A few months ago, I was lying in bed when a thought came into my head that has refused to leave ever since.
What happens after school?
Not after my final exams. Not after signing out or taking graduation pictures. I mean after all the excitement dies down and everyone goes back to their lives. What happens when nobody is telling me what to do next?
For the last five years, my life has had a timetable. Every semester came with its own problems, but there was always another registration, another timetable, another exam to prepare for. Even when I complained about school, I never had to wonder what came next because someone else had already planned it.
Now, nobody has.
My final examinations start this month, and if everything goes well, I’ll be signing out next month. People keep asking me, “So, what’s the plan after graduation?” I smile because that’s what you’re supposed to do. The truth is that I don’t have the answer they think I have.
A few months ago, the pressure at home became too much for me. My mum and I had an argument, and I cried harder than I had in a long time. I remember sitting there thinking, I have to leave this house after graduation. It wasn’t because I didn’t love my family. I do. But at this stage of my life, I was tired of feeling like adulthood had started everywhere except in the place where I lived. I wanted to make my own decisions. I wanted space to become whoever I was going to become.
That was what pushed me to call my boss from the office where I did my SIWES in Lagos. We spoke for more than an hour. I told him I was scared about life after school. He listened patiently and told me I could come back to Lagos. He talked about how many young people had arrived in the city with very little and eventually found their feet. He encouraged me to pray about it too.
I was grateful for the conversation, but after I ended the call, my questions were still sitting beside me.
Come to Lagos.
Under whose expense?
Stay where?
With whom?
People say, “Just move to Lagos,” as though the city itself is an answer. What they don’t talk about is what it costs to arrive before you’ve even started living. They don’t talk about trying to build a life in a city where almost everything demands money before it offers opportunity. They don’t talk about what it means to stay with relatives or family friends, trying to be thankful without feeling like you’re taking up too much space.
Then there is Uyo.
Staying back sounds sensible until I think about what staying back really means for me. I have a tailoring business that I genuinely love, but working from home is not as simple as people imagine. The moment you’re at home, your time belongs to everyone. You can be in the middle of finishing a customer’s outfit, racing to meet a deadline, and someone calls you to do a chore because, after all, you’re in the house. Sometimes customers spend more time bargaining than appreciating the work itself. On other days, I wonder if I should put sewing aside for a while and try something completely different. Recently, I’ve been looking into customer service roles for foreign companies, something I never imagined myself doing a year ago.
The strange thing about this season is that none of these options feels wrong, but none of them feels certain either.
After that conversation with my boss in May, I decided to stop worrying about it. At least, I tried to. I told myself I would cross that bridge when I got there. My final year deserved my attention, and I didn’t want fear to steal the little time I had left as a student.
It worked for a while.
Now my final exams are here, and the bridge no longer looks far away.
I mentioned my fears to my mum again recently. She looked at me and said, “God will see you through.”
I believe that.
I pray that.
But if I’m being honest, that wasn’t really the question I was asking.
I wasn’t asking whether God would be with me.
I was asking where I would live.
How I would survive.
Whether leaving home would be a mistake.
Whether staying would cost me something else.
Perhaps this is the part of graduation nobody talks about.
We spend years preparing to finish school, but very little time preparing for the quiet months that follow. The months where you’re no longer fully a student, but not yet the person you’re trying to become. The months where everyone congratulates you, while you’re secretly wondering if you’re ready for the life everyone assumes is waiting.
In a few weeks, I’ll probably wear a sign-out shirt, take pictures with my classmates and smile at the camera. Anyone who sees those pictures will think they know what comes next.
The truth is, I don’t.
Right now, all I know is that adulthood seems to begin with waiting.
Waiting for NYSC.
Waiting for an opportunity.
Waiting for enough money to choose where you want to live instead of where you can afford.
Waiting to discover that the life you’ve imagined for years is finally beginning, even if it looks nothing like you expected.