I expected this book to move me. When one pens a memoir a few years shy of 100 years old, you can expect nothing less.
I am probably showing my age, but the first time I encountered Ms Tyson was in Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Family Reunion. I saw her again in How To Get Away With Murder. By then, I was interested in her as a person after reading Viola Davis’ Finding Me. I wanted to know who this bright light that inspired a 7-year-old Viola to answer her calling was.
Ms Tyson’s story, much like Viola's, takes the shape of the typical “Black Girl Rags To Riches” narrative, starting with poverty, the church and abuse in the home - and how that results in your first heartbreak at the hands of your first love, your father. That was one of the first aspects of her story that I related to. While there was no physical abuse in my home, there were incidents that left me struggling to reconcile how I can love someone as much as I did, while suffering such pain as a result of their actions. Like Viola and Ms Tyson, I had to learn to humanise him.
Of course, this always finds a way to rear its ugly head much later in life. Her relationship with her late husband, jazz legend Miles Davis, resembles one of my own. One where you find yourself nursing, filling and loving someone into healing and in turn, their reliance on your presence feels like it's filling a gaping wound inside you - creating a toxic tumble dryer of co-dependence. It took me a while to realise something Ms Tyson realised during her second act with Miles. Living with, loving and being loved by your father does not exempt you from developing daddy issues.
“I thought I’d long since come to terms with my father - with how he’d both delighted and failed me, with the ways in which he’d unknowingly bruised me just as all parents do, despite their best intentions. But once Miles stumbled back into my world, I learned just how much of a father wound I was still nursing”
I started reading this book while filming a series titled Conversations With My Grandmother where as the name implies, my grandmother and I chatted about her life. Her experiences, losses, lessons and hopes. This book, in many ways, felt exactly like those conversations. One of the ways it reminded me of the series was when the topic of sex came up.
In one of the early chapters, Ms Tyson narrates her first sexual experience that resulted in the conception of her daughter “Joan”.
“...he lifted my dress. I recoiled slightly, but before I could back away, he was inside me. He immediately exploded…On the bus ride home, I replayed the scene in my head. Did we just have sex? Is that what that was? I honestly was not sure. Like my period and all other topics of a sensitive nature, Mom had never had a forthright conversation with me about intercourse.”
Ms Tyson’s family, like mine and I am sure many more, did not have important conversations. And that’s why she didn’t know that she’d had sex - or rather, had just been raped because there was no consent - you cannot give consent if you don’t know what is happening. In a separate story, she touched on how she revealed to her mother that an uncle had touched her inappropriately. This revelation prompted her sister to mention how the same uncle had touched her too. These are just two stories that highlight the dangers of not talking to children about sex and their bodies. It is in secrecy that sexual abuse festers.
Some of my favourite stories in this book are the ones Ms Tyson told about her friends. I value friendship dearly and it was beautiful to hear how her friends carried her, questioned her when necessary, offered her grace and spoke her name in rooms she had not entered.
It would be remiss of me to not mention her decades-long career. Ms Tyson's career, when it started, how it blossomed and its longevity is awe-inspiring. At 27, I am only now coming to terms with my creative calling. For years, I have stifled it with aspirations of a career in law and when that did not work out, an actual career in corporate South Africa. Finally, my calling has gotten too loud to ignore. Almost as loud as Ms Tyson’s exclamation:
“I am sure God didn’t put me on the face of this earth to bang on a typewriter for the rest of my life,” I said. “There is something else for me to do. I don’t know what it is, but I will find it.” From my lips to God’s ears—or, as I see it now, the other way around.”
At 31, after much discouragement from her mother, Ms Tyson started her illustrious acting career. THIRTY ONE.
This just goes to show how the light God put in you cannot be snuffed. Not by anyone or anything. It is never too late to follow your calling, to let your intuition - or as Ms Tyson calls it, “Goose Pimples” - lead you.
From Ms Tyson I learned that a woman must always have her own place - separate from her man’s … and some vex money to go with it. Take care of your body - it is your temple. And most importantly, always trust your intuition. As a creative, I learned that I must lend my platform to what I truly believe in and even when it is hard, hold fast to my values and know when to say “No, thank you”.
Just As I Am is an open and honest conversation you can only have with someone as sage and experienced as Ms Tyson was. It offers a “no holds barred” conversation, free of ego and pride. It teaches many lessons in love, faith, friendship, family and taking a bet on yourself.
Beautiful 👌🏽