At 18, I thought I’d figured myself out.

Away from the norms, my home, the grey, navy and white uniform; I felt free to find my own form in a sea of tie-dye and blonde dreadlocks.

I would become a ‘creative’ – And, so I created.

Mimicking the steps, sounds and actions of those who had already had space to explore beyond the black and white of wrong and right. I placed those who had roamed the grey area of ‘maybe right, possibly wrong’ on a pedestal that may have been right, but probably very wrong.

I ditched the black t-shirt and jeans and donned the colourful uniform of Bristol’s roamers. I ditched the hair straighteners and embraced the God-given curls I’d been ashamed of my whole life. I was called beautiful by people who really meant it, despite the skin tone that had placed me in the box of ‘could have been beautiful if she weren’t darker than Karak tea’. I bought my own journal, and proudly splayed my mistakes on its yellowing pages.

I would become a student – And, so I became lost.

At 21, I thought I’d figured it out.

I ditched the colourful tie-dye leggings for black jumpers and ripped jeans. I took up black coffee and a love for solitude that complimented each other like cake and English Breakfast tea. I watched it brewing in French Presses and drip from Chemex pots and La Marzocco coffee machines whose superiority to every other make I pretended to understand.

Still a creative, I created.

My journal more a necessity than my purse; I made a home of the metallic chair in the coffee shop next door. I fell in love… with silence. With my own company. With Spotify premium and how I could take showers and listen to music without ads. With the gold-dusted pink tone in my Naked 2 palette.

I would become an adult- And, so I became lonely.

At 23, I know I haven’t figured this out…

But that’s alright. Because just like my beloved coffee, my essence takes time to brew into the perfect colour- not tie-dye, not black.

I am a creative – of connections, of art, of words splayed on yellowing papers.

I am a student- of experiences, adventures, interactions.

I am an adult- in my decisions and premonitions. In the way I react to my own downfalls. In the way I count to 10 before I answer. In the way I love and allow myself to be loved, because of my skin, still 3 shades darker than Karak.

I would become everything and nothing in time – And, so I let myself simply be.