I call the cold and grey brick city of London home; but the prelude to my becoming occurred under warm skies on Nigerian soil. When dad met mum on a return visit to Nigeria and my beloved granddad facilitated their union, dad was already a father of five and a three time divorcee who was some thirty years mums senior. Having emigrated from Nigeria to London perhaps a decade or so before, he now found himself alone trying to raise his three youngest children. My parents union had all the hallmarks of practicality; London held all the possibilities of economic upward mobility for a woman from a small village in the Delta state of Nigeria. Mum was the eldest of five; she came from a poor family that were depending on her to break their cycle of poverty. That was the way it was back then and in many ways — in formerly colonised countries — still is. We live in this modern world; evolving humans with the same old problems. My parents story had little of the incessant romanticism that many people attach to love and marriage but it’s a classic love story nonetheless.
It was my birthday yesterday. Even though I identify as the ‘indoorsy’ type, I decided to brave the offensive cold that numbed my ears and take a train for the first time in years. I headed into the city to see a new exhibition at the National Gallery that had been calling me on since December. Although this is the beginning of my 46th year around our sun and of being a native of London, I still navigate the centre of my city like I’m a tourist trying to find their way back to the hotel. It’s funny how life has us in this habitual cycle of navigating and connecting with ourselves and others and places one way or another. Among any crowd, I instinctively reach for the sweetness of solitude. My eyes were all about, connecting landmarks to forge a path through the chaos. There were people everywhere; of course there were, it was a Saturday afternoon in central London. The mixed chorus of raised voices protesting everything and the gridlocked traffic — dotted with red buses and black taxis stuck in a go slow of diversions that seemed to have them going in nonsensical circles — were not unusual. I arrived at the gallery and soon enough spotted my sisters face among the queue. ‘Happy birthday’ she beamed as we traded hugs and made the outside feel like a safe space.
The exhibit was masterful and breathtaking. Artist Kehinde Wiley succeeded in provoking our thoughts to take ‘a look at what’s possible.’ The larger than life scale of the pieces and the imagery of the short film that ran alongside them seeped in through my skin; they bedded down like generations of echos from across the African diaspora that united in my psyche. It was Black magic— an unspoken love language. Those moments will stretch over time and oceans; around bends and over bridges to become memories that will reconnect me with myself and other people and places and moments that afford me another chance to begin again from a different starting point. I hope they will afford me the wisdom to keep pursuing what is possible unaffected by failure and success alike. It was a privilege and poignant to see these works of art displayed in my city and to know that I share my Nigerian heritage with the artist. I speak English with a London accent and the vast, creative diversity of Nigeria on my tongue. At times it can set me apart from the sons and daughters born and bred on Nigerian soil. But Nigeria still speaks to me and I’m grateful for that connection — even when it speaks to me in languages I don’t understand. With a full heart and before London became all sunset, silhouettes and moonlight, I headed back home.
