MY LIFE, SUDDENLY TURNED UPSIDE DOWN

When I decide to close my mouth to stop singing, I come back little by little to the present time and I distinguish four voices around me that I recognize as those of Kilian, Lilian and Ethan my three children and also that of mother Jeanne, the woman I consider my mother and who has saved me from death many times now. I don't know when they came to join me in prayer but when I open my eyes, I see them all on their knees beside me praying. I turn my head to the alarm clock and see that it's almost 6:30.

Me: (In my head) Again? I said I was only going to pray for an hour. It's because of things like that that I avoid singing, now I'll be late for the market. I do not like

Mama Jeanne: (interrupting me in my reflections) NZAOU instead of wasting the beautiful communion we had this morning with the Lord, we must pray for the end we are going to leave here.

Me: (turning my head in his direction) Oh.

Maman Jeanne: (eyes still closed) Oh what? You think I didn't hear what you thought in your head right away? I said to pray to close the moments, we will leave.

I fell silent and continued to stare at her in silence. This woman, there are days when I look at her and I wonder if she is not God's secretary or the person in charge of the reports? She often hears what people are thinking in their heads and is able to repeat it verbatim at the ready. She says it's the "gift of knowledge" that does that. It is one of the gifts of the Spirit that she received. She has plenty of others, but this is the one that shows up the most.

Kilian: (challenging me) Mom?

Me: (coming back to me and looking at him) Hun?

Kilian: But pray no, what are you waiting for?

Me: Hmm. (I close my eyes again and decide to pray to complete the moments) Excellent Father of grace, we bless you once again, for your kindness which was renewed in our lives this morning, including Your breath. Yes, it was not given to everyone to have it and we did not do anything good or more than others to deserve it so we just say thank you. Thank you for the health, for the strength, for the protection that we have been the object of and that we will continue to benefit from throughout this day.

Thank you for your good hand which rests on our different activities and for your angels who are constantly in motion around us and work so that none of our members hit a stone. Precede us on the paths that we will take throughout this day and may the precious blood of your son Jesus the Christ serve as our cover. Preserve our members from evil and our hearts from all iniquities so that only Your name may be exalted in each of our works. Thank you for these times that You have arranged this morning and we recommend this day to You so that You are in control. All glory to You, who was, who is and who is to come. This prayer is in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Them: (in unison) Amen.

We all got up and the children went to give their grandmother a hug before coming over to give me one. Their grandmother had probably already left the room to take out the small plates that we soiled during the night to wash them when I spoke again.

Me: Did you sleep well?

Them: (in chorus) Yes mum.

Ethan: I had a weird dream.

Me: Really?

Ethan: Yes.

Me: What did you dream about?

Ethan: From a man.

Me: But still?

Ethan: He was a man who was tall, he spoke in front of people with a microphone in a church. Then another man came to me and said, "Do you see that man who is preaching over there? I said yes. And he said 'this is your father and he has come.

I frowned and my heart blackened in my chest. Even my body language has changed and the kids have noticed. They know very well that they don't have the right to talk to me or ask me anything directly or indirectly related to their father. Every time they did it, even since they were very small and they tried to find out and understand why they didn't have a father like the others, I scolded them and once I had even leaned so hard when they were 7 years old that it was the last time they had questioned me about this agent of the devil that I had had the misfortune to love one day. They knew that their father was a taboo subject that had to be avoided at all times.

Ethan: (frightened) Mom please don't get mad, I didn't do it on purpose. I just wanted to tell you my dream sorry.

Me: (trying to control myself) I hope you told that gentleman you don't have a father huh?

Ethan: (looking down in sadness) No.

Me: Hmm. The next time you have this kind of dream, you will tell this gentleman that this gentleman is not your father because you do not have one. Did you understand me correctly?

Ethan: (small voice) Yes mom.

Me good. (looking at his two brothers who were just as sad as him) And that goes for you two too. If you ever have such a dream, you will say the same to that person. All right ?

Them: Ok mom.

Me: Okay. Now let me pass, I'm going to quickly take my shower.

They shifted and all three sat on the bed with sad faces. It's always like that when they try to talk to me about him. I get up, I get my outfit that I had taken care to prepare the day before and that I had carefully placed on the lid of my laundry basket. I pull out my towel, which I swing over my shoulder, and my toothbrush in the little cup that serves as a pot of places for them. I also get the toothpaste that is there and my body cream that is right next to it before leaving the room. I cross the small hallway and the living room to find myself outside where I actually find Mama Jeanne washing the plates sitting on a stool.

Maman Jeanne: Are you already going to take your shower?

I do.

Maman Jeanne: Where is the bucket of water?

Me: I'll go back and get it. I first put things there in the shower before coming back to get it.

