Friday Note: HHP and Riky Rick walked the path of immortality

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Riky Rick passed away on my birthday this year. Now listen, the day had already started circling the drain before I heard about this sad news. I had missed my flight to Cape Town and, instead of having an Aperol Spritz in Camps Bay, I found myself spending my birthday alone at Glenda’s in Joburg, nursing a broken heart and a depleted bank balance. 

The news of Riky’s passing hit us all like a ton of bricks because everything seemed so good from the outside. Stylish, handsome, successful and a beast on the mic, nobody could believe we’d lost Boss Zonke. 

This being World Mental Health Month, I’ve realised how many of us have been fighting for our lives. October 24 marks four years since HHP also died by taking his life. This has made me think a lot about life and not so much about death. I know this seems like a heavy subject but I promise I’m going somewhere uplifting with this, so stay with me… 

As a black person in South Africa, I’ve noticed how much money, time and resources we spend on death. I mean, Desmond Dube has made a career from selling funeral plans on TV — that’s how much emphasis we place on death: We would have some of the country’s best actors sell us on it. We have after-tears parties at funerals, we buy expensive blankets that end up in the ground and cater for seven days for people when planning for a funeral. It’s not enough that we’re bereaved, now we’re in debt because of it. 

But I wonder how many of us are as committed to living. And when I say living, I mean truly living our best lives, not our less-than-average-but-hey-I’m-surviving lives. Are you living your best life right now? 

All I’ve done all my life is chase goals, tick boxes and mark milestones but the pandemic stopped me in my tracks. I had to relook at how I was living. On the outside, I looked like I had the life but, privately, I realised I wasn’t doing what was making my heart sing. I was living to work instead of working  to live. That realisation made me change everything about my life. And when I say everything, I mean everything. 

People often will ask you what legacy you want to leave behind and, the older I get, the more I realise legacy is about the incremental decisions we make along our life journey that defines what legacy is for each of us. 

Take a case in point, Sidney Poitier, the first black man to win an Oscar. He said something I’ll never forget: “Life is not about what you say ‘yes’ to, it’s about what you say ‘no’ to”. 

Boy, was he right. There’s nothing as expensive as a “yes”, Because “yes” requires your time, effort and energy; when you say “yes” to something or someone, you’re potentially saying “no” to yourself. Agreeing to every proposal, saying “yes” to every invitation and taking any job can lead you to compromise yourself and your values. 

When Mr Poitier said “no” to a role when he had a wife and kids to feed it was a dangerous move on the surface but a smart one in the long term, because he was making an incremental decision about his legacy. 

Riky Rick and HHP will live forever because they left an indelible mark through their music. We all know a South African summer is nothing without Jabba, and that when you’re dressed to kill, you can’t help but think of Riky’s words when he told us all, “Sidl’ukotini”. The Cotton Fest continues this year because Riky Rick is alive in the hearts of everyone he touched. It will be an indictment on both their legacies if all we choose to remember about them is how they left, not how they lived.  

The same can be said about Virgil Abloh. The first black creative director for Louis Vuitton’s men’s range, Abloh broke glass ceilings in fashion. He was a visionary, a street-style aficionado and one of the best to ever do it. When he chose to dress Trevor Noah at the Met Gala he knew, being of Ghanaian descent, it was crucial to support the first African host of The Daily Show. 

(Side note: Noah himself is reassessing his life and what he wants from it — that’s why he’s choosing to leave the show to live his best comedic touring life. Because, what we think may be the perfect life for him, may not be that necessarily for him.) 

Abloh died at 41 after battling with cancer and, as Louis Vuitton searches for his successor — it’s been a year and the luxury group LVMH is still looking for a replacement — it’s clear his legacy is more than just in fashion or Off-White. 

The truth is, nobody really dies because love keeps us alive in people’s hearts. And so I ask you, since you know for sure you are going to die, how exactly are you going to start living? Life is beautiful — and short — and because of this duality, you owe it to yourself to live it with joy. You deserve a joyful and purposeful legacy.