This is a tributary addressed to a much younger self. Perhaps, you’d find in it, also, an address to your

younger self or even to yourself at the moment. Twenty-two is that year to which I can trace back, and

from which I can trace forward and backward.

Being young and innocent is priceless, but life happens, anyway. The experiences and events of life shape

us, but we are responsible for that into which we are formed. There will be regrets, but also wisdom;

scars, but also reminders of strength and fortitude; memories, but also lessons from familiar grounds, all

outcomes of decisions we made and make. In the end, what you make of the process of your growth is in

your hands. For me, I thought to pay a tribute to the past and my younger self for not being broken, and

for making the person I am today, and to say she turned out an unbreakable force. And also to those who

inspired some of these writings.

This tributary is narrative, reflective, judgmental, corrective, and rhetorical at some point. You will also

find some to be epistolary, but everything is inspired by real life experiences, mine, friends’, relatives’ and

strangers alike. They are mostly pieces I wrote years ago. I tried not to tamper with them, tried not to ‘fix’

them a lot, or make them too better, considering I wrote them as a much younger person in every sense.

They’re meant to be proof of growth by capturing immaturity, in the art of writing itself, in the way I and

everyone who inspired this acted, reasoned, felt, processed and responded to things, and I hope you make

some sense of it.

Goodness Chinelo Nwankwo