Here to Stay

It’s happened to every other utility, so there should be no surprise that today we have been mostly offline. The router has stared with two-unblinking green eyes as if a little hung over from such an extreme of events during the New Year.

What’s more, this morning my boiled water shower was cooled by an equal part from the several 10-litre bottles I’d filled the last time the tap was flowing: The water’s off again. The electricity has been on at least when we’ve been in the apartment lately, though I look forward to the day when things settle down and an electrician can be brought in to change some dead light bulbs. With 18-foot ceilings, this is not a job for the householder. Presently, neither the master bedroom, my bedroom, nor my bathroom has any overhead light. By luck, I carry a little flash light in my backpack, so I’ve been able to negotiate nighttime routines. Lucy and Yves have a 40-watt lamp, the only lamp on the premises. My rooms are in total darkness after dusk.

There’s no special need for anything but dimness in Lucy’s room today: She has finally retreated with the baby to rest and enjoy the solitude she deserves after the barrage of well-intended family congratulations—good wishes in the form of loud, cheerful intrusion, the mixed blessings of new parents. She gets a little sleep between nursings and well-meant visits.

We made a happy parade home from the Clinque de la Madeleine around noon, driven in my brother-in-law’s shiny new Citroen sedan. Claude and Dominique drove down from St. Louis, 300 kilometers up the coast, when they got the news on New Year’s day. Claude is a hearty man, to put it mildly. Never without a smile of good cheer, he is the jolliest internationally-known professor of English linguistics in the world. A man with students all over this continent, he had a Fulbright at the University of Michigan and has taught at universities across the francophone world. Never the awesome professor, he leads with his persona of Evangelical Christian minister. His gorgeous, stylish, deeply maternal—and sassy as all get-out—wife is equally convinced. The two are impressively active in their Christian beliefs and do an astonishing amount of social good.

We brought all the bags into the apartment and settled the baby in his crib in the middle of an admiring circle in the living room. Claude then surprised only me by bursting into rapturous, rhythmical prayer, clapping and doing a shuffling dance. Soon I was clapping along to the ecstatic rhythm of his words. Amens and hallelujias were sent up and, after his protracted thanks were lifted in many octaves, Dominique raised her arms in fervent, spontaneous prayer and benediction. Lucy’s tears were the first she’s allowed herself, and they flowed unstoppably; Yves pulled her close. All eyes were closed but mine, the pagan who dared to watch the scene, touched by the cloud of passion with which all the blessings of the day were received and even more—boldly, perhaps—requested for the little baby, his parents, and for Mami Ann who had traveled so far. I was surprised by the demonstration, but not untouched.

Claude and Dominique spent the afternoon next door with daughters Coco and Gigi, and taking Yves shopping for pharmaceutical and last-minute infant necessities. When the whole family assembled again around 9 p.m., I hadn't realized that a new festivity was in order. I had eaten a baguette sandwich at 6:30 and was considering retiring as a good example for Lucy.

That's not how it works. Dominique had prepared a Congolese feast: marinated and baked pork chops and chicken; dried, savory fish with vegetable; foufou, which is a sort of polenta made of manioc root. Foufou is manipulated into a ball by hand and then dipped into a thick sauce of chopped cassava (manioc) leaves mixed with finely chopped, smoked fish: delicious! There were fried plantains and a sauce so hot that Lucy forbade my even looking at it for fear of burning off my eyelashes. Amazing food.

Our meal lasted until after 11:30, complete with yet another amazing French cake and champagne. But I think it had to be obvious to any eye that the new mother was completely spent; she had to remove herself many times to nurse. Nevertheless, the company enjoyed the (very enjoyable!) Congolese rhumbas and sambas, which fascinated me too. The music that the Congolese had imported to the New World, had washed through French and Spanish cultures, had sailed back via Cuba and landed in Brazzaville with an original twist.

Leftover foufou and plantains

I signaled to Lucy that I'd step into my maternal role, break up the party and get the poor thing to bed. She led me out of the room and laid into me in no uncertain terms. I was urgently required to do no such thing! It is an absolute of hospitality to parents and in-laws here that they come and go as they please. If you keel over in their presence, so be it. If they show up when you're sleeping, you get up and prepare food and drink as if you were expecting them. And indeed, Coco and Gigi waited on their parents hand and foot, even bringing a tub of water so that Claude would not have to retire to a bathroom to wash his hands before and after the meal.

What a gig!

Out of  the instincts drilled into me by the American ideal of feminine good manners, I rose to help clear the table. Lucy chased me down at once: It was not for mothers to do that! Go back and sit down! I did it, but only to make life easier for Lucy, for I felt infantilized by the hegemony of the prevailing Congolese expectations. I wasn't allowed to protect my weary, postpartum daughter! Aren't we Americans?

Lucy shrugs these occasions off. They are rare and bearable and just part of life. She and Yves giggle about them when they're over. I observe with fascination, and I do indeed take an interest in the cultural differences. But I see now that my deep sense of motherhood trumps culture, even when my child is an adult who is gracious, disciplined, and respectful of her husband's ways. I am the bear who needs to tame herself.
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(Written over the course of two days of internet and electrical lapses…)