Confessional

Love in the Margins

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Some of the most formative love stories of my life didn’t end in relationships. They didn’t even begin in the way stories are supposed to. No grand gestures. No well-lit first dates. Just quiet connections that existed… on the edges.

The guy who always studied with me for our classes and did joint assignments, even though we never once called it a date. The friend who made me playlists but never said the words I needed. In fact, this guy made me laugh because he could never remember when we met and yet for me, it was one of the most significant events – I felt so much for him when we were talking… joke was, for him, it was just another great conversation (!).

So many tender moments and so many left on the way. There was one guy who very quickly, after an equally brief liaison, stopped talking to me. By then, I hadn’t wisened up to college guys and their ways. He just moved on and never looked back—but knowing him sure taught me how to spot guys like him from a mile away. 

There was one with whom we had an instant connection on a flight from North Carolina to New York. We sat there looking at each other. Our shoulders moving ever so much closer. He had these beautiful eyes and it felt like it could be something. He invited me to walk Central Park with him. But before I could answer, we remembered he was engaged.

There is another stereotype I have encountered one too many a time: the almost-lover who said, “Let me get you home,” after a night out but could never quite make a move when we got to my house.

Love in the margins is tricky. It doesn’t ask for much. It thrives on eye contact that lingers half a second too long. On inside jokes. On the careful way someone says your name. It rarely announces – or pronounces – itself. But it leaves shadowy feelings. Most of the time, these comment balloons type of love, just has enough room for longing and not much else.

It took me a while to understand this kind of love. I think it took me far too long to see that some loves are not meant to unfold. They are, instead, meant to reveal. To show you what matters to you. What doesn’t. Where your boundaries are. Where your softness begins. And sometimes just to remind you that you are alive. Breathing.

These “love in the margins” people are never for a chapter in my story. They are present in memories and only ever remembered in nostalgia, or in the demands of every love scene that comes long after they are gone.

I don’t write about them often. Mostly because I don’t want to overinflate what wasn’t. But also because I know that love can be true without being permanent. That not all loves have a destination… sometimes they’re like matching in place. Love in the margins. I think this is possibly where the most human parts of love reside – not so much in declarations, but so clear in the “it could have been.” 

That One Bad Review

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There’s a particular kind of hurt that comes from being misunderstood in public. Not criticized. Misunderstood.

I once got a review for one of my books—buried deep in a blog I hadn’t even known existed until someone sent me the link. And let me just say: I don’t go looking for reviews. But when you hear the words “I found someone talking about your work,” you click. Of course you do.

At first, I was okay. Curious. Even nodding at some of their points. Yes, there were typos. Yes, the structure was a little jagged. I could own that.

But then came the sentence that made my throat tighten:

“1.5 out of 5.”

And suddenly, it didn’t matter that they said I had a strong sense of place. It didn’t matter that they mentioned potential. I could feel my lungs get smaller in my chest. My stomach flipped. It was like someone had looked at the whole of me and said, “pass.”

What hurt wasn’t the rating. It was the finality of it. Like I’d been scored as a person, not just as a writer. Like the sum of years spent collecting ideas, sitting through doubt, pushing past paralysis—could be wrapped up in a number and dismissed.

That review made me question everything.

Why I write.

If I’m any good.

Whether I’m wasting everyone’s time—including my own.

I cried a little. Not dramatically. Just quietly. Like something tender had been poked one too many times.

And then—I don’t know—I remembered that, much like friendships, the relationships a writer has with her readership is deeply personal. I think I needed to embrace the fact that as a writer I may not be for everyone. In fact, it felt like you know creating any form of art is a journey of sorts. Sometimes, even good art shows up before it’s ready. Or before the reader is ready. Or maybe before the writer is ready.

I think I was successful in consoling myself. So, I keep going. With typos. With imperfect plots. With the kind of writing that might earn me another 1.5 somewhere down the road. Because I also know the kind of writing that earns a message like, “I didn’t know anyone else felt this way.” 

And true… now that I am sitting here, remembering someone who asked me how I am able to write this and capture something so relatable to them. And for that kind of connection, I’ll risk another review.

Where I’m From

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Lately, I’ve been thinking about where I’m from.

