In the DreamWorks movie Shrek, the character Shrek said to Donkey: “Ogres are like onions”.
People are like onions, too, for the simple reason that they have layers.
Onions have dry crusty layers, then half dry and half juicy layers, then fleshed out layers, and if it’s
still budding, a green inner layer that no one can eat. You can be patient when cutting an onion, to carefully peel back the layers and get to the part you need without getting hurt in the process.
In the days of high school theatre, we- I mean people- placed shrivels of onions in their eyes so they would have a pool of tears for the scenes where they had to cry. Lucky for me, I never had to place onion juice in my eyes because I only got jester roles, maybe because I had a funny face or a great personality (…ha! just kidding)
In my personal experience with chopping onions, the fresher the onion, the more it stung your eyes.
But strangely, every human being I had ever cooked with in the kitchen reacted to fresh onions
except my mother. In all my years, I never saw her eyes water up as she sliced onions. When I asked
her about it, she would say ‘old eyes never cry because of onions.
Thinking back, I think it affected her eyes at some point; maybe she was trying to be brave in front of me, or maybe it was not in her tear glands to work up tears without a strong emotional reason.
To prevent me from thinking she was an alien, she once told me that when she was much younger, she had special cooking sunshades which she wore when deep frying foods in a pan to prevent the hot oil from splashing into her eyes anytime she had to stir or turn food over in a frying pan and when she cut up onions.
To help my eyes, I would buy onions in bulk before the previous onions would run out, so that by the time I got to the latest batch, they would be a bit old and would have lost their ‘sting’.
I would advise against this because when left for too long, onions begin to grow or rot, depending on where and how they are kept. The onions which do not grow begin to slowly deteriorate; the layers become so soft and mushy that the whole onion sometimes has to be thrown away.
After a week of throwing onions away, every time I picked up an unsatisfactory bulb, I decided to
stop being a waster and manage what I had. I almost wished I had not made that decision just yet
because the onion bulb I selected seemed extra squishy when I picked it up. It seemed really
mushy to the core, and I wanted to throw it away.
But, as though I heard a deep voice in my head not to ‘give up’ on my onion, I decided to work
through the mush and see if there was anything usable. True to the ‘little veggie voice’ in my head,
beneath all that mush was a perfectly unharmed onion bulb. It even smelled and looked great!
The mush seemed to get to almost the core, but unexplainably, this half of the onion was perfectly
preserved. I was grateful that I resolved not to be wasteful, if only to discover this ‘treasure’ and
learn these three very precious lessons:
1. Anything you do not use will rot with time.
Do not neglect dreams, projects, talents, vision, goals and relationships. There will never be
a right and perfect time to do anything worthwhile.
Life is always happening, and we all get busy or distracted. Try your best to make time for what matters to you, even if it’s just a few minutes of research, practice or going back to school, or making time for a family date, marriage date, phone call to a friend, you add to the list.
2. Make a decision not to waste, neglect or abandon anything valuable to you.
If something is important to you, polish it, nurture it until it blooms and shines, but do not be quick to throw it away.
This can be relationships, skills, or even your self-growth. It is often human nature to give up when something is hard or does not work out the first time.
Keep looking out for the things that are worth it and important to you, figure out a way to preserve talents and relationships, and keep improving and nurturing them.
3. Every second chance is a blessing, not a right.
Sometimes, life gives you a second chance to make something good out of something you thought was hopeless or something you have lost.
Perhaps you have something or someone with whom a relationship has been ruined or has begun to rot, the same way a fresh sap can grow from a rotten tree, life can give you a second chance if you can be patient and determined enough to go through the mush and the muck to make it work. Second chances do exist.
When it seems you have neglected someone or something, and it seems to fail or not work out, do not be too quick to lose hope on it, or them- if it’s a person or people.
I cannot wait to hear from you. You can send me an email or comment down below.
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handle Tomi Sule Emmanuel.
Keep living with the hope that all your dreams will come true; keep learning and keep
smiling. Cheers!
