Tribute

I remember when I was younger, I was spending one of my school holidays staying with Aunty Ronke and the kids and I got a splinter; I couldn’t have been any older than 9 but I remember always being scared of getting splinters taken out because it always involved a pin and a lot of digging. But for one of the only times I can remember getting a splinter removed in my life, it didn’t hurt. Aunty Ronke had this calming energy to her, she told me an anecdote to distract me and always spoke to me in a gentle manner and always made me feel safe, even when it came time to serve out a punishment to me whenever I was staying over.

Those summers in Chatham were such an integral part of my childhood and the habits I developed staying with everyone and seeing the way the family came together as a unit and the love I felt in the household, never made me feel like a cousin, I always felt like a sibling that lived in London. In the same way that Tomisin, Dami and Anjie speak of my mother as “big mummy” that’s how I saw Aunty Ronke, I’ll never forget her and her lessons and I will always feel her calming presence.

Miss you, Aunty.
Femi Mosuro.