March 29, 2009
Some dreams get lost never to be found, some you throw away because the very magnitude of them shakes your soul to its core, some are written and rewritten like a manifesto and sometimes, less often than it should, something wonderful, sparking, moving happens. Some dreams you grasp with all the strength you can summon and you cry, and you pray, and you grit your teeth and walk through the fire.
I am a dreamer. I am a wanderer.
When I discovered the power of epiphany, revelation, I was somewhere in the area of 15 or 16 years old. I wrote poetry, very good poetry. I was deep. I felt old enough to grasp what was being realized and do something about it.
Lately, I seem to stumble upon revelations like a rock climber whose unlucky foot finds a loose resting place in a solid mountain side. Once the dubious piece crumbles underfoot, nothing exists as strongly in that moment as the need to find another foothold. It is a desperation so deep, its nearly spiritual, the longing to find a solid place that will sustain your weight long enough for you to move on to the next foothold and the next after that.
I had a plan for myself. A good, detailed plan. I was driven, focused, to the exclusion of everything else. Then, without preamble or warning, something happened that irrevocably changed me. I feel as if this mark, this scar, this morbid reminder is never-healing, unmerciful; the ache of it unrelenting. It was the very pain of that mark, that scar that forced me to look up and realize life was happening around me, to me… without my consent. The things that composed my day to day existence, like an orchestra building towards crescendo with layers of robust sound comforted me. I was happy to go through the motions, note by note. The symphony of friends, family and work all beautifully composed, lulled me into a sleepy existence.
They were the metronome of my life. Constant, dependable. I sweated the small stuff sometimes, and that was alright with me.
I remember when moved into my apartment in Silver Spring. After toiling so hard to gain this new freedom, to reach this personal benchmark, I was excited beyond belief. I smiled to myself for no reason at all. Every time my feet touched the plush carpet, I felt a small burst of joy in my chest. A sudden jolt like a Five n Dime firecracker, startling, sharp and pleasing to me.
My mom gave me a Swarovski crystal bowl as a housewarming gift. It came in a crisp red cardboard box with a picture of the bowl on the front, staged in an elegant setting. I examined the bowl, briefly admiring its beauty and elegance. Then, I packed that bowl away in the closet near the front door. It was supposed to go on my coffee table, offering sweet things to all who glanced in its direction. Then, I realized that the space was freer, happier and less pretentious without a coffee table. So, in the closet, the bowl stayed.
I kept telling myself, I will use this bowl for something special. An event that warrants the use of something so beautiful, so precious and so thoughtfully given by one of the people I love most in this world.
The day I moved out, I remember packing things carefully and compulsively into a box labeled “FRAGILE”. My heart danced a little as I picked up the red box with tattered corners. The cardboard was slightly bent, dipping in the middle in tandem with the hollow of the bowl and more flexible from being stored; from sitting on the top shelf with countless other transient things laying of top of it, being taken off and being put back again.
I opened the box and took out the bowl. It was still shiny, pristine. The colors filtering through it were so clear and beautiful and unashamed. I was surprised by the emotions that hit me in that instant with the sun filtering through the angles of the bowl. Pure yellow and shy orange shades caressed my face like an adoring lover. I wanted to break the bowl, knock it off the counter in one sweeping motion. Smash it into a million glittering pieces. And then… then I wanted to eat everything from ice cream to eba and stew in it that very day, make up for those days in the closet.
I studied the sunset through the bottom of that crystal bowl in the solitude and quiet of my apartment that evening. I sat on the carpet in front of the floor to ceiling windows and watched day turn to a glorious, smoky night. I wondered to myself what had happened to me while I danced to my very own symphony of sounds. I danced to work, griping about my co-workers, my bosses, I enjoyed the perks of living in 5-star hotels for a few weeks every month. I danced home to the sanctuary of a place I built all by myself, for myself. I swayed and twirled to the comfort of having my very best friends within arm’s reach and the fact that I never had to be alone, unless I really wanted to and sometimes not even then. I went to sleep at night knowing I was safe, that a sheet of solid ground caressed the soles of my feet, reassuring me. No loose footholds existed in my world and I was accustomed to that. I had put away all the crystal bowls in my life. Saving them and waiting.
