Synopsis:
Edwin is abruptly promoted from absent baby daddy to sole caregiver of Joy, his seven-year-old daughter, following her mother’s death. Joy’s plants and presence disrupt Edwin’s home life, infuriating him when she crosses his all-important creature comforts: soccer and whisky. It’s only when he sees a drawing of Joy and her late mother in their old garden that he begins to understand what the plants mean to her, and finds it in his heart to make room for her in his world.

The Idea

Absent or largely unavailable father’s have become a common occurrence in my communities. Mother’s have had fill the gap and many endure, which offers me some, if limited, comfort. But I have wondered how our children would survive our absence if the worst happened.

Joy's Garden attempts to bring to life a moment where an absent father encounters himself as his child's last hope. I needed to see if and how he might step up. Joy’s Garden is at its heart a hopeful story: about how a child might survive their mother’s death, how a father could learn what is needed, at least for a moment.

I was very interested in setting this story in the kind of housing developments that many middle class families in Nairobi live in today - concrete boxes not well suited to children's play or fostering their connection to the natural world.