and gestured with a mock bow for him to sit, he laughed at my actions and ever since became my closest confidant. Maybe fine art teachers are not bad after all.