It was like squeezing a lightly pebbled half-lemon into my open mouth after a lifetime of drinking lemonade. The epiphany was shocking and bitter. Only after disabusing me of old notions and the taste of lemonade did it betray notes of sweetness to me.
What I didn’t realize is that the symphony I’d built had become so layered, so loud and dominating that I’d lost this essential thin; This desire to put the most ordinary and clandestine things in crystal bowls to be looked upon, examined and maybe judged and broken by passersby. This desperate, spiritual need to decorate my life with grandness, to use what everyone else keeps for Christmas because I liked the look of the sky that day, or because I’d painted my nails red and it made me happy, or just because I wanted to. I’d sacrificed something invaluable for what was mesmerizingly easy.
Very few people know exactly what I was leaving behind, or what I was coming toward. Shedding a previous ME, like a snake sheds its whole skin. At a quick glance, it looks as if the thing could rise up menacingly and bite you, but really, it’s just a shadow of what used to be there. The actual danger has moved on, transformed, an old being with a new skin.
In truth, I left behind things that I still seek redemption for; A well of regrets that runs deeper than even the most far-reaching of my emotions.
Yesterday, nestled in the comfort of my father’s house, my wrapper hugged tight about me, I thought about those things floating in that deep well. The rains have come again as beautiful as before, or more so.
I moved closer to the window and I heard it falling in torrents. Violent and cleansing. I listened for the song I hear each time it rains a melody unlike anything else in the world, unique to this place, unique to me. Sometimes I think I may even hear God as fat drops split open on rooftops, on the grass, on whatever they hit. In the sound they make. Last night, I took off my wrapper and walked around the grounds in the violent and cleansing rain.
This morning, I woke up to the smell of freshly watered earth. Permeating, powerful and fertile. I find that doubts have been lessened, smudged like the writing of a marker that is not quite dry. In their place there is a lingering, honest certainty. I have questions now that I had previously stifled into my subconscious for the sake of easiness. Questions that now hungrily insist on answers.
I have a plan. Documented. Written with ink only I can read and understand, interpret. And as I revise and edit and decide on the setting and stage on which the play of my life will take place, I will remember if by force all the crystal bowls I packed away.
I will keep my eyes open for my chance at redemption.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Thursday, March 26, 2009
May 4, 2008
It has been eight months and a few days since my arrival here and since my last entry. It was anti-climatic, my arrival, unremarkable in almost every way. Stepping off that plane in no way shape or form prepared me, or cemented my new reality, my new beginning, the next marked segment of my life.
In fact, as I sit here now, in the back of my car on my way from Ibadan back to Lagos, that day melts into countless others. There is something about the trees, the tropical weather that makes time pass differently. Sometimes in the evenings, I just stand outside and let a cooling breeze wash over me and I’m so glad, even thankful to be here. It’s a welcome departure from the sun at noon or 1pm, or 2 pm when your only thought is to breathe through the heat and try not to pass out. And then the rains come, not as heavy as they did in my youth, but spectacular still; powerful and seductive they sweep through suddenly raw and intense like a fresh wave of pain or grief. Sometimes, the rain is calm. It falls and the drops are preternaturally big but soothing like a melody in low tones.
They day of my arrival gets lost in other times I have arrived in this country, dreading the heat, the scent and the jet lag less than I dreaded the inevitable boredom. It blurs into times when I was the one leaving so many others, regretful expression molded onto my face, masking the joy I felt in my heart (I’m finally out of here!! Back home to everything that’s familiar to me, later suckers!!).
I’ve seen both my parents melt into the crowds beyond the gate at Murtala Muhammed airport, looking tentatively over their shoulders at me, probably wondering if and when I would break. I watched them thinking, ‘who’s the sucker now?’ and laughing to myself, at myself. ( Sidebar: I’ve also seen Don King parading through the airport, tufts of his ridiculous salt colored tresses swaying to and fro with his movements, waving a miniature American flag on a stick. Humiliation doesn’t begin to cover it.)
