A Picture of Modupe in 1976

Overcoming My Fear of the Dark

I grew up in a large family within a sprawling compound, we operated a communal kitchen that also catered for the many elders residing in our family house. Some of them were widows of family members who had passed on, each with their own room and space, necessitating a centralized kitchen.

My aunt, Iya Deleke managed the kitchen alongside other older women in the family. As children, our duty was to distribute food to the elders, particularly those ones who were immobile. I had no problem with this arrangement save for one: I used to get panic attacks.

At the time, I was assigned to deliver food to an elderly, sight-impaired, woman who lived in the furthest room of the building. Her condition meant she had no need for lights in her room or the passageway leading to it. As an 8-year-old, I clearly couldn’t say ‘no’ to my aunt’s requests to deliver food to Mama because refusing an errand at the time was simply unthought of... at least not if you wanted to be able to sit properly.

At that age, I feared any dark spaces and was always looking around to see if some masquerade of the other would attack me in the dark. I spent quite a bit of time fainting in fear and this made distributing dinner to the room a serious challenge. To cope, I devised a strategy.

The room where the Mama lived was accessed through two swivel doors that never stayed open. My challenge lay in the passage between these doors, which housed the rooms for the elders most of whom were immobilized. I feared that some were dead of dying and this terrified me. I just did not want to be caught between the two doors without at least one of the doors being open. So, my strategy became to sprint through the first door and reach the second before the first one closed.

This resulted in a lot of banging doors announcing my arrival. I would hastily drop the food at Mama’s door, greet her quickly, and sprint back, ending up breathless and with a fine film of sweat on my body. I never knew I was being observed.

One day after emerging from one of my frantic runs and breathing erratically, my grandfather called me over.

“Dupe, why do you always run with the food?” he asked.

Cautiously, I explained that the dark passage scared me. He nodded thoughtfully and said, “You don’t have to run.”

He took me to his living room and handed me a traditional clay lamp fuelled by palm oil. “I will place this in the passage and light it so that it is no longer dark. But it will be your job to ensure it does not run out of oil,” he said. He then showed me where to get the oil and advised me to add oil everyday so that the lamp never went out.

That was my liberation from the fear. Never again did I have to faint or break out in cold sweat. Finally, I could deliver the food properly without splashing it everywhere. This kindness from him impacted me deeply.

Through his actions, he taught me that love is both salvation and empowerment. It means saving people from trouble and giving them the tools to save themselves in the future. A true elder loves by protecting and empowering the younger ones.

This experience is why I chose to live my life in Service and Love of others.