Writing with Juliet Iwelunmor

5 years later, our hair is slowly greying, bones are still wide, and life is running by without a care. From out the dark, at the beginning of the pandemic, words started to emerge from deep within as we trembled through the world. At first, they were concerned about health care workers, all those literally on the frontlines while we stood on the sidelines. Then they explored all the times we wandered through forest parks. At least the air is clean, lighter and less demanding there. And so we walked, through the park with the ones entrusted to our care. The one we named after our fathers is almost 13 now. Back then, as the pandemic made us drunk with life, she was 9. Now the best of us is growing taller and taller. Then there is the one that God brought to our lives. He is still the reason we look always on the bright side. Then the one named after God isn’t afraid of anything and is as God is, only short, and thin, but bright as a flame. Then there is the one we give back to God always. He laid in the womb, waiting in silence, without speaking, without letting out a sigh, until the faithful July day of his arrival. He is still the one we give back always. Still the one who loves as loves is, just as the magic of connections that begins in the womb. 5 years later, these words are trying, hoping, allowing you to see, as you read, how words, singular or plural, involving the life we hold with care, can sprout like blossoms on a spring day. To watch life continue, past a pandemic, past 5 years of change, is a gift that requires we hold on to the memories, even if through the unprecedented times we experienced. For all time is time and so to life is life and so to memories worth telling again and again.