On this platform, I talk about things that matter to both ‘collective-us’ and ‘individual-me’. I especially talk about books and celebrate legends, and since February 8 I came onboard blogging I’ve enjoyed the grace of consistency. However, this grace of consistency was threatened today; I’d travelled and really couldn’t figure out how to compose the post or even what to compose. As soon as I met Ijenna, I just knew something was up! And I didn’t hesitate to immediately ask her permission to talk about her here. She neither said yes nor no, but was surprised that a guy she just met for the first time since Adam would want to talk about her on a blog post. I insisted I would, which is what this post is about.

I’ve chosen to spare us the details of how we got to meeting; let’s leave it at providential. However, the rich content of our little more than 2 hours chat is what motivated this post. Walking out of that teaching hospital (yes, a medical student), I became better in the following ways:

Grace is real
Here was a girl who has it all! She appears to have beaten the four-fold criterion for classing the ideal woman: Behavior, Brains, Background, and beauty. Don’t ask me how I knew; I just knew. The brains and beauty part were pretty obvious; I used to know the background; and I trusted that the behavior was consistent with the background, plus I experienced some of the behavior for myself today. When I pointed this out to her, Ijenna and I were unanimous in attributing whatever she’s got to grace. Grace is real, and always real. And there is plenty of it for each and every one of us. Just ask it!

Vision is everything
A friend once told me I’d make a fine journalist. Ijenna would have said same if she had to. The questions I was firing at her were just too many for my own count. But this Ijenna of a lady keeps wowing me with answers that set my brain afire. Though still a medical student with some time left for graduation, she already had everything figured out. She demonstrated to me that vision is everything. Methinks I’d be crossing the line revealing those of hers here; all I can say is watch out for her in a few years to come.

Teacher par excellence     
Moved by my questions, she taught me some medicine. I’d read about caesarean operation but didn’t quite get the basis for the distinction between the vertical incision and the horizontal incision. What Ijenna did was unbelievable. She simply raised up her wrist, made two moves on them, said just a few words and I magically understood what she explained like forever. She taught me other things: what happens with and around pot-belly, the real gist about cholesterols, the art of eating healthy, and what happens with the heart. She just had this way of explaining everything so well.

Sophisticated simplicity
This collaborates with her being a teacher par excellence. Medical jargons didn’t come anywhere in the picture. There was no need to as she always had her way of getting around them. Where she was obliged to use them, she always had to produce and keep producing ‘layman-friendly’ synonyms until I got the gist. This sort of simplicity is a sophisticated one. It is a sort of simplicity we should all aspire to.

Conclusion
Today, more than ever, meeting with Ijenna made me realize that there are amazing people out there; all you need do is become amazing yourself and then reach out to connect with your kind. She particularly told me that life’s got levels and we all get to, by our actions and inactions, decide where we belong. If in her turn she gets to write about me, I’m confident she wouldn’t say she wasted her precious time.

What a blessed day! I should especially thank Ugo Okoye for making it happen.