Outside of that, there is a reason why this compulsion to write anything comes in spurts. I have scarcely felt that urge since I’ve been here. I began work 7 days after I touched down. I didn’t have time to adjust. It was like trying to breath at the bottom of the ocean, with a powerful undertow holding you down, pulling you back. I just needed to break the surface, fill my lungs.
So many things have happened here, so many things have I seen. I look in the mirror now and I know it’s possible to live a lifetime in eight months. I don’t know this because I previously believed it to be so. I know this because it has happened to me. Inescapably, undeniably, I look into my own eyes and see someone I do not readily recognize.
On the way to work one early morning, the sun rose as we drove on the express on the way to the third mainland bridge. The sky was brightening with each passing minute, yet when I looked up, I saw the moon. Pale and shy compared to its nighttime majesty when it owns the sky, it was faint but still it was there. I wondered what it must be like for the sun and the moon; passing like strangers but for a few fleeting moments at dawn and dusk each day. Each glimpsing but a shadow of the other before passing beyond view. This, I feel, is how my inner selves reconcile with each other. They interact in glimpses, fleeting memories, The person I was before I came and the person I am now are different, too different, but sharing the same heart, soul and mind nonetheless.
Nothing could have prepared me for this. No research, familiarization, talking to others or optimism could have prepared me for this. I can honestly say I see something shocking, new, important, different everyday. I have loved in a way I never knew possible here and lost as well. I have stepped over boundaries I never dreamed I would encounter and bested them. My heart and prayers tell me that I am on track. Things have not happened quickly, or easily. I curse my traitorous intuition when I encounter daily annoyances that make my eyes burn. I will never complain about I-95, Beltway or any other traffic again. I will not be ungrateful when a beggar asks me for money or food (although I would still rather give them food) because just now, I am blessed with the ability to give. I will not let the ruining of my favorite shirt unravel my whole day because I have so many clothes here I cannot fit them in my closet, yet I notice how some of my staff wear the same things to work day in and out and always look ironed, neat and professional. I will not take for granted that the place I order breakfast from delivers when I’ve passed at least six children banging on my window looking for handouts on my way to the office. I have witnessed the last moments of a victim of a biking accident die by the side of the road because no one could help.
I have seen only 3 ambulances during the entire 8 months I have lived here. I have seen at least 6 bodies of car accident victims either laid out on the road or already covered with a wrapper or sheet. I have seen forgotten people and been afraid to remember them myself, for, what could I do?
Then again, amidst all the tragedy, I have seen hope for this country. A booming economy, but so many skeletons in the closet, I wonder who will help clear them away? Who will bring light to the benighted, who will give color to the colorblind? And as I ask these questions, my task, my purpose begins to take shape. Ask and you shall receive and I truly believe that.
I came home for a week or so in March. For a moment, it was as if my ‘other life’ hadn’t happened at all. I was right back on the smoothest roads I’d felt in a long time. Guzzling starbucks (skim lattes only) and talking on my cell phone that never once dropped a call. I wrapped myself in the luxury of constant electricity and dared to wash (AND DRY) my hair without fear of PEPCO/ NJ GAS taking light and leaving me with a half damp head. I reveled in a place where (the majority) of everyone follows the rules, where there is order. It was fabulous. Truly. But something within me couldn’t deny that I feel a certain peace being here, for now at least. Something that lies still inside me, instead of trying to break out through my rib cage and escape. This thing… it lies still amidst the uncertainty of this country. It breaths in deeply and is still.
I can’t count how many times someone has asked me what I’m doing here. Why did I leave the ‘land of opportunity’ to come to Nigeria. They stare in slack-jawed amazement when I tell them I just did. I was bored, I wanted a change. Mostly, I think, this is because they see it as a change for the worse. A lot of people spend their lives trying to get away, or at least thinking about getting away, yet, here is this oddity standing before them, insisting with gleaming glossy eyed fanaticism that they were bored.
