Parable of old man who measured his lifetime using a miniscule cup

By Peter Kimani

Kenya: Folks, a belated Happy New Year! I hope you had a smooth transition; I navigated out of town just in time for the midnight countdown, dodging inebriated teens at the Nakumatt Lifestyle mall where I was running some errands.

Hours later, I was headed back to my roots, driving through the Thika Super-highway, sections of which were still littered with fragments of glass and broken vehicle accessories.

It was evident some motorists had difficulty driving on clear stretches of the road and had chosen to go sideways.

But I had a smooth ride, negotiating my exit off the superhighway without incident to take Kenyatta Road where, within no time, I was driving past the home of my maternal grandfather, Kariku wa Kimani.

Fitting parable

He passed away a few months ago, while I was out of the country. But it was only this week that I learnt about his eventful burial, a fitting parable that could profit those who may wish to organise their time this year and beyond.

First off, I must disclose that by sharing this story, I am violating the sanction he placed about his death: he decreed no advertisement should be made about his passing through the mass media.

The rationale for this was that his burial was a family affair and those that needed to know would get the news without broadcasting the same to the wider world.

Although he was a man of remarkable means, he said should his family have lacked the resources for a decent burial, one of his assets was to be disposed of to raise the money required for his send-off. Under no circumstances was any money to be collected from the public for his burial.

That was not all. The old man insisted that his body was not to be kept longer than three days before burial.

And on the material day, no food or drink was to be offered to mourners. A burial, he had said, is not a celebration.

Further, no speeches would be allowed other than the priest’s sermon. The old man also requested to be laid to rest by noon so that people would not excuse their lost day to his burial. After all, his work was done; people needed to carry on with their own lives.

And sure enough, all rites were concluded by 10.30am.

If the man sounds mysterious in death, he was even more enigmatic in life. He turned propitious marshes into productive rangelands on which he ran a successful dairy enterprise.

But some of the stuff about the man is probably fictive – like his trenchant adherence to planning. All visitors were supposed to have prior appointments and those that arrived unannounced were turned away.

I received an invitation to visit him some time last year but never got to honour it. Now that he’s gone, I can only speculate the life lesson he might have prescribed.

Still, all is not lost. For a society with very fluid notions of time, it is remarkable that one man kept track of his time under the sun for a whole 92 years.

The enduring legacy of the old man, in a sense, is that time is the singular asset that’s truly ours. Prudent management of the resource, as his life attested, should bear a bountiful harvest.

And even when the sun set on Kariku wa Kimani, he ensured the day was properly managed for maximum benefit to those he left behind.

That’s a lesson worthy of emulation as we set our goals and resolutions for the new year.