“I used to think of my life in seasons, but what gave me the idea it would be the least bit predictable?”

My friends have been subtly nudging me to write again, and really, so have I. My last post was 6 months ago! And honestly, I’ve been trying to get back to the notepad. But every time I’ve tried to even think about it, I’ve distracted myself with something else. And now I realise it’s because I knew it’d be a flood once I start typing. You see, my head is a mishmash of a lot of random things lately, some I’m simply not ready to contend with until I’ve properly braced myself. So…. today, we’re keeping it light! Haha you didn’t think it’d be that easy, did you. I have to go deep, sorry! It’s just who I am, and probably why you’re reading this anyway. But today’s depth is the good kind, the gratitude-filled, hindsight-clarity-inducing kind. Because one does not turn 40 everyday! So humour my throwbacks and soliloquy for today, will you?

I’m 40 years old today! If you’re like me and find random specificity important, then you would be pleased to know that I’ll actually be 40 today at exactly 7:30pm WAT (GMT+1)! And while I was supposed to be launching my new pet project today, I’m instead simply enjoying everything else. I’m focusing on ME today. I get it - a milestone birthday is a good time to birth a new idea into the world, and after launching 2 projects around my 38th and 39th birthday, this year was going to be the big one! But life happens. And with the year it’s been, I’ve had to get off the wheel and simply sit with contentment and gratitude for where I am, and it feels amazing. Did I temporarily abandon my creative side? Maybe. But am I basking in the simplicity of new routines and making baby step progress everyday? Heck yes! And for right now, that is more than enough. I’m currently relaxing in the tropical island of my dreams, with my nearest and dearest, probably sipping on something nice as you read this, and wondering how this little girl (yes, ‘this’, not ‘that’ in past tense, because I’m still little) is able to look back 4 decades and still smile.

You know that thing people say about how women have babies and in an instant, forget about the pain of childbirth and are willing to go again? Well, I don’t quite know about that but I will say though…. that with my life so far, when I look back, I don’t feel the growing pains anymore, I don’t see missed goals or those disappointments that seemed huge at the time. Instead, against the backdrop of everything - nice and not so nice, I see the full picture. Granted, I have to squint sometimes to see clearly, but I see nonetheless. Oh I feel too, I look back and the feeling bubbles back up like I was back in that place, only this time the sense of achievement, joy and peace is amplified and the pain is dulled a little bit more with each backward glance.

I see the time when I helped others feel seen like when while in Australia I launched the first accessibility program that gave the opportunity for visually-impaired people to get work experience in our organisation. I easily regurgitate the sense of surprise and deep pride when out of necessity, I had to learn Dutch (of all languages) to an impressive level, and did it in just 4 months (Thanks Colinda)! I recall the sense of calm when I walked into any exam hall or interview knowing I was ready. I recapture the feeling of awe and just being so tiny from standing high up at the Klein Matterhorn (went up with a lift, I’m no mountain climber), letting the water splash all over me underneath a double rainbow at the base of Niagara falls, floating in the blue waters in the Maldives, swimming in the Aegean sea and sipping wine at an underwater winery in Croatia. I don’t feel the stress of the career changes that sometimes felt like self-orchestrated whiplash, instead I look around me in wonder as to how I went from starting university in a course I had no clue how I would practise, moving along a seemingly disjointed path that now makes total sense, to making supply chain decisions that affect hundreds of millions of people around the world. I don’t remember in excruciating detail the stress of relocating and packing bags, but I see in my son’s eyes the confidence, adaptability and ease that has come with living in 4 continents in 8 years (no more relocation for a while, I’ve promised. Please hold me accountable). I can always count on the fulfilment that comes with planting my feet on the ground in a place I’ve always wanted to be. So it doesn’t matter that I’ve now been to “only” 36 countries even if for a minute there I really wanted to have done 40 at 40! Because at age 20, that number was 1, so you know, perspective! Someone asked me recently what makes it so easy for me to enjoy my life. She said something about the ease with which I oscillate between having the time of my life, then living an almost mundane routine. She said ‘it can’t be that simple! One minute you’re clinking glasses at a place I’ve always wanted to go, the next minute, you’re posting school lunch boxes on your instagram stories’. Oh but it is!

