The Bowing of the Legend

Nigerians never cease to amaze me.Our attitudes and disposition on serious life matter(s) gives an outright conclusion that we seem to be the most devastated and frustrated people but we palliate these with jokes,it speaks volume of the air and temperature of our society.
An International basket ball player, Kobe Bryant (41 years old)has been killed in his chopper along with his daughter(Gianna,13,an aspiring basket ball player)and other seven persons while trying to attend a game at Mamba Academy in the USA.This accident, did call for a sober reflection.Internationally, even America that is believed to have it all had a sober reflection on matters dwelling  on eternity but in Nigeria,jokes and comics  on his death started flying around. This got me thinking that as a people, do we still even have values for life and morals.

On Sunday,26th Jan.2020,we woke up to the news on the death of a  young American  and an international basket ball mentor who with 8 others including his daughter were crashed by Kobe Bryant's private chopper .He died at the very prime of his life when life had just began for him.  Though he left the world earlier than would have been envisaged ideally but these salient lessons I learnt from his endearing life.

1.Living life well is not a function of how  far but how well.
The young man was an achiever no doubt. He was young but had achieved so much in his short years with resilience,zeal and hardwork. He entered the National Basketball Association(NBA) from high school and played his entire 20 season professional career in the league with the Los Angeles Lakers .He won five NBA Championship and was an 18 time all star,15 time member of the All NBA team and 12 time member of the All defensive team .He was also named NBA most valuable player,MVP in 2008.He was regarded as one of the greatest players of all time.

2.He was happily married.
Though he and his soulmate Vanessa had it tough when in 2011,they divorced  and reconciled together as love birds in 2013.He was 21,when he met his wife who was 17,while they had their tough time on issue dwelling on adultery,he apologised to his wife publicly on a radio programme  while she was seated there with him with tears on his face. His parents were said not to have attended their wedding because they felt he was too young to be married at the time. Together as a couple,they had four daughters,Natalia(17)Gianna(13),Bianka(3) and Capri(7months).He was indeed an adoring husband to his wife and an adorable father to his children.
He was indeed a dedicated dad as he told Maria Shriver shortly before his death in an interview that ' Being a father is the thing I am most proud of in this world,it's my greatest achievement'. One can imagine the level of such happiness of an achiever in his career and also in his home.

Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna Bryant who lost their lives in the unfortunate crash.

3.Being mindful of wishes and confessions.
Tracy Mcgrady  came into the League almost same time with Kobe Bryant,while the former came in,in 1997,the latter came in,in 1996.They spent most of their times together in the Lakers. Mcgrady had this to say after Bryant's demise when he spoke with Rachel Nicohols of ESPN that Bryant had always wanted to die young although he had confessed this before he had his daughters. He claimed that he had always said he wanted to die young and be immortalized, he wanted his career better than Michael Jordan's.
One may not have known the reason he had wished for  death earlier while he was younger but the point is there is power in our confession and wishes and so no matter what life decides to throw at us,good or otherwise,what we say at any and every moment is  very much important and may go a long way to determine what we become or what becomes of us.

May God give the families of the deceased the fortitude to bear their losses.