N'Chiam!

I was my mother's first responsibility.

She, an inexperienced woman of nineteen

With only Faith to sustain her, got pregnant by my father,

Whom my grandparents despised but tolerated

And would tolerate for the next twenty years. The rumor,

As told to me by my fiancée, was that my grandfather, now my best friend, my Abraham, threw down money for an abortion

When he found out I was coming;

My mother refused the money and had me

A month early in June. I was sickly and blue

And the size of a dollar bill with a hard plastic tube

Down my throat, reaching deep into my unformed

Lungs. My chances of survival were that of Gomorrah without Lot

And everybody but my mother knew it. That tenacious woman willed me

To live. After six months of brutal testing and many days and nights without

Sleep, God decided my mother's faith was strong and she was fit to join the challenging ranks of Motherhood.

N'Chiam!