But you see, that doesn’t even begin to cover it, but how many people do you know have time to listen to the when’s and whys of a complete metamorphosis? So, for now, I’ll stick with, “I just did. I got bored and needed a change, that’s why I’m here.” When you think about it, it doesn’t sound ALL that crazy does it?
It has been eight months and a few days since my arrival here and since my last entry. It was anti-climatic, my arrival, unremarkable in almost every way. Stepping off that plane in no way shape or form prepared me, or cemented my new reality, my new beginning, the next marked segment of my life.
In fact, as I sit here now, in the back of my car on my way from Ibadan back to Lagos, that day melts into countless others. There is something about the trees, the tropical weather that makes time pass differently. Sometimes in the evenings, I just stand outside and let a cooling breeze wash over me and I’m so glad, even thankful to be here. It’s a welcome departure from the sun at noon or 1pm, or 2 pm when your only thought is to breathe through the heat and try not to pass out. And then the rains come, not as heavy as they did in my youth, but spectacular still; powerful and seductive they sweep through suddenly raw and intense like a fresh wave of pain or grief. Sometimes, the rain is calm. It falls and the drops are preternaturally big but soothing like a melody in low tones.
They day of my arrival gets lost in other times I have arrived in this country, dreading the heat, the scent and the jet lag less than I dreaded the inevitable boredom. It blurs into times when I was the one leaving so many others, regretful expression molded onto my face, masking the joy I felt in my heart (I’m finally out of here!! Back home to everything that’s familiar to me, later suckers!!).
I’ve seen both my parents melt into the crowds beyond the gate at Murtala Muhammed airport, looking tentatively over their shoulders at me, probably wondering if and when I would break. I watched them thinking, ‘who’s the sucker now?’ and laughing to myself, at myself. ( Sidebar: I’ve also seen Don King parading through the airport, tufts of his ridiculous salt colored tresses swaying to and fro with his movements, waving a miniature American flag on a stick. Humiliation doesn’t begin to cover it.)
Outside of that, there is a reason why this compulsion to write anything comes in spurts. I have scarcely felt that urge since I’ve been here. I began work 7 days after I touched down. I didn’t have time to adjust. It was like trying to breath at the bottom of the ocean, with a powerful undertow holding you down, pulling you back. I just needed to break the surface, fill my lungs.
So many things have happened here, so many things have I seen. I look in the mirror now and I know it’s possible to live a lifetime in eight months. I don’t know this because I previously believed it to be so. I know this because it has happened to me. Inescapably, undeniably, I look into my own eyes and see someone I do not readily recognize.
On the way to work one early morning, the sun rose as we drove on the express on the way to the third mainland bridge. The sky was brightening with each passing minute, yet when I looked up, I saw the moon. Pale and shy compared to its nighttime majesty when it owns the sky, it was faint but still it was there. I wondered what it must be like for the sun and the moon; passing like strangers but for a few fleeting moments at dawn and dusk each day. Each glimpsing but a shadow of the other before passing beyond view. This, I feel, is how my inner selves reconcile with each other. They interact in glimpses, fleeting memories, The person I was before I came and the person I am now are different, too different, but sharing the same heart, soul and mind nonetheless.
Nothing could have prepared me for this. No research, familiarization, talking to others or optimism could have prepared me for this. I can honestly say I see something shocking, new, important, different everyday. I have loved in a way I never knew possible here and lost as well. I have stepped over boundaries I never dreamed I would encounter and bested them. My heart and prayers tell me that I am on track. Things have not happened quickly, or easily. I curse my traitorous intuition when I encounter daily annoyances that make my eyes burn. I will never complain about I-95, Beltway or any other traffic again. I will not be ungrateful when a beggar asks me for money or food (although I would still rather give them food) because just now, I am blessed with the ability to give. I will not let the ruining of my favorite shirt unravel my whole day because I have so many clothes here I cannot fit them in my closet, yet I notice how some of my staff wear the same things to work day in and out and always look ironed, neat and professional. I will not take for granted that the place I order breakfast from delivers when I’ve passed at least six children banging on my window looking for handouts on my way to the office. I have witnessed the last moments of a victim of a biking accident die by the side of the road because no one could help.
