Yes Stevie, she is lovely!

By Matthew Woolford

The first time I held Amari, she was weeks away from being born and still in her mother’s womb. This was at the Women’s Centre of the Mount Hope Women’s Hospital, Champs Fleurs, where my sister-in-law, Asma, was attending Lamaze Class in mid-2019 in preparation for Amari’s birth.

Given that I was working within walking distance of the training, I decided to pay them a surprise visit. Timothy, her husband, my brother, however, was stuck in traffic and unable to be there on time. As providence would have it, I was, and so decided to render assistance.

I went through all the exercises, which allowed me to hold Amari, dance with Amari and play with Amari, and after almost four years, thanks be to God, the beat still goes on.

According to her name tag given at birth at the Mount Hope Women’s Hospital, Amari was born on October 26, 2019, at approximately 9.53 p.m. She was 44 cm in height, weighed 6 lbs and 9 ounces, and to my recollection, had a full head of hair.

To say that she has been a joy and a blessing to me, and the rest of our family, would be an understatement. I just love the way the sound of her voice fills the entire house with the joy and positive energy it seems only children can bring; that little sprinkling of Heaven, the place from which they all come.

When she was younger, I used to tickle her, but now she is tickling back, and it just has me in stitches. At the Maloney Indoor Sport Arena, July 8, where we attended the Female Basketball Action (FEMBA) Tournament, she regularly poked me in the back and then disappeared before I could catch her, and when she wrapped her arms around my neck, I felt as if Superwoman herself had draped her cape around me and I had unbelievable powers, if only for a moment.

My favourite time with her though is when we throw a bedsheet onto the floor, take out a scrapbook and together colour the living daylights into blank pieces of paper, creating our own works of art.

To this day, she is my one and only niece (or nephew) and has taught me so much about my own capacity to give and receive love. To be perfectly honest, for years I have struggled to trust in my own ability to build sustainable relationships, even doubting, at times, my ability to appropriately care for others and to receive the same in return.

Through my relationship with Amari, however, God has shown me that I am still okay, and the capacity to remain committed to do the work of love with and through others has not been lost.

According to Matthew 18: 4–5, “Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever receives one child such as this in my name receives me.”

And I have so much still to learn!

In the booklet insert for the Songs In The Key of Life Album, Steveland Morris, better known as Stevie Wonder, wrote:

“I’ve never considered myself an orator nor a politician, only a person who is fortunate enough, thanks to all of you, to become an artist given a chance to express the way he feels and hopefully the feelings of many other people.”

With his composition and rendition of ‘Isn’t She Lovely’, the first track on Disc 2 of the Songs In The Key of Life album, and which, according to Wikipedia, “…was not issued as a commercial single and therefore it did not appear on the major charts in the US and UK. However, due to radio airplay, it reached number 23 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart on January 29, 1977,” Stevie captured every feeling I have in my heart toward my niece and perhaps the feeling every man in this world has, or should have, toward his niece or daughter.

And to think that this song was only released but for the sheer gravitational pull of its supremely true message.

Of equal importance, and to the best of my memory, this was also the song played for the ‘Father and Daughter Dance’ at Timothy and Asma’s wedding on June 23, 2018.

Wow! How God works!

So, yes Stevie, she is lovely, and always will be! You knew it then, and I know it now.

‘So very lovely (and definitely) made from love!’