Not in the way people mean when they ask at a networking event, or in the way passport stamps try to explain you. I mean the places that shaped the inside of me. The places that made me laugh a little differently, sit a little quieter, learn the timing of pauses between stories.

I’m from the smell of ironed uniforms on Monday mornings and shoes polished sparkling and shiny black with Kiwi shoe shine.

From porridge that tastes slightly burnt but still feels like home. And bread spread with blueband and then panfried – like French toast but without the eggs.

From relatives who were my first friends and who are so many that every get together is spent answering the same question like 15 times… and it feels like home to echo a response and be received each time with job. And relatives who can tolerate you telling the same stories every year—always louder, always funnier—with details that change depending on who is listening. 

From cousins who know what it is to play in an Ikumbi and come out covered in the white residue of shackled maize that has been stored to cook Githeri later in the year. 

I’m from long silences during car rides.

From knowing how to read moods by how people stirred their tea. Or gave you a side eye. Or held one orange colored Bata slipper. Heck even a mwiko.

I’m from shared worn out shoes, and dresses, and shirts, and hair clips… and the quiet dignity of reuse. From generosity without ceremony. From people who shared and showed up. From afternoons where the electricity went out, and someone started singing in the dark.

There are parts of me that were shaped not by big events, but by small repetitions. The way a plastic chair creaks under your weight during a long story. The rhythm of a name answered three different ways depending on who’s calling it. The softness of my mother’s voice when she prays for us—not performatively, but from somewhere deep inside her chest. And loudly on Saturday morning which was so annoying when you’re trying to sleep!

I’m also from people who often said things that made me cry at night because their honesty was sometimes cruel. From whispered tales shared in phone calls and catchups and today, from WhatsApp messages. From family gatherings that always wanted to ask if I should join the gym and I fought the urge to punch people in the face. From questions about love and marriage – and having no answer to give over and over again. From women who never said I love you but insisted on singing a chorus after a family gathering and saying a prayer of protection and journey mercies. 

I’m still from those things. Even when I live elsewhere. Even when I sound different. Even when I write in a voice that someone might call “neutral.” Even when I silently withdraw from gatherings that seem a bit more hostile than I would like but still strike a chord of longing inside me.

I carry these people, moments, conversations, tears, and everything else in my silences. In the way I pace a paragraph. In the way I don’t always finish a thought.

Where I’m from isn’t just a location. It’s a cadence. A palette. A way of remembering.

What they don’t see

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There’s something no one tells you about being perceived as “strong”: it’s exhausting.

People see what you offer them. The output. The curated energy. The smiles, the wit, the competence. And if you’re really good at performing the role, they rarely ask how you’re doing. They just assume you’re doing fine. Thriving, even.

What they don’t see is the fight beneath the stillness.

The pep talks before you show up.

The tears that come after the phone call ends.

The way your chest tightens before you click “send.”

The mornings you sit at the edge of your bed, willing yourself to just… start.

They don’t see the rituals that keep you upright.

The playlist that summons your voice back.

The coffee you reheat three times before it ever reaches your mouth.

The voice notes you record and delete. Then record again.

I’m learning that part of the ache comes from being invisible in plain sight. And it’s not because people are careless. Sometimes, we become very good at hiding—at being functional, charismatic, articulate—while slowly eroding from the inside out.

There have been days I’ve performed confidence while feeling like a fogged mirror. Present but unclear.

There have been seasons I’ve ghosted people, not because I didn’t love them, but because I was afraid they’d ask questions I didn’t have answers for.

And there have been long stretches when I’ve written nothing, not because I had no ideas, but because I couldn’t face what those ideas might reveal about me.

So if you’re someone who seems “fine” to others but feels like you’re barely holding the seams together—this is for you.

I see you.

And I’m trying to see myself too.

The Day I Almost Quit Writing

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So, there was a day—not too long ago—when I genuinely considered quitting writing. Like, for real. Not the dramatic “I’ll never do this again!” kind of moment, but the quiet, heavy kind. The kind that settles into your bones. The kind you don’t say out loud, because saying it would make it true.

I had opened my laptop and stared at the screen for a solid hour. Typed a few words. Deleted them. Typed something else. Deleted that too. Then I just sat there, arms crossed, blinking into the void of the blinking cursor. That thing is a menace, by the way. Judgy little stick flashing at you like, “You good, sis?”

I wasn’t.