I have seen only 3 ambulances during the entire 8 months I have lived here. I have seen at least 6 bodies of car accident victims either laid out on the road or already covered with a wrapper or sheet. I have seen forgotten people and been afraid to remember them myself, for, what could I do?
Then again, amidst all the tragedy, I have seen hope for this country. A booming economy, but so many skeletons in the closet, I wonder who will help clear them away? Who will bring light to the benighted, who will give color to the colorblind? And as I ask these questions, my task, my purpose begins to take shape. Ask and you shall receive and I truly believe that.
I came home for a week or so in March. For a moment, it was as if my ‘other life’ hadn’t happened at all. I was right back on the smoothest roads I’d felt in a long time. Guzzling starbucks (skim lattes only) and talking on my cell phone that never once dropped a call. I wrapped myself in the luxury of constant electricity and dared to wash (AND DRY) my hair without fear of PEPCO/ NJ GAS taking light and leaving me with a half damp head. I reveled in a place where (the majority) of everyone follows the rules, where there is order. It was fabulous. Truly. But something within me couldn’t deny that I feel a certain peace being here, for now at least. Something that lies still inside me, instead of trying to break out through my rib cage and escape. This thing… it lies still amidst the uncertainty of this country. It breaths in deeply and is still.
I can’t count how many times someone has asked me what I’m doing here. Why did I leave the ‘land of opportunity’ to come to Nigeria. They stare in slack-jawed amazement when I tell them I just did. I was bored, I wanted a change. Mostly, I think, this is because they see it as a change for the worse. A lot of people spend their lives trying to get away, or at least thinking about getting away, yet, here is this oddity standing before them, insisting with gleaming glossy eyed fanaticism that they were bored.
But you see, that doesn’t even begin to cover it, but how many people do you know have time to listen to the when’s and whys of a complete metamorphosis? So, for now, I’ll stick with, “I just did. I got bored and needed a change, that’s why I’m here.” When you think about it, it doesn’t sound ALL that crazy does it?
Written August 2007
The beginning.
So many people have asked, and so I feel that the first entry must encompass my decision. I do this not because I feel I need to explain myself or my actions, however erratic they may seem, but because I want (and maybe need) to voice why I am heading in this direction.
I could say this has been building my whole life, subconsciously, but that might be an untruth. I went to Nigeria in January, not kicking and screaming but definitely not willingly. I hastily threw outfits together and braced myself for what I perceived to be yet another interruption in my own personal rat race. ; A disruption of my day to day activities. Get up, pick an outfit, get in the car, go to work, come home, pay bills, eat, gym, TV, phone, friends, and sleep. All tasks completed with blinders on (black, leather blinders with chrome studs) got to be half-way glam… or at least as glam as I could afford.
The point is, the unwelcome, uninvited interruption turned out to be a head clearing rush. It's akin to being completely color blind for years and then one day seeing a vibrant blue sliver of sky. Naturally this leads you to have ideas… internal revolutions in which you might realize that there are other colors to be discovered and/or made by your newfound hyper vigilance. I came back seeing colors I never knew were there.
Once the mind has discovered something, that something is indelibly etched; you can never forget its there, you can't just go back to the way it was.
There is a whole other world out there that I know nothing about. I could know Nigeria better. I don't really speak the language.. I understand little more. I cook some but not a lot. I know the culture I grew up with, but I know pieces are missing.
So, here is where I found myself on January 26th, crying uncontrollably on Virgin Atlantic watching the sun recede into the horizon and remembering my autopilot life. My father, a relatively short man with a loud laugh and shaking belly stared at my crumbled visage. Never one to acknowledge emotion, much less talk about it, he grabbed my hand over a plate of pommes frites and ribs in London Heathrow airport just as my tears were drying and asked, "What's wrong?"