I don’t need to think too deep or look too far back though (okay 40 years is a bit far back), to recognise what a miracle my life has been. Because I wasn’t even expected to be here! No one planned for me but God. My parents definitely did not bargain, plan or wish for an 8th child! After beating the IUD odds and coming into this world unscathed, I apparently almost lost my life on day 9, only saved by what my mum has constantly described as a miracle, something involving a phone that was out-of-order for weeks that only worked at the exact moment when they needed to call the doctor who saved me. On paper, I wasn’t even supposed to ‘bear fruit’ but I beat the fertility odds too. From being told I couldn’t conceive naturally because I did not ovulate to having 4 pregnancies and 2 delicious babies. Yes, the miscarriages hurt, but it’s such a dull ache now. PCOS is still a struggle, but in today’s context, it’s just another part of that mundane routine I talked about. The high in that pendulum though, is looking at my boys and realising that a brand new generation has been blessed out of the unplanned and unexpected. That’s how I balance out the supplements, monthly back-breaking cramps and crazy hormonal issues.

So it really is simple. I’m here, and being here means living in the routine, but stealing moments of pure joy. It means grabbing my happiness when it’s blowing past and like colourful bubbles from my kids’ old toys, spreading that to people around me, if only for a moment of levity and a reckless smile. Sidebar…. those beautiful bubbles come from soap. Does soap scream beauty and whimsical? Isn’t it just a mundane thing we use in the most grunt-inducing routines? But check out what it becomes when it goes in a bubble machine, given a bit of air and let outside of its casing! You get it? Okay, let’s look forward now… So I might probably never address a crowd for the purpose of passing joy around but I will share it in my personal relationships. I will be earnest and honest about how I make sense of these seemingly random circumstances that have led to me sitting here sipping this drink and feeling loved. I will look into my husband’s eyes, both in mischief and in soberness but always in love, and constantly offer my mantra to him. The one that sings when I recognise what a match we are, how we somehow (almost freakishly) are aligned on the big things despite differing like day and night in personality; how he has been the most unwavering springboard, pillow and rock (yes, at the same time) in the last decade and a half without whom I would have been writing a completely different tale today, if at all I could even find the inspiration and confidence to use my words. The guy whose stoic strength of character has literally carried me on its back so many times, I won’t even try to count; whose dreams match mine as perfectly as one of my 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzles (hint hint… birthday present… cough cough) And in keeping with the rest of my tale, the deep and wide kindness of our all-knowing God! How beautifully random it is that his path somehow connected and intertwined with mine one cloudy day in Port Harcourt, and how that simple introduction by a mutual friend completely changed the course of this story.

So here’s to this girl… The one who didn’t know who she was or wanted to be in her 1st decade, who started her second decade being thrown into the pressure cooker of Nigerian boarding school and coming out semi-cooked anyway…. Who ended that decade after barely surviving adolescence, failed independence and peer pressure but still holding tight to a dormant confidence planted and nurtured by her amazing family where she never felt ‘unwanted’…… Who in her 3rd decade somehow walked into excellence - academic, professional, big relationship decisions, marriage and motherhood (eep!) while if we’re being honest, kept looking behind her and wondering (‘me? are you sure?’) but also realising that this was a decade of evidence. Outer evidence of the inner worth and quiet confidence that had been planted in that very first decade. At the end of the third decade it was clear what I was being built to withstand. But then came the fourth decade, with even more big changes. And I know everyone says the latest decade is their most fun so far, but isn’t that the dream? Oh and it was for me! Big career and geographical changes (multiple!), probably my first real experience of what being on a faith journey means (still navigating), the testing of that confidence I thought had bloomed (spoiler alert, it’s looking like my dutch language exam so far…. expect flying colours!)

In many ways, I’m still the girl in each decade. I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up, I’m still clutching a bit of that confidence and self-assuredness tight to my chest, still walking in excellence because I haven’t been convinced anything else will do, and I’m still open to big changes because they’ve always led me to wider horizons. Like Mindy Kaling said on a podcast recently, (paraphrased) I have to be ‘chronically unconfident’ to still feel like an imposter about the things I’ve mastered for years. So while sometimes, I’m still looking back and asking the same stupid question (‘me? are you sure?’), this time I’m not waiting for an answer or for anyone’s confirmation. I’m catching myself mid-question, remembering who I am, nodding in acknowledgment of all the forces behind and within me, and turning back to business.