That day, I felt like I had nothing left to say. Or rather, I had things to say but didn’t trust myself to say them well. That’s the difference. It’s not the blank page that scares me—it’s the fear of not doing justice to the thing I care about. The story I want to tell. The person I want to honour. The truth I’m not sure I can shape without softening it too much… or slicing too deep.

So yeah. I almost quit. Not in a meltdown way. Just… quietly. Neatly. I thought maybe I could bow out gracefully, stop trying, and redirect all that creative energy into something else. Something less… exposing.

But then, something unexpected happened.

I got a voice note from a friend. She was laughing about a line I’d written in something ages ago. It was a throwaway line—nothing special. But it stayed with her. And in that moment, I remembered what writing can do. Not in the grand, earth-shifting sense. But in the small ways. A sentence that stays. A line that lets someone exhale. A story that makes someone feel a little less weird, a little more seen.

That was enough to keep me from quitting.

Barely, but still.

So I didn’t write anything amazing that day. I didn’t suddenly get a brilliant idea or complete a half-done draft. I just showed up again the next morning. And the one after that. And I started learning that the practice of writing—especially on the days when it feels pointless—is what makes you a writer.

Not the accolades. Not the perfect sentence. Not even the finished work.

Just the showing up.

And so here I am, still showing up. Still not always knowing what I’m doing. Still hoping that something I write—maybe even this—will land where it needs to.

Returning to the Page

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Yesterday night, I couldn’t sleep. That’s nothing new—middle age things. That’s right. I am now officially middle-aged. Or at least somewhat close. I keep thinking maybe, because of human advancement, we’ll be living until at least 120 years. In which case, I am nowhere near a midlife anything. But still.

Lately, I’ve been feeling a restlessness that no scroll, no conversation, no Netflix binge can still. Even during the day. And when I’m really quiet, I can hear the itch to pick up my journal and write. At night, the urge is stronger. During the day, some voices are louder…

“What if you wrote again, Ema?”

I usually shake my head in dismal response. Because… FEAR. I don’t know how to answer that question.

Whereas the romantic in me thinks writing again would feel like returning to a friend I once loved, my inner child remains unsure if that friend even wants to speak to me. And so… I’m paralyzed.

(Ok. Pause. Now that I think of it, there’s a friend of mine who isn’t speaking to me and—well—this is exactly how I feel about that too. I’ll double-click on that later.)

I’ve written before about writer’s block, but I recently unlocked a new layer of hell: creative paralysis.

For a long time—say, about four years—I haven’t really been writing. At least not in the way a serious writer should. Part of it was life doing what it does. The other part? Just a lot of noise. The kind of noise that drowns out any flicker of humor, tragedy, or inspiration that could drive a story.

I think I lost touch with my inner narrator—the one who connects to the characters and listens to their stories, then reaches out to me so I can spin moments into metaphor and silence into sensation. Losing her was terrifying. Life got so loud in my head that I couldn’t hear myself. And losing that connection to story made me imagine a dead muse in a castle somewhere—or at the very least, passed out.

As I write this now, I think the reason I couldn’t write wasn’t that I had nothing to say. I stopped because I didn’t know how to say what I needed to say without breaking.

Man, I really admire people who can channel sadness into writing. For me, grief choked out every bit of light. I felt like there was nothing left to connect me to my creative core.

But in the last few months, I’ve kind of started returning to myself. I think the insomnia and the urge to write are some forms of muscle memory. The words have started to return—not in a rush, but in fragments. What excites me is that these half-formed thoughts come while I’m showering or doing life things. When I’m driving. When I take slow walks on the beach.

It feels like I’m reconciling with my inner story concierge. Maybe I can start trusting that the world of story can hold me again.

I know this isn’t a triumphant return. It’s not a grand announcement either. I left so many projects hanging when I went on freeze, so there’s no shiny new thing to plug. But I do feel like there’s plenty inside me that’s aching to be heard.

So, I’m here. Once a week. For the rest of the year.

Not to impress.

Not to perform.

Just to tell the truth, as best I can, in the moment I’m in.

I’m back.

And I’m beginning again.

Nefelibata

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A friend sent me a really beautiful picture with a word that I am not even sure I can pronounce. The word – Nefelibata – describes a dreamy individual who dances to their own tune. I jokingly asked my friend if that was me. She surprised me when she said yes. I giggled, actually. Mostly because on my best day I would honestly wish I was this person.

