A life on the water had taught me when to let go – and what was worth holding on to . . .
BY CHIOMA OKEREKE
In our community, we learn how to catch fish at a young age. The trick is to keep tension on the line. Your target can easily escape or wriggle off the hook if the line goes too slack. We’re taught early on to recognise the moment the prize is ready.
I’d already crossed from Adogbo to Better Life Market twice that day to sell my basket of fish, so I was tired. On my journey back, my eyelids began to droop on the trip across the lagoon. I felt my torso weaving to the steady rhythm of the black waves underneath the canoe containing two other women who’d also finished their day’s trade and the young boy piloting our vessel for a small fee.
Gripping my basket with my feet, I noticed and dismissed the chipped nail polish that I’d been too lazy to redo.
My shoulders softened as the sun gently lulled me to sleep with its steady pressure on my back and I surrendered, letting the soundtrack of the women’s conversation penetrate the blurry mountains forming in my dreams.
“Don’t splash me, please!”
“Hold yourself well, Auntie, and the boat won’t rock –” “What are you speeding for? I said carry me home, not my dead body!”
One woman fussed noisily as the boat lurched to the left and my body shifted automatically.
The lagoon isn’t for everyone, but this water is in my blood. My parents and their parents before them could tell you how the ironwood shacks on the waterfront predated most of the now bustling megacity. They remember when the waves could deliver your reflection like a looking glass, instead of the charcoal ink we drift through nowadays that’s clotted with rubbish.
Driftwood, abandoned tyres, endless plastic. The trash pulled in from shipping lanes circling us like exotic aquatic life.
These days, the lagoon is a warm mouth that swallows everything whole.
But back to the fish. Disrupter of my dreams and transformer of my fate.
The lagoon’s lullaby had almost ensnared me when I felt something land in my lap. The surprise contact forced my eyes open as a cold but firm, wet force flapped against my bare legs that closed on reflex to cradle the fish that had fallen just shy of my lappa.
I’d inched my skirt over my thighs to make the ride inside the canoe more comfortable. Flinging the fish off my flesh, I screamed, alarming the canoe’s other occupants.
They on
