Dial - Season 2 - Episode 52

Episode 4 years ago

Dial - Season 2 - Episode 52

A week passed, and then one morning I just couldn’t get out of bed.

I had a splitting headache and could barely move.

Fortunately, Brian checked on me very early in the morning, and then he drove to the health post to bring the doctor.

The man, looking absolutely distressed, looked at me with sad eyes.
“It’s the old age, Mr. Biko,” he said softly. “You have blood pressure now, and I have to put you on a low-dosage course for a few days to monitor you. You also need glasses for your eyes. Last but not the least, you need a walking-stick.”
And that was why, getting close to my twenty-seventh birthday, I started using a walking-stick, bent double, and lived my life like an old man.

My grey hair began to fall off my head, and within two more weeks I was completely bald.
I walked holding my waist with one hand, and a walking-stick in the other. I coughed like an old man, and took blood pressure medication.
These were horrible times indeed in my life!

And then, one evening, whilst sitting in the garden with Abena Adobea, my sweet love, I felt a massive jolt through me!
The pain was electrifying, staggering and absolutely relentless!
I croaked with pain as my heart seized up, and I couldn’t breathe, the left side of my body going numb completely!

I was aware of lying on the floor and seeing Abena Adobea screaming, and then everything went dark!
Later, when I opened my eyes, I was lying in bed with straps around my arm and the doctor holding my wrist and checking for a pulse.

I was told, eventually, that I had suffered, and miraculously recovered from, a heart attack!
And as I lay there and tears fell down the withered sides of my face, I knew I had but a short time to live…and I appraised myself with candid truthfulness.

Finally, I made a decision.
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