I briefly wrote a weekly Substack series titled Short Decades. It's still one of my favourite essays although it's a bit different to what & how I typically write.
In Yoruba culture, proverbs (òwe) reflect a worldview of pragmatic realism through encoded insights about human nature, virtues and cosmic order. These sayings serve as vessels of generational wisdom which transform lived experience into actionable guidance. This philosophy aligns with a broader African saying "An elder sees sitting down what a child cannot see standing up."
Recently I've been contending with "Ogún ọmọdé kìí ṣeré ogún ọdún". In other words, twenty children cannot play together for twenty years. I suppose it can be considered a simple (but harsh) truth.
I heard that saying for the first time just months following my elementary school graduation. At the time, I understood it as nothing more than a poignant observation about how time and circumstances naturally separate even the closest bonds. My friends and I had branched out to different schools across the country, many of those bonds would not remain the same, and we would inevitably each form new ones. In many ways, I no longer resonate with the proverb.
If you've been following these essays, you might've noticed a thematic interest in how language shapes thought. In this case, I believe the specific juxtaposition of 'children' and 'play' does more than just mark time's passage, but also reinforces the disparity in age/wisdom – perhaps to trivialise the nature of child-like companionship compared to the 'adult-style' social bonding.
While I appreciate Yoruba philosophy's staunch realism, I find myself questioning the absence of a counter-narrative to this seemingly hyperbolic adage. Yes, twenty children cannot play together for twenty years – I understood this even as a child. But perhaps the more interesting question is whether a handful of connections, carefully chosen and deliberately maintained, can defy the proverb's implied inevitability.
Many of my friends are also from Lagos, Nigeria, but are scattered across the world. However, this dispersion only amplifies the difficulties in nurturing friendships. Hence, this paradigm is extremely intriguing on a personal level – more so considering the timely festive season where many of us return home. Despite my friends and I being dispersed across different countries over the years, I am glad to still have friendships spanning 5, 10, and even 20 years. I am therefore able to provide some firsthand perspective.
I believe all adult relationships are fundamentally rooted in choice: we actively choose to begin, maintain, or terminate relationships. Regarding relational endings, these typically stem from either situational or personal changes. I believe this best aligns with Derek Parfit's 'Relation R,' which argues that psychological continuity and connectedness supersede personal identity as determinants of lasting relationships. When applied to friendship, particularly in the context of the diaspora, this framework illustrates why maintaining long-term connections is so complex. It's not necessarily about staying in touch, but about maintaining connection with someone who, like you, is constantly evolving under vastly different influences.
As explored in one of my earlier essays, today's social media platforms are content vehicles for consumption instead of network ecosystems for connection-building. Instagram, for example, is particularly sticky: most people use it daily, but not to see their friends anymore. Instead, our friends' story updates compete with brand ads and influencer posts for our dwindling attention. Alternatively, seeing 'friends' daily in real-life school or university settings was different: it was just us & them. Now, the dominance of social platforms has degraded the friend-friend paradigm to mulch.
This shift has also created a peculiar paradox in how we maintain relationships beyond the digital sphere. Social media promises constant connection but delivers something more insidious: an environment characterised by endless identity performances which prevent authentic and tangible connection.
The result? A striking irony where we possess extensive means for connection, yet meaningful connection feels increasingly elusive. The ease of maintaining surface-level digital connections has paradoxically raised the activation energy required for deeper engagement. From doomscrolling short-form content to the proliferation of hookup culture, we've become accustomed to treating things as consumable rather than preservable. Our relationships increasingly mirror our consumption patterns – quick, disposable, and optimised for hedonistic pursuits rather than lasting value. Perhaps this is another feature of late-stage capitalism manifesting in our social dynamics. Who knows?
I suppose it's only natural to resist accepting potentially harsh truths, especially when the outcome isn't involuntary. But I fail to understand how we've elevated this into virtue by rationalising distance over effort, independence over interdependence, and loss over preservation. On one level, I suppose there's no benefit in deeply valuing something that society no longer seems to. But in an ever-changing world—politically, socially, and technologically—the one thing you want to be able to count on is each other.
I know twenty children can't play together for twenty years; I've known that since I was a child myself. Yet somehow it seems we've rebranded naivety as believing relationships can endure, and wisdom as expecting them to fade – embracing "natural drift" as an inevitable occurrence rather than a genuine possibility. I fear this self-fulfilling prophecy not only justifies our passive disconnection from existing bonds, but potentially leaves us perpetually guarded in new connections we're told are temporary by design.