My mountain; "A cold letter to Oyiwee, my grandmother."

Notes on Grief

It was later in my 20s when I figured out why it's been emphasized that home was a feeling and not a place. Enugu is where I come from, and it was on this hill that the man and lady who became my parents made me. They made me under the fluorescent glamour of their own intimacy. That very night, every other thing felt unimportant; and they even added glamour to it to prove a point, which yielded the bastard me. I was literally made in a point-making and point-proving scenario; perhaps I can boldly say I was brought into this world without love.

Well, it's quite unfortunate; we don't get to choose our fate. I was brought into this world out of wedlock, and it has been a name-tag I was made to wear for life like a stigma, the label of a lady of easy virtue. My father, they said, was a stranger, and my mother would later remarry a second-class Anambra man due to her poor life choices. I was raised by my grandmother, Oyiwe, the kind-hearted Enugu woman who knows what to do with stockfish; her bitterleaf soup is unparalleled. I sing loudly about her cooking everywhere I go. She defined the difference between "the promise of love and loving" through her actions. While my own mother promised to love me each time she visited with just words, love is just bigger than mere words. Oyiwee showed me affection in her everyday actions, stood firm for me every day, and she was the one who carried my mountain, like it was hers. Oyiwee was tall and grave-looking; she wasn’t really known for beauty, but her kind heart covered up for all her facial shortcomings. She was a victim of two failed marriages, but the first one took a toll on her; it cut off her tongue and left her speechless in this world.

It was in Ozoude's brown jotter that I learned that love was all about who stayed and not who promised. Each time I recalled that 14th line on page 8 of his jotter, I kept wondering why people keep saying what they don't really mean. Ozoude was a learned Imo State man; he had a doctorate, Oyiwee would say. She meant he was a doctor of books, a member of different fellowships across the east, and the husband she desired so much. He was supposed to love Oyiwee, his wife, in return, but I guess loving and making a marriage work wasn't part of Ozoude's specialization in the Ph.D. he acquired. He sent Oyiwee away after she bore him "Nne-ohe," my mother, but regardless of this, Oyiwee still constantly poured out love and decided to wear her pain as a badge and not as a burden. Oyiwee only took Ozoude's personal jotter as she left because it was in it Ozoude wrote down every single line he used to win the heart of Oyiwee while she was still in her prime. My granny Oyiwee told me every night she read through those jotters; she couldn't describe how Ozoude wrecked the walls of her heart. Once she let down the tears and asked the moonlight why “A man would awaken the love of a woman, with no intention of loving her.”

Regardless of everything, she showed me endless love until her last days. She always called me "Akupee" and ended up soloing it like a song.

"Akupee" and ends up soloing it like a song

" _Akupee n'elo egwu_

_n'elo egwu. "

Meanwhile, Akupee meant a handfan, and she would further exaggerate, saying I was an unexpected peace of mind like the Page boy of Connecticut. She decided to drink her cocktail of pain with ice cubes, and the universe blessed her in other ways. "Nneohe Nwaugwu-okwo Oyiwee" are her names in full; she would say in one of our proverbs, "Achokwa mma ekwu okaa ihe eri n'enyashi," which loosely translates to "If we start searching for the kitchen knife, it would reveal what was ate last night. I won't bother to explain this proverb because an adage from Ngwo also highlighted that if a proverb is thrown to a person and still explained to that person, it means the dowry paid on the head of the person's mother is worthless, 'korpor.' But regardless, I would accord you that respect, not to expose your flaws at this point. It is a very personal adage to the Ngwo man, and every Ngwo man holds it in high esteem. Oyiwee often used this proverb to navigate from talking about being loved; she felt speaking about it reminded her of her revolutionary lover, Ozoude. Since she didn't get enough, instead, she chose to give out more.

Love makes the world go round; Oyiwee raised me into a grown-up even before I was 13. Oyiwee taught me a lot; she made me understand that Nne-ohe, my mother, refused to mention who that stranger was that night I was made despite all efforts. She further emphasized that I should fight tirelessly for a better life because a day will come when she won't be here anymore, and Ngwo might doubt I belong here. Identity is something Ngwo hold in high regard; the house you come from, on the extreme end, gives you a kinsman.

Today, Oyiwee, the woman who used to carry my mountain, is late. Visiting her old hut came with so many emotional thoughts. Nne-ohe, my mother, hasn't gotten over what would have been; she keeps mourning a time immersed in possibilities, a time that would never come back again. She said the picture of the man she made me with that night was no longer clear in her head; long years of silence had scrubbed those pictures off her memory walls. She no longer likes to see my face these days; it seems my face reminds her of times that could have been mended. Each time I see Nne-ohe, she looks like a stranger, and visiting Ngwo felt very empty. Something bigger than here left this place for me. I no longer felt at home when I visit this town because I felt like a fading story, a story that never happened.

Maybe I should end it here and reread this story again to effect the needful.

P.S. Notes on Grief: A story of a grandmother, Mother & Child.