COLD FALLS

by ene ijato - October 15, 2018

Baby its cold outside.

The sometimes-chilly air of October, an accompaniment to the diminishing slamming silver raindrops ploughing the loose earth. A beckoning of Sahara winds with its cold dry air, plucking slender leaves off the neem trees and the bougainvillea, and soon to wrap around us with its ashen hue like a second skin.

Living in northern Nigeria has its perks. Growing up with the changing seasons that sometimes stop midway and morph into something else. Like between the rainy season and the dry season, the scorching heat that roasts human skin, also found again after February’s harmattan and before the rains come by April. After spending so much years growing up and living in northern Nigeria, it is a surprise that I still anticipate the seasons with a small sense of trepidation. With conversations, the likes of,

“The harmattan of three years ago, was brutally cold, I hope this year’s harmattan would be just as cold. Where the freezing air stops at 3.00pm, peeking the sun out of layers of clouds for a brief moment and resuming its bone chilling duties as quickly as 5.00pm. we need cold like that again.”

I often daydream of living in New York, sitting on a bench in an open park by a rotunda, feet sunk into ankle deep snow. Or journeying to the Himalayas, breathing in cold air through my nostrils, and filling my lungs with the chill. I love the cold.

I love that it allows me to layer up, and wear multiple clothing at the same time without looking outrageously bizarre in Nigeria. I love the more cups of steaming tea slurped by a burnt tongue, with engulfing books to keep company. I love the smell of memories laced in the cold air, of old wells and burning firewood.

I love when cold falls because it brings with it so much, in so little a time, and it makes me want to be more of myself, and less of who I am supposed to be.