Moonbows

When it rains...it pours, every drop pelting rooftops noisily like thousands of tiny baked clay, the night is dark, the air is cold and damp, the wind billows like Boreas' breath, forks of lightening strikes across the icy dark-blue sky, thunder rumbling like the earth is cracking and ready to throw up its contents...I shiver, we shiver...not literally but in the face of difficulties we were facing collectively as a family financially and emotionally, individually...Where is our Moonbow....What are Moonbows?

 Sallah celebration after the fasting was very lukewarm in the Adagiri household this year, apparently, the recession is still in full swing and everyone just pretty much kept a lowkey celebration! Mom had called me to discuss our plans for the day and what type of delicious meal will be cheaper to prepare,

"...I think white rice with stew will be better with beef...after all, we aren't giving out food to any of our neighbors or what do you think"

She asked me, I pondered over my thoughts for a bit and suggested fried rice will be cheaper, I opined,

"Tomatoes and peppers are now quite expensive, then we'll need much more vegetable oil than we'll need for fried rice, I think fried rice will be cheaper, the ingredients don't cost so much and it'll look more pleasing to the eyes than white rice and stew which we've been having literally all day every year"

I said with a chuckle, Hamz's voice interjected from behind suddenly, almost startling us, suggesting we go with fried rice, Mom twitched her lips irritated, saying she knows Hamz will go with fried rice to which he grinned happily from ear to ear,

 "Fried rice is bae anytime Mom"

He chuckled, Mom shook her head in a show of mock sadness, stood up to leave the sitting room then asked me to remind her about the money I will need for buying the items for the fried rice before she goes out to visit a friend before remembering something as her face squeezed into a puzzled frown, looked directly at me then went,

 "What of my mom? I would need to send some food to her and she obviously wouldn't like fried rice and as I'm low on cash, I wouldn't want to be