The Year 2017; This Far
OG Mandino in his book The Greatest Salesman in The World States, “True wealth is of the heart, not of purse.” He further goes ahead to write,” Do not aspire for wealth and labour not only to be rich. Strive instead for happiness to be loved and to love and most important to acquire peace of mind and serenity” What a wonderful words they are? Every time I reread these words jotted down in many diary, I feel the need to be in pursuit of this kind of wealth Mandino talks of. I ought to have peace of mind, body and character.
The year 2017 started a bit earlier for me. I had the resolutions to look forward to as year the slowly dragged on. To love people was supreme. As a matter of fact, I only realized we are very close to the elections the other day. What naive of me? I chose to close my ears to the hullabaloos that surrounds the elections. I am after peace and my happiness. Let me be categorical though, I will vote on August eight; it is my constitutional and legal right. That is enough as pertains the elections for this year.
The year 2017, what has excited me so far? This should be a very interesting tale. The most exciting thing with this year possibly is the people. I mean the people I have met or interacted with. To all my readers, I am grateful for the interactions we have had so far. Let me hint that we have made tremendous steps and hopefully we will become bigger. You are the shareholders here. You deserve all the credit for the person I am in terms of writing. When I started the year, I had said I will treat people with utmost love, respect and value. I am doing well this far because I have faithfully published at least one article a week for my readers. This is utmost aspect.
In today’s article, I appreciate all of my friends. There are the old friends and then the new ones. All the same, they are highly important to me. They have inspired me a lot. One such longtime lady friend, Jerusha Biyaki, a teacher in the making has been invaluable to me. She is a student at Kenyatta University. She has made it her personal initiative to follow up on me and sometimes give me tall challenges, all of which build me to be a better person. I have known her for as long as i can remember to spell words. She is my kinfolk; one who teaches people virtue and value, you can see why her friendship has stood the test of time. What more can I say? Perhaps authoritatively that I wish her the very best that life can offer and hope she makes it big in this life, which of course I know she will. The next time I write about her, possibly it will be a bigger tale.
Then there are two guys, Lewis Munene and Robert Agolla. These are the ones a person says, “These idiots know too much of me. They are not my friends any more. They are family.” We have stood the test of time. 2017 has made us harder and smarter, that, I can tell you is the truth. Someone could have started to complain already; the man from Kericho, the land of tea leaves, Kiprono Collins Sang’. Then the man from Mt. Kenya James Warui could have joined too, no complains buddies. You are in the pack too. These guys have made the year a bit easy going. The fire sight chat has been a success courtesy of these guys. Tomorrow looks even brighter in as much as today is bright too. We only have to keep moving.
There are some friends I have not yet met. Prof. Augustine Bukenya is one such great friend. We got in touch some time back and he has been one of those friends we have not met yet but has had a big impact in my life. For the short time we have been in touch, he has encouraged me by all measure to be better in my writing. Getting in touch with him together with Mr. Julius Sigei, who is the weekend editor with the Daily Nation newspaper, has given me every motivation to keep writing and get to be better with time.
Another great friend is Prof. Bitange Ndemo, whom I did meet a while back. He, deep into the year has been an encouragement to me and has made me to aim at nothing short except my ultimate prize. He has been more than a mentor, I learn a lot from him and he has made me broaden my thinking in a number of spheres ranging a wide range of sectors. It has been a moment worth of reckon.
Then there has been the aspect of reading. I read an article written by Sunny Bindra on the 52-books challenge. He was challenging his readers to try and do fifty two books by the end of the year. In that sector I have really tried because so far I have read almost thirty five books. The challenge lies in the number of poems and pieces of verse – as Prof. Bukenya refers them – I have done so far for this year. They are less than twenty. I need to pull up my socks cliché as it may sound. Hopefully, I also need to do a literary book before the year ends. It is just mid-year and I am getting the momentum and energy like it has just started.
As this blog will be celebrating two years of active service to you our readers, in a few months of course, I hope the story will be bigger and better. To all and sundry, I wish to end this article with this quote of which I can’t clearly recall the author. He said, “Time is the most precious commodity I possess. (And the hour glass of my life is nearly filled) I hope it inspires you.
Copyright @ 2017