These two words cracked something open in me that I'd been too afraid to break down myself. How could I tell him that the optimistic, bright and happy young individual whom he sent away to college was not the person who sat across from him now? How could I explain that he and my mom were the litmus test for what individuals can accomplish and that I didn't feel I would ever reach that one decisive mark?
I began at the beginning… Everything is just alright. I find that my job is not mentally stimulating…nor does it pay enough and I have been languishing in Maryland for the last three years battling this mentality that "its too late for me to do what I really want" which is crazy because I'm only 25 right?
Then there's my 'purpose' I haven't discovered it yet. But I know it involves helping the world. (I know I know, let the eye rolling commence). But I am not contributing ANYTHING great to society as it is. And I am so deep in the rat race right now that I can't think straight. I exist in a benighted state.
My fear is that this is how life passes you by when you're not looking. I know the fabric of life is not composed with flashy buttons or shiny pins. It is composed of the threads that weave everyday life the seemingly mundane the ordinary that weave together to form something tangible. The days pass by and suddenly, you have a cardigan… (eh… make it a Michael Kors cashmere sweater, black please).. and you have no idea how it got made.
The move, possibly the scariest and most brilliant thing I have ever done in my adult life is my answer. It's my salvation, and weirdly enough, it was suggested by my seemingly unobservant Dad.
Since the decision was made, strange things have begun to happen. I went on an 'eliminating the fear' kick. I cut my hair. (a little background for those to don't know, I formerly suffered from undiagnosed hair neurosis. I was obsessed with growing my hair by any means necessary, so imagine the stylist's shock when I took the braids out, saw my natural hair snaking down my back and instructed her to cut it all off.)
The hair cut…. was a huge step for me. Hair is security… an affirmation of womanhood and being without a LOT of it for even a short time is nerve-racking. Its just symbolic of the last few years of my life, stuck in neutral afraid to take risks afraid of what will happen, only doing things I KNOW I'm good at, instead of giving something else a try that might actually be a challenge… who I'll upset, who won't really want to be around me anymore because I chose a different path, afraid of waking up the next day and thinking, "I made a terrible mistake".
For now, I'm willing to take that risk.
The friends who have fed my soul for the past eight years, held my hand when I didn't want to walk alone, sustained me when I had nothing left will be my friends even through this latest development of mine. Those women and men who have literally helped mold me into a worthy individual by breaking off pieces of themselves and patching up my holes will never really be separate from me. I am pieces of them and they are pieces of me, figuratively speaking.
:::Warning! Preachy-ness ahead. Cease reading if you simply cannot DEAL:::
And who could forget the grand master of my destiny? He's walked with me all the days of my life and will continue to walk with me until those days are over and I am with Him. He's been there in my darkest hour and on my brightest days. When no one else would come, He was there for me offering unconditional love and acceptance and friendship. Although I can't see His grand plan, I have faith that I will be sustained, watched over and protected. I am ever so grateful for this gift, and hopefully my gratitude will manifest itself in ways yet to be seen. Thanks JC, for everything.
The beginning.
So many people have asked, and so I feel that the first entry must encompass my decision. I do this not because I feel I need to explain myself or my actions, however erratic they may seem, but because I want (and maybe need) to voice why I am heading in this direction.
I could say this has been building my whole life, subconsciously, but that might be an untruth. I went to Nigeria in January, not kicking and screaming but definitely not willingly. I hastily threw outfits together and braced myself for what I perceived to be yet another interruption in my own personal rat race. ; A disruption of my day to day activities. Get up, pick an outfit, get in the car, go to work, come home, pay bills, eat, gym, TV, phone, friends, and sleep. All tasks completed with blinders on (black, leather blinders with chrome studs) got to be half-way glam… or at least as glam as I could afford.
