I attended Bisa Butler’s Hold Me Close exhibit last night here in Los Angeles. It was the last day of the exhibit, and I’d invited some friends to join me. I ended up running into a few other friends I didn’t know would be there, which further reinforces the idea that LA is a small town in a big city.
Have you ever gone to an art exhibit knowing it was going to be great, beautiful, etc., only to have had your entire world rocked out of nowhere?
If you live long enough, nothing is ever really “out of nowhere,” because we are all operating on the timeline we are supposed to be on, so anything that happens might be part of the plan.
Ciera and I made our way around the exhibit while we waited for my friend Hans to join us. Hans arrived, and I walked around with him for the second time. This time, I was able to see more of the art up close because the crowd had started to thin out. My favorite! A gallery seemingly all to myself, even though there were still a lot of people there. One piece I hadn’t really noticed before called my attention, and I realized why I may have overlooked it at first. It appeared to be a father holding his daughter, keeping her warm. Since this concept was foreign to me, I initially walked right past it…until I couldn’t any longer.
“The Guardian” by Bisa Butler took my breath away and forced me to stand still. Stand in the “what if,” I had a father who was not only my father, but a guardian and husband to my mother. What if I had a father whom I grew up knowing, learning, and being inspired by, and not one whom I don’t even know the exact date he died? What if my father had been there for me and taught me how to navigate the world being fierce, yet soft, patient, and faithful to myself? What if I had a protector, a guardian for when times were hard and I felt like the entire world was against me? To have someone to help navigate the loss of my mother with, because he loved her just as much as I did, and that was the true love of his life. Someone I would learn about men from, I would be nervous to bring boys home because I was my daddy’s little girl. What if?