Mama Jeanne: Alright. Fortunately even that you insisted on drawing and filling the three barrels there yesterday night. Cécile (a neighbour) told me that the SEEG (energy and water company of Gabon) cut off the water again this morning. It even seems that they went to the newspaper yesterday to say that they had to cut off the water in our area for 3 days. What are they building oh, I don't even know.

Me: Do they even need to justify themselves? Usually when they cut off the water here, they give us reasons? It's their water, they just have to cut it. They do the work, they do the work, yet it is only on our side that they cut as there are only the mandjango (the poor) here. But on the other side where there are barriers there, there is permanent water, even though we are in the same neighborhood and the same sector.

Mama Jeanne: Oh. Things like that, we don't talk anymore oh, we put everything back to God, he's the one who will judge them for their actions.

Me: Hmm.

Maman Jeanne: Fortunately our God who does not sleep, inspired you yesterday so that you can draw water before they cut it off. You see how good it is, right? We must give him glory. He can never forget his children.

I wanted to think to myself that he had forgotten me more than once, but I restrained myself. His secretary may overhear and gossip about me endlessly. So I forced myself to suppress those thoughts.

Mom Jeanne: (changing the subject) Today is the last day of the Mimi seminar, you didn't come the first two days, are you going to miss it again even tonight?

Me: Mom, you can see that it's not on purpose. I am at the market all day and when I come home in the evening I still have to help the children with their homework and make them study their lessons in addition to doing things here at home to prepare for the next day. Where do I find the time to come to the seminar? I had already told dad Mike (the senior pastor of the church) that I was not going to be there due to lack of time.

Mom: Hmm. Myrna I have already told you that the activity you are doing there is thanks to God so you always have to do everything and fight to come and listen to the teachings. Besides, young man of God there, I'm telling you how deep he is in his message, you can't. You feel that he is someone who has a real communion with God. The man there is not agitated like the young pastors of today who believe that to transmit the message of God, it is necessary to shout and jump everywhere like madmen. If someone hasn't come out of the church deaf yet with loud noises from the baffles that they're putting on full blast, they're not going to leave. I don't even know where they went to learn this way of doing things. They don't know that our God is a peaceful and respectable gentleman who doesn't need to make a lot of movies to be heard. But they don't, it's the "yo, yi yah" (making faces that accompany his words) before releasing a simple message.

Despite myself, I start to smile. Maman Jeanne has problems with the young preachers, singers and musicians of today. She finds them too light and superficial. She says most are much more into the show and the vibe doing the "did you see me?" rather than doing the work of God. When she has the opportunity to speak with them, she immediately reclassifies them.

Mama Jeanne: (continuing) People don't even really know who Jesus is anymore because of all their nonsense. But Pastor Lilian no, the young man there is posed.

Me: Lilian? Yesterday you said his name was Ethan, right?

Mom: Yes. These are his two first names. Ethan Lilian.

I frowned for a moment at the coincidence. These first names are those of my children and they do not hold them by chance. They were the first names of their father who himself held the three first names. From his name, NDZAMBA Ethan Kilian Lilian. The man who destroyed and ruined my whole life and whom I hate deep in my heart, to the point where when I try to think of him, I even tremble with anger and get angry until I have the veins coming out on my temples. Basically, I had called each of his children by one of his first names followed by his last name so as not to get attached to them and hate them as much as I hated their father. Only, four weeks after their birth, I couldn't remain insensitive, my heart melted when Maman Jeanne had forced them on my chest. The beam of love that invaded me at their contact made me realize that they were my children, a part of me and that I had no right to reject them because of their father, they had nothing to do with it, they were innocent people. From there, I pulled myself together and accepted them as such. I had wanted to change their identities but I had been told that it was too late, they already had birth certificates and that to change that, it was now necessary to go to court where they explained to me a long and expensive procedure. I was struggling to feed myself properly and was going to throw money out the window for a name business? I dropped this story. At the beginning, even if it was difficult, I ended up making a detachment between their names and those of their father and with time, pronouncing their first and last names became natural for me. Just listening that there's a man with two of my children's first names makes me weird.

Maman Jeanne: The man there has a beautiful and strong aura. A bit like for you when you start singing.

As soon as I listen to this, I already know that I have to get out of there because I feel that she might resume her speech that I am wasting the gift that God has put in me by refusing to sing. I don't want to listen to that, I've already said that singing and me are over.

Maman Jeanne: Look even this morning how the house was filled with the presence of God, I tell you that

Me: (cutting her off) I'll do my best to attend today. What time did you say it ends?

Maman Jeanne: (looking askance at me) Normally at 8 p.m. From 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. But since today is the last day, maybe it will go until 8:30 or 9 p.m.

Me: Okay. I'll see how to get there.