Journey To Queerdom ✔️

MINUS FIVE

After Football I tried other masculine games like Tennis, which was fun until One day, the tennis ball hit my head, Gosh I felt headache for days. Since then I was so scared of the ball. We used the Golf ball to play Lawn tennis mostly, it was heavier and bounces more than the transparent one, gotten from used up roll-ons. I would beg them to use the latter, they'll boldly refuse saying.
    ‘That's your own cheat code.’
  It wasn't, I wasn't just comfortable with how the balls bounces really high, knowing fully well the depths of pain I suffered from it's hit, I think I got hit again or somehow the ball go to me really hard, My phobia for the ball grew tremendously, There was no way I'd play well if I kept running from the ball, my plays were really bad I had to stop again.
     Sitting at home after school was quite tiring and really boring, not to mention it didn't make me more of a man cause I got so used to knitting. Initial we were taught how to knit with Wool and a Crotchet in Primary Four or so, then it was fun, everybody had to buy wool and knit.
   “Now that you've all learnt to Knit,  For My assignment,…” Our Home Economics teacher said.
   She'd had not finished talking when Jude, the 'ITK' in my class then said in a low voice from behind the class.
    “…She'd tell us to knit A bag or a Muffler.”
“…Get a Crotchet and Wool knit A bag or a Muffler you'd submit Next term, it's your take home assignment. ”
  Well, Jude was right, but how did he know? Well he must had heard it from students in Primary Four B or C.
  ‘Ma Which color of Wool should we use?’ Binta, our Class Monitor asked.
   “Any color of your choice.”
    “Okay Ma.” Binta replied, everyone was still either Amazed or envisioning their assignment.
    'I'll use blue and pink' someone said quite loud.
    “Okay, Class monitor, collect their notebooks and keep them on my desk immediately. Have a nice day.”
    ‘Thank you ma.’ the class Chorused.
  She had hardly left the class when she turned abruptly, like she'd left out something really important.
    “Take that Assignment seriously, it's your First C.A.T ” She said.
   She just made the class realise that the assignment was much more important than we thought. Had it not, the boys won't take the assignment seriously. We boys have a thing for unseriousness. Though not me. Maybe cause I wasn't a normal boy. In recent times I was the only guy who gets to come between the First and Seventh position in my class. Girls aways filled the top position. It was almost like this in most classes.  The boys would often tease me for being too much of a bookworm and nerd, not to mention most if the times I'd hang out with girls. I'll defend my self.
   “Most girls are serious minded. That's why I stay around them. After all, Birds of same feather Flocks together.”
  Some guys, who at one point in time wanted to get serious either because a nice gift had been promised at home for a good result or some other reasons would try to spend time around me, the truth is it usually doesn't last.
      Home Economics was a very nice subject then, though in my later was considered Feminist. I really Enjoyed the Subject, especially the practical aspect where we'd either Cook, Bake, knit, Sow and even more. It was fun. Maths was another interesting subject, Not to brag but I was confident in all my academic fields except for Nigerian Languages. Like i said I was Northern and also born northern but most of my childhood I travelled from one state to another due to the nature of my dad's work. More troubling we lived in one Barracks or the other where the Lingua-Franca was Pidgin.
If you've stayed in the barracks you'd know perfectly well. I knew just about sixteen words in Hausa, most of which were insults. Funny enough I'm not  exactly Hausa but since it was the mother language in the North, My dad insisted we'd learn it. Both my parents are not from the same village nor State but they all fall under the North. So they resolved to Hausa as the Family's Language. I was told they spoke Hausa before I was born. But the whole Barrack life didn't permit it anymore. When I got to Primary school one of the subject combination was Nigerian Languages, where I had to choose one from Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba. My mom insisted I chose Hausa, to get a full grasp of the language. But adventurous me refused, I chose Yoruba, don't blame me I'd been in Lagos for three years then, far much more than I'd stayed in the North, I had a not too strong command for the language but it was better compared to the sixteen insultive words I knew in Hausa.
      The Term's Holiday came quite fast I was eager for it, maybe cause of the knitting assignment, even though I found it rather difficult in chosing the right color or colors for my Bag. 'Wait bag?' Yeah i wanted to knit a bag, even though all the guys I met during the holiday either in Church or elsewhere told me they were making a muffler, only the ladies were so thrilled about the idea of making a bag. I really am strange.I heard Tricia even knitted various bags and sold them. She was a prodigy, she'd started knitting from Primary one long before we got to the topic in class. Everyone in my class was talking about making Mufflers, I got uncomfortable with the idea of making My bag, I'd hoped a boy from another class would knit a bag. So, I did a little survey. I had a good friend in Class Four C, he was really the social type, I knew he'd get me answers.