A Toast To The Love of My Life.

Dear reader, let me start at the beginning.

In primary school (read "elementary school" if you're American), I was picked on a lot for being as the teachers called me "too nosy". In secondary school (read "high school"), I was again picked on by teachers and boys in my grade for being "too talkative", "too interested in gist and gossip".

Apparently, according to whatever societal code of conducts my teachers and bullies lived by, boys weren't allowed to be talkative. Boys didn't engage in gossip or small talk or listened to rumors or leaned in when the story got good. The role of the man according to their laws was to be quiet, uninterested in "petty gossip", calm, cool, collected.

I was NOT calm, cool, collected. And like any young boy at that age, I didn't yet have the full ability to completely disregard bad advice and embrace the person I was. I tried to change.

Lord knows I tried.

I tried to remove myself from conversations right when it was getting good. I tried to say "No, I'm not interested in hearing that" when one of my friends said "Jide, I have gist."

I tried. I tried and I failed.

Never once did the sentence "No, I'm not interested in hearing that" escape my mouth, not once did I leave the conversation right when it was getting good.

And I struggled with that. For the longest time, it was one of the banes of my existence. I wanted to become the idea of the brooding man I saw on television, the man who only said "yes", "no", and "can we talk about this later, the game is on" when someone begun talking to them.

But I was not that man. I was the man who loved conflict, drama, the gist, the ups, the down, the plot twist at the end. I was a man who loved the story, who still loves the story.

A quote I saw online by a man named Anthony Jones really speaks to me. It says:

Most of what I did growing up wasn't wrong, they were just me being me, but I wouldn't have know that.

Because the way I was treated, the way I was punished, looked at, the names I was called. It was unnecessary for a boy who only wanted to hear what was actually going on between Chinaza and Segun.

Over time, and by that I do mean much later in my life, I came to finally accept the fact that I am a boy who just LOVES STORY. I love a good story. If that be good gossip, gist, a good book, a movie, a podcast...nothing makes my day better than a good story.

Story is the love of my life!

And I know that sounds like an extreme statement to say but that is the truth for me. A perfect day for me is talking to my friends or family or hearing/reading/watching something good and it's because of the story.

When I'm going through good times, a good story makes my smile all the more broad. When I'm going through bad times, story is there to cheer me up and tell me about others who have gone through the same things I'm going through and how they were able to overcome it.

Furthermore and this is going to sound weird - but I embrace drama and the good and bad in my life because I know that with everything that happens to me, there is a new story added to my back pocket - a real life experience I can use as a touchstone to make every emotion I write about in my own work stronger, as well as a frame of reference that can allow me see a Taylor Swift music video and go "Yeah, I've been there too Tay Tay".

Story is my favorite thing in this world and I am so so sooo thankful for the world we live in today that has digitized story so much so that it is accessible to us now via smartphones, laptops, and Kindle devices anytime we want it.

So, here's a toast to what has given me my best of friends, to what has kept me company during cold nights, to what has gotten me through long waits at the airport and kept me sane through a whole pandemic. Here's to what I am proud to now write as a full-time job.

This is to you, story, and all the people who have brought you to me this year - Netflix, Hulu, Apple Podcasts, Amazon, HBO, Barnes & Noble, VOCAL.

You are the real MVP and you're the best partner I could ever ask for. This one's for you Story. I love you.

Cheers!