Homegoing

Where do I come from?

Who do I come from?

Who am I?

Why am I?

These are some of the questions that haunt me as I grow up as a Black person in the U.S. 

For as long as I can remember, I’ve felt this gaping hole in my gut. It’s the Ocean, that unbridgeable distance, that keeps me disconnected from my deepest self. 

It’s the overwhelming, un-holdable fear that I can never know the stories of my direct ancestors. That I can’t know the generations of scars and strengths that make my life possible.

And in that fear, and grief, and desperation, I opened up Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi.  In return, Homegoing opened up the Door of Return for me.

Homegoing is a story of loss, legacy, more loss, healing, and the unbreakable bonds that connect us through space and time.

Reading Homegoing felt like unwrapping gifts that I didn’t know I needed: gratitude for my ancestors, whoever they were, humility, and trust in the truth that only stories can offer. 

I didn’t even know that it was possible to tell the story of a single family, separated yet unified over seas and centuries, the way Gyasi does in this book. 

This one possibility of a family not only blew my mind away to all of the beautiful possibilities of our pasts, but to all of our futures as well.

There’s so much that I could say about this book that I’m still figuring out after reading it months ago. What I know for sure for now though is that this is art that I will return to for a long time.

Shout out to my mom for recommending this book to me like five years ago. She ahead of the game.