The Specter Of Death Is Always Upon Us
Learning to deal with life’s great inevitability.
“Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong: and a boy deprived of a father’s care often develops, if he escape the perils of youth, an independence and a vigour of thought which may restore in after life the heavy loss of early days.”
Winston Churchill, 1874–1965
No other quote sums up my early life more than the one above from Winston Churchill. Anyone who has a modicum of knowledge of the grandson of the 7th Duke of Marlborough would readily appreciate that his father’s passing when he was twenty years old had the profoundest effect on him and his life choices.
Mine was no different.
I was only 13 years old when my father passed away on the 7th of April 1991. Even though his death certificate stated that congestive heart failure was the cause of his demise, it seemed as though this seminal event had taken place long before the actual date, clearly as a result of a life of broken dreams, constant setbacks, epic failures and great difficulties.
My father, Adesina Adigun Adeniran was the first of eleven children born to Phillip Balogun Adeniran, on the 14th of November 1936. Owing to his position in the family, he had to cut his education short to retrain as a teacher to help support his siblings…