An Invitation

Destinations, I’m learning, ain’t necessarily the best part of the journey. There is so much to be gained on the way, the path so potentially wealthy.

This might could be why I love to walk. Wherever. Anytime. My aunt Precious’ house. Church Ave. from Utica to Flatbush with my grandmother. Washington Heights to Brooklyn. Along the Layou River, Dois de Julho to Campo Grande, Havana Vieja, or King’s Way Market. It just feels natural. Good-like. You know?

So it is in keeping with this that I ask you to walk with me.

5 months ago, I arrived in Brazil with the intentions of maintaining a weekly blog for the 6-month duration of my stay in the country. All right, now I admit that in practice intentions are worth very little. But things happen. And this is the first entry. It comes on the first day of my last month here. Ya’ll still willing to get down?

Really, the reason I’m soliciting your company is more personal than anything else: my protracted struggle to negotiate that transparent line between being alone and being lonely…(or maybe it’s just my attempt to escape it altogether? Me and my self-deception again!). But it is also my acknowledgement that in order to discover our generation’s mission from the relative obscurity Fanon told us about, we must contend with and make sense of the theme and role of migration/movement that drenches our history and present. Where you headed to? Where you coming from? And what you learn on the way?

Then perhaps more than anything else, this is an invitation. True goodness is never individual. The places I go. The people I meet. The conversations I have. The inspiration I receive. None of it belongs to me alone. They’re ours.

So, if you will, walk with me. Let me share. We got work to do.

-Amari