2+7 = 9.

The number nine has been playing on my mind since the first playful rays of warmth peeked through thick grey summer clouds this year. It has been in my dreams as I sleep, in my head as I click-clack away at my desk. Two plus seven equals nine. And nine is a number that holds a lot of significance to me. Usually, birthdays are painstakingly important for me because I don’t take a single day I’m alive for granted. Every breath that bellows through my lungs, every synchronised beat my heart makes, every flutter as my eyes open and close, drinking in the world around me, it is all so beautiful, so perfect, so wonderful. 

Twenty-six was a year of exponential growth, usually, in my younger years, I would have said ‘Oh! 26 was a hard year!’ But I don’t think it was ‘hard’, it was a testing year for sure, but it was everything I absolutely needed to be where I am right now. From my post-university blues to dealing with difficult situations, it was all necessary for the season I was in, and if I’m to highlight just one thing I learned this year, it’s to really ‘live’ in the season you’re in. Embracing every single millisecond of that season, working with the tide instead of fighting against it. I worked solidly in the darkness of postgraduate depression, shooting off applications, meeting up with others who were struggling with life’s blows, breathing encouragement into their lives as a way to deal with the sticky oil slick demons clinging to my back, cackling, whispering untruths into my ears, waiting for me to crack. But the crack never quite came, instead, I sought help, buried myself in the word and rested in the peace of Gods perfect timing. I look back and I squeal with joy at all I overcame and now at twenty-seven, I’m allowing myself to bask in the sparkling lushness of life. 

As a seasoned ‘worrier’ complete with hand-wringing, sleepless nights, and a fearful demeanour, I have had to work dutifully on finding ways to cast off the stained, dark and dusty blanket of ‘what if…’ and carefully drape the glittering, bright cape of ‘even if…’.  Across my shoulders each and every morning.

My early twenties were (Excuse the architectural language) me setting the heavy rough foundations of what is to be. Concrete blocks that grazed my hands leaving thin trails of blood over the pale grey, dust-covered jeans, beads of perspiration erupting on my forehead and my eyes prickling with tiredness. I wanted to give up during this period, but I didn’t and I urge all of you in the foundation building period of your lives to keep toiling, keep building, keep going. I look at the foundations I’ve laid and I can finally wipe the salt-stained trails from my face, look up to the sky and smile, a smile that I feel from the tips of my toes all the way up to the top of my head. The sun has come out again, and it’s time to re-consult my floor plans. The foundations have been completed, but here comes the real challenge. Am I ready for it? Not solely on my strength, but his.

Two + Seven = Nine.

The number of divine completeness and new beginnings.

Here’s to twenty-seven.

What I Wore….

Dress c/o & Other Stories | Heels – Next (old) | Bag c/o Boden (old)

[Photograhy by Yossy Akinsanya]

xo