I believe I Can Fly
Chronicles of Adwoa — Part 1
There comes a time in every girl’s life when she stares at her reflection, sighs deeply, and says to herself, “Honestly, I was not meant for this life.”
This is the story of Adwoa, a 20-something-year-old Ghanaian girl.
Adwoa believes she’s destined for greatness, but not your regular career-driven, small girl with big God, corporate ladder climbing boss-babe, no, no, no. She genuinely thinks she’s supposed to grow wings. Actual feathered aerodynamically functional wings.
It all started one Thursday evening after she listened to Burna Boy’s “23”, R.Kelly's “I Believe I Can Fly” and read one too many Pinterest motivation quotes. “I am meant to soar,” she whispered dramatically with her arms spread in front of her mirror. “Hey madam, you can’t even climb the stairs without panting. How exactly will you fly? ”Her inner voice of reason tried to drag her back to reality.
Get Mymoir’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
But Adwoa was undeterred. She Googled ‘how to manifest wings’ and even started sleeping on her stomach to give her back muscles room to expand and maybe get a flat tummy while at it, thinking she could kill two birds with one stone. Science was not on her side but delusion definitely was.
One Saturday afternoon, after another round of overthinking life her love life, career, purpose, the cost of banku and tilapia in Accra, Adwoa decided enough was enough! She climbed onto her rooftop with two pieces of white bedsheet strapped to her arms. “It’s today or never,” she declared. The neighborhood kids gathered below, chanting, “Fly, aunty, fly!”
She jumped, but didn’t fly.
Adwoa landed right on her bum and stayed there for two hours, contemplating her existence.
Later, her aunties dragged her into their house and scolded her for disgracing the family name. Afterwards, Adwoa quietly slipped back to her room, stood in front of the same mirror where she convinced herself she could fly and sighed.
“They just don’t understand my spiritual transformation, or perhaps I wasn’t meant to grow wings. Maybe I’m just meant to rise (metaphorically)”.
But knowing Adwoa, she’ll probably try again next week. After all, delusion is just passion with extra confidence.
