And This One Thing I Do

The V Monologues
When the V Monologues premiered in London a couple of years ago I shuddered every time my eyes or ears caught a review. I was, quite simply, appalled that yet again in liberal London we were evidencing the negative externalities of democracy and an open society – that notion that all things are permissible, although not all things are beneficial.

Deeply sanctimonious and intolerant of the blatant public coverage of all things intimate and personal, I wondered once again what the world in the first world had come to.

But I hadn’t bothered to find out what the drama production was about, mind. I hadn’t made the effort to actually read through a review, and neither had I taken the time to listen to the opinions and discourse on the television and radio about the V monologues. In fact I couldn’t bring myself to do any of these for I was deeply offended by very title of the Monologues drama.

Why so? Well, I thought my Christian faith would not, could not, allow me to appreciate such dramatic entertainment. God bless my soul.

The Tarzan Monologues
Decades later, a little more mature and more appreciative of the diversity of the creation of The Creator (in thought, skill, persuasion and creativity) around me, I have learnt to be less judgmental and more receptive and respectful (even if not consenting) of the thoughts of others.

It’s the notion, once again, of deciphering motive and intent, reading and interpreting experience and exposure in the content of people’s speech, actions, thoughts and creations – whether that is literary creation, musical creation, or dramatic art and performance. And some of these motives are quite innocuous.

So The Tarzan Monologues premiered at Terra Kulture on Sunday afternoon and guess who was on the front row seat to witness this world premiere? Having denied myself of the pleasure or anger of watching the V Monologues a decade or so ago, I was determined to see this one through.

And what utter pleasure! Big ups, Wole Oguntokun.

The Insightful Monologues
The monologues chronicled the thoughts, insights, fears and joys of men. From The First Time to The Purse Strings. From 6 Myths About Marriage to Defilement. From Open Letter to my Father to Powerful, Sexy and Grey.

And these monologues were insightful! Imagine the learning and knowledge opportunity of having seven or eight men of various years of age sharing lessons and experience of their own respective life time? Forget all those self-help books on knowing yourself and knowing your garden. Go see and hear the monologues and you may just finally get that bingo moment on understanding your brother, your nephew, male boss, male domestic worker and so on.

I left the theatre feeling sorry for having denied myself of the opportunity to have learnt @ play years before through the V Monologues. And I further queried why I had denied myself the opportunity in the name of Christianity.

My Light Bulb Moment at the Theatre
Fact remains that there is much in the Tarzan Monologues for our pastors, counselors, deacons and church leaders, and everyone else for that matter, to learn from.

We’ve become so accustomed to focusing on separating ourselves from the ‘world’ and working our way up to heaven – my senior pastor once put it this way: being so heavenly minded that you are of no earthly use. But to consistently and deliberately remove yourself from the ‘world’ as many do in Christendom when many a time the world needs your perspective and yet also has lessons and knowledge in it for you is to my mind an act of counterevidence. Even Christ Jesus Himself came down to planet Earth to demonstrate how to live.

But I like the way St Paul puts it in the first book to the people of Corinth in 1 Corinthians chapter nine:

19-23Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, nonreligious, meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, the defeated, the demoralized—whoever. I didn't take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ—but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I've become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life. I did all this because of the Message. I didn't just want to talk about it; I wanted to be in on it!

To my mind you cannot go out into the world and be a breath of fresh air, you cannot provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God if you have not bothered to understand and appreciate their mind, their issues, their thoughts - in effect, what is driving them.

That is the art of relationship, the art of counseling, the art of relating, the art of exchanging, the art of evangelism and the militant zeal for a cause.