Why am I awake at 12midnight thinking about my School Mothers in Secondary School? Well, the trigger is my school daughter turning 40. You mean I have a school daughter that is turning 40? Absolutely yes but not that I am that old. As I began to probe how Tope became my school daughter, I realised that beyond her sister and older brother being my friend and Tope being that cute litte teenager too, was my desire to give back some of the privileges I enjoyed as a Junior student from my school mothers.

It is not very usual for a guy to have a school mother not to talk of three school mothers. Of course I had very powerful School Fathers in the likes of Kazeem Agboola in JS 1 but in JS 3 as a thirteen years old boy, I felt I had outgrown that but some I founf myself having three influential school mothers. Oh my! I call them influential because in a school like ours, everyone was powerfull. Then being a prefect gives another layer to that power (Hopeful you have the charisma to sway the badge you wear). So I was in JS 3 and my older brother (Bankole) was the House Captain of Scorpion House and because we are guys, we weren’t the regular chummy chummy follow follow type of siblings. I had spent my first two years in that school without a lot of his female colleagues knowing he had a younger brother howbeit, in the boys hostel, it was obvious. Either through resemblance or me running to his hostel to hibernate from the fiery darts flying around the Boys Hostel.

Bankole’s prefectship exposed me to his female colleagues. The likes of Ronke Fernandez (Food Prefect), Funmi Awote (Catholic Prefect) and Goriola Dada (Muslim Prefect). If you went to my school, you will understand this was luxury and I didn’t hesitate luxiriating in the opulence that these people’s influence provided. While the three of them were exceptionally good to me, Goriola Dada was the one that mothered me the most. As a JS3 student, I stopped eating the regular food in the Dining Hall. As Prefects had their duties in dining hall, I had the privilege to enjoy the presence of three well respected Female Prefects. The days Goriola was not on duty, I had the attention of Ronke and when Ronke was not on duty, I had the attention of Funmi. Needless to say I was without anyone of them at any time. My School Mothers really shielded me but that had nothing to do with me.

On days I wanted to be humble and sit with my fellow masses (JS3 students) for dinner, Goriola would walk to my table and pull me out of a table of 10 to get a pot of food to myself. It was called the Prefect’s pot! Wow! I felt priviledged. She wasn’t just pulling me out of the table, she held me around the entire Space Ground while I had my colleagues quaking at the stiff supervision of the other prefects. Now for those that didn’t attend Command Lagos, Space Ground is a sacred place for the Powerful and Mighty. Just as Space in our Stratasphere is considered the gap between Heaven and Earth. Space in Command Lagos is the space between the Boys Hostel and the Girls Hostel. Remember I said it is the preserved of the Powerful & Mighty. Needless to say being a senior student doesn’t guarantee your presence there. You must have some clout. You must have some cariage or in my Gen Alpha son’s word, you must be sigma with infinite aura.

I would swagger around space with Goriola or Funmi or Ronke where some seniors didn’t have guts to go. Space was not just Space, guys met with their girlfriends there and if you move to close to the Female Hostel Gate, it is percieved you are trying to sneak into their hostel so Space was kind of out of bounds. So the idea of you being in Space increased your profile somewhat. The influence of School Mothers. Of course I was one heck of a cute clean teange boy (this I am 100% sure of) but I knew I was just enjoying the friendship they shared with my older brother and not exactly because of me so I knew I had to return this favour to someone else. Several times, I watched my colleagues fight over pots of food while I had my “Prefect Pot” waiting.

I need mention amongst my three school mothers, I felt most comfortable with Goriola because she is family and she lavished me with some big sister love that even as I write this, I feel incredibly indebted to her. Goriola was so posh that she wasn’t even drinking school water. They brought her water from home and it wasn’t just water. It was Ragolis Bottle Water in the 90s. You can imagine on several occassion when we had scarcity of water in School and I was going to walk back to my hostel with Ragolis Water. Thanks to my loving School Mother. The several N50 notes she would just slip into my pocket. I was shielded from what every other JS3 boy was going through that I had to sneak out of school a day after that 95set passed out (finished their WAEC) because I just didn’t think I could go back to my reality of being a regular student.

I became a Senior Student and out of the strong friendship I have with Okanlawon & Folake Ajayi, it made sense to have their lil sister as my School Daughter. I felt the need to shield someone else and this my forever school daughter was one of those. I am not sure I did as much as I got from my School Mothers for Tope as teh COMLAG terrain had changed in my time but I tried.