exits

To lose a mother — adults well into their 50s become toddlers again. For this thought and fear that existed for years as you grew and they grew is now real. It happened, and to most, it only happens enough times to count on one hand; a lot of times, just a finger.

My grandma, Ayeeyo Waris, allahu naaxariisto (may God have mercy on her soul), was the matriarch of my family. She was a mother to many, a mother for those who lost their mothers before that fear could even nurture in themselves. She had an impeccable sense of humor that she carried until her last moments — her roasts a blessing, comic laureate. She left in her sleep, surrounded by generations, people who wouldn’t be here without her. No greater legacy or better way to go — her death, a reminder of our life.

It happens to everyone — death. The only guarantee in life. Yet still, the thought makes me still. Ayeeyo Waris knew this, and so does my mother — she’s been reminding me since childhood. Perhaps that is her way of making sense of her own fear. It happened this weekend, and no amount of preparation arms you against the pain, protects you from the grief. When you enter this world, your exit is the only guarantee. Our world today paints this rhetoric “pessimistic,” but it is only the truth. Many exits aren’t fair, most exits will cause pain some way or another. We pray for a peaceful exit, an exit in sleep, an exit at ease. We spend our whole lives accepting this exit — acceptance in the form of denial, of confusion, of prayer, of avoidance, of transformation. Exits of those around us remind us of our own, or of those closest to us. It could be any of us, after all.

But you’re still here. They’re still here. Only you know who “they” are. And while exits are unpredictable and elusive, life is power. Life means you’re still here. They’re still here. And while others are not anymore, while others have made their own exits, however peaceful or unjust it could have been, it is life that allows us to keep moving — to make change in our personal and greater world. Life allows us to still be here. To be still and to be here.

If you woke up today, may you live each day inching closer to peace with your exit. And for those that made their exit, either today, or last week, or last year, I pray for you with the living breath you no longer have. Breath, the currency of life. Life, the gift from above.

Thank you, Ayeeyo.