I think about things beyond my control, things that I may never have answers to but can’t help questioning.
Today I said out loud that my Grandma was a complicated woman. She was hard to love because she had one too many mean spirited comments and actions that made every person around her hold on tighter to every act of kindness in an attempt to remind ourselves that she was also a kind person.
But I have all these questions I will love to ask her, questions about her words, actions and the walking contraction she was, blowing hot and cold in the same minute.
I think what I wonder about the most is who ‘’Oreoluwa’’ is, where she comes from, and the women woven together to make her who she is, becoming and will become.
I hold my grandma in high esteem; I am proud of her accomplishments. She went into the world and took hold of anything she wanted from asking her husband to marry her, to building successful businesses and running a household of 5 children. I find myself wishing I am as audacious as she was demanding more from life and going in pursuit of all my dreams. I find myself thinking of how she had a whole room enamoured in her presence, everyone hanging on to her every word and looking to her for guidance.
She was who she was a composition of all her choices, but in the end, she is loved, she is missed in the sea of brokenness she is left her lineage to work through, a brokenness I can only hope we can work through.
For my last question to her, I imagine asking her this question in her pickup truck while driving home. ‘’Grandma?’’ I am sure she will answer ‘’ Derin Kekere Kin o fe ?’’ with a smile on her as she looks at the road ahead, concentrating on driving and waiting for me to ask my question, I ask. ‘’Grandma, are you proud of your legacy?’’.