A Stranger To My Own Tenderness - by Oluwatobi Kolawole

--- Personal essays can be revelational, and sometimes I ask myself when I write if I just really want to tell others who I want to be known as, or if there is a space where I can be myself and still be at home with whoever I'm interpreted as. The thoughts kick in, and my deceitful self takes the stage, ready again to use words in a way I once loved to. I had a recent discussion about whether I was a morning person. And most of my colleagues voiced their opinions as to what they thought. For the record, I, surprisingly, have become the fulcrum that holds the cohesion of my team. The one who decides to hold the difficult conversations and shares a knowing about each person within the team, and even if people's temperament and disposition are the walls I have to climb, there has been no issue with me relating, even though with the devil. Apropos of the conversation, I recall that people who have lived with me do not consider me a morning person. And this was my response to the cynicism of my colleagues. Most mornings, I wake up grumpy, foremost bothered by the fact that capitalism still rules this world and no one is doing anything about it, and second, that I always have many things to do all at once. So be it siblings, exes, or even friends, there are two types of actions alluded to my being, one is the normal one when I get up and stay on the bed till my body system boots slowly enough to piss the fuck out of everybody around, and the other is when I'm ready to start having conversations which most time doesn't happen till I'm ready to head out for work. Work colleagues have a different view, but that's just because by the time I have to jump on a bus, take a keke, or enter a cab, conversations would have happened, so work talks or sanguine interactions will just be a natural outflow or a continuation from what has already begun within my domestic space. Both truths are valid (I hate to say this), and even though clarity comes with so much context, it is easier to just permit people to interpret you in the best way that they can see fit. With the information that they have, and the ignorance they can do nothing about.The other day, it was someone at work yelling at me that I was an avoidant because I didn't reply to a text, and with proper knowledge now, she had a point, I can be such a horrible person, and with all the elaborations going around on this global village, all the pieces are finally coming together to create a meaning in my head. I think I'm an incurable avoidant. One article I read said it's a trauma response. The human condition must be studied, and behavioral patterns should be explained either as a premise for acting better or as an acceptance of what is, an incurable condition. I don't know the granular details of why I do the things I do, but I like to make myself believe that everything I am is a roughly mixed amalgam of my experiences, especially my childhood experiences. I don't like talking all the time. I grew up with people not giving me answers to my questions. While I can be jovial and be the conversational person that is needed to keep rapport flowing within a work department or a friendship group, I snap and withdraw from everything at some point, and that stepping back feels sharp most times. Talk ought to be cheap, but not here. It comes because I want to say something, not because I have to say something. And that is a reality people stumble upon as soon as they get closer. With me, anyone can go for days of no communication and return. In my last piece, I narrated the idea of a love interest being away for a while and us planning for the aftermath of that distance. It's the archetypal version of what I consider perfect for my person. But then, it is believed that like poles do not attract. Sibling love has its place in everyone's life, my life especially, and truly, life assigns them to us, and us to them in the most arbitrary way possible. Within bad moments, it's possible to wish for vile things, such as your parents deciding not to have coital interaction as your dependency list increases with every attempt at it. It doesn't show in the beginning, but the plot thickens as you all grow into adults. Stay with me, but also know when to leave. And when to come again. --- Within my memory span, I think independence as a boarding school child, and stepping into the darkness of finding myself after graduating from the university, has lured me into thinking that life only begins when one can, in the most lonely path, reason out clarity from a confusing state. And it's not just difficult, it's excruciatingly painful to carve out something for yourself out of nothing. To look back at all that has made you and decide to undo its effect and recreate yourself in a new image. Casually listening to an interview with Wole Soyinka today, and he repeats the words of his father, his encounter with Desmond Tutu, and Nelson Mandela. Each recollection for him took him back to moments that had led him to all that he has become. For me, every attempt to tap into the wells of my past has revealed certain things that I want to change. And the personal essays do not hide them for me. I think whoever considers me worthy for a relationship has to make do with the jabs that would hit the heart so strongly that they gasp for life. Sometimes I feel like an alien. I tire people out, and sometimes, I see it in their eyes that they are trying their best not to walk away. As though my lot is not a part of this world, as though something in me shattered to a point of no return where I can no longer give what I once gave, even when I try the hardest. In one lifetime, the memories remain, and every disappointment scraped off the walls of gentle affection I ought to offer this world, for all my words, empathy, desire, affectionate responses, soulful songs, and tears have been used up on another love. --- Authors NoteI used to think self-awareness was the beginning of change. Now I'm not so sure. Some of what I found when I looked inward, I've carried forward anyway - not because I chose to, but because some things become you before you ever get a chance to choose. This piece is an honest account of that. Make of it what you can. I did.

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