The point is, the unwelcome, uninvited interruption turned out to be a head clearing rush. It's akin to being completely color blind for years and then one day seeing a vibrant blue sliver of sky. Naturally this leads you to have ideas… internal revolutions in which you might realize that there are other colors to be discovered and/or made by your newfound hyper vigilance. I came back seeing colors I never knew were there.
Once the mind has discovered something, that something is indelibly etched; you can never forget its there, you can't just go back to the way it was.
There is a whole other world out there that I know nothing about. I could know Nigeria better. I don't really speak the language.. I understand little more. I cook some but not a lot. I know the culture I grew up with, but I know pieces are missing.
So, here is where I found myself on January 26th, crying uncontrollably on Virgin Atlantic watching the sun recede into the horizon and remembering my autopilot life. My father, a relatively short man with a loud laugh and shaking belly stared at my crumbled visage. Never one to acknowledge emotion, much less talk about it, he grabbed my hand over a plate of pommes frites and ribs in London Heathrow airport just as my tears were drying and asked, "What's wrong?"
These two words cracked something open in me that I'd been too afraid to break down myself. How could I tell him that the optimistic, bright and happy young individual whom he sent away to college was not the person who sat across from him now? How could I explain that he and my mom were the litmus test for what individuals can accomplish and that I didn't feel I would ever reach that one decisive mark?
I began at the beginning… Everything is just alright. I find that my job is not mentally stimulating…nor does it pay enough and I have been languishing in Maryland for the last three years battling this mentality that "its too late for me to do what I really want" which is crazy because I'm only 25 right?
Then there's my 'purpose' I haven't discovered it yet. But I know it involves helping the world. (I know I know, let the eye rolling commence). But I am not contributing ANYTHING great to society as it is. And I am so deep in the rat race right now that I can't think straight. I exist in a benighted state.
My fear is that this is how life passes you by when you're not looking. I know the fabric of life is not composed with flashy buttons or shiny pins. It is composed of the threads that weave everyday life the seemingly mundane the ordinary that weave together to form something tangible. The days pass by and suddenly, you have a cardigan… (eh… make it a Michael Kors cashmere sweater, black please).. and you have no idea how it got made.
The move, possibly the scariest and most brilliant thing I have ever done in my adult life is my answer. It's my salvation, and weirdly enough, it was suggested by my seemingly unobservant Dad.
Since the decision was made, strange things have begun to happen. I went on an 'eliminating the fear' kick. I cut my hair. (a little background for those to don't know, I formerly suffered from undiagnosed hair neurosis. I was obsessed with growing my hair by any means necessary, so imagine the stylist's shock when I took the braids out, saw my natural hair snaking down my back and instructed her to cut it all off.)
The hair cut…. was a huge step for me. Hair is security… an affirmation of womanhood and being without a LOT of it for even a short time is nerve-racking. Its just symbolic of the last few years of my life, stuck in neutral afraid to take risks afraid of what will happen, only doing things I KNOW I'm good at, instead of giving something else a try that might actually be a challenge… who I'll upset, who won't really want to be around me anymore because I chose a different path, afraid of waking up the next day and thinking, "I made a terrible mistake".
For now, I'm willing to take that risk.
The friends who have fed my soul for the past eight years, held my hand when I didn't want to walk alone, sustained me when I had nothing left will be my friends even through this latest development of mine. Those women and men who have literally helped mold me into a worthy individual by breaking off pieces of themselves and patching up my holes will never really be separate from me. I am pieces of them and they are pieces of me, figuratively speaking.
:::Warning! Preachy-ness ahead. Cease reading if you simply cannot DEAL:::
And who could forget the grand master of my destiny? He's walked with me all the days of my life and will continue to walk with me until those days are over and I am with Him. He's been there in my darkest hour and on my brightest days. When no one else would come, He was there for me offering unconditional love and acceptance and friendship. Although I can't see His grand plan, I have faith that I will be sustained, watched over and protected. I am ever so grateful for this gift, and hopefully my gratitude will manifest itself in ways yet to be seen. Thanks JC, for everything.
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