I have written before that I think the writer version of me is my best self. I feel that I was built to be a writer but I just didn’t know. And so, my life has taken me down roads that leave me writer-adjacent with deep longing to truly live a writer’s life. I honestly think that if I had chosen the writing track, my life would have been totally different. In some ways, I hold a belief that there is a whole life that awaits me on the other side of embracing my Nefelibata-ness.

What remains astonishing to me is that even after all this time and after all those affirmations from the interwebs, the novelty of walking the road less traveled is more a marvel rather than a lived experience. What is this courage that I (maybe you, we?) need to really live? Maybe it’s not too late to try and be Nefelibata?

Rethinking Ema

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So when I first started this blog, I wanted to have a way of connecting myself as an author to my future audience. In my mind, I was going to be writing and publishing many many books every year. My dream was that I would be sensational and lots of people would want to know me… hehehe… and so my blog became performative in some sense. When I read these posts, I find only snippets of myself and wonder who this person was that wrote these words. They sound like they could be my words but they also give me a sense of holding back. Some posts are quite raw – showing my insides and make me cringe ever so slightly. Being witness to your past pain is quite a jarring experience. Being witnessed to a version that you have evolved from makes you introspect a bit more… So I guess in all this, I have a question – what is true now? What remains true? What is the essence of Ema?

I think I still want to write. I continue to write. I have some great days of discipline and some not so great days. I am surer of the voice in which I write. I am humble in my pursuit of this craft. This is truly a gift that flows its own course — to be subject to its whims is quite the lesson I sometimes need — being too sure of oneself has some downsides. I have less doubt and this makes writing that much easier. There are still stories inside me that are bursting to be told. I will try my best to honor this call. This is my greatest dream and it to be a prolific writer will be my greatest achievement.

What does this mean for Ema? The name lives on, I guess. I will continue to write and Ema will continue to publish. What I hope to create is a world that feels authentic to me – the storyteller me – you know, which is a small part of the other parts that make me, me!

Re-awakening

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It’s been close to a year since I posted anything on this beautiful website. This year has been one of the hardest ones yet. I lost my writing mojo and lost my darling Father. It’s been grueling. Some days I know who I am and some days I am lost. The words to express the grief are just beneath the surface on my pain — but it’s so very hard to reach myself. And so I have been in a holding pattern.

I had a conversation with my brother yesterday. And I encouraged him about managing the sadness we feel by setting a minimum number of activities for each day. Right after Daddy died, I started with one activity minimum. I had to shower. And even then, showering was often not taking a real shower. It was hard. And then with time, I raised my minimum to three activities per day of which taking a real shower was not negotiable. You see, in the past, when I have battled depressive feelings, taking a shower has been so hard. So I knew if there’s one thing I should deal with decisively, it is showering. I leave the day open for two major activities that may include work or just managing life as an adult.

I feel like I am ready to make an upgrade to five activities per day. Showering properly is one of them and now, exercise is another. I have to put in at least 30 minutes per day. I think I will still leave two major activities open and for the last slot, I have to get the writing in.

Writing keeps me balanced and keeps me sane. It puzzles me when I am unable to write. I can’t tell if it is a sign of the state of my inner being or if it is a consequence of my true state of mind. I suppose it doesn’t quite matter. I need to do better because it really does make me feel better.

I guess my fifth commitment is about balance in the end. Writing gives me balance. And so I will write.

Christmas, Writing, and this year

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It’s been so long since I wrote anything. It’s been really difficult to get into the space where I connect with inspiration to write and express and leave my heart on paper.

Writing is mostly cathartic but also an extension of who I am. This year has tried me in the deepest way and pushed me to be so much more than I ever thought I could be.

I am so grateful.

So many people had it way harder than I did. I suppose if finding inspiration to do this thing that I desire so much is my only difficulty then I am so fortunate. So yeah… I am grateful.

Gratitude is such a funny thing. It is defined both by what we say and what we hide… this post hides a lot too… even so, at its simplest, it conveys that there was much that was lost by so many. Inspiration, for me, and perhaps time… time that mostly shifted in a blur… and now it is Christmas.

I suppose I will be bleeding on this here keyboard because I am back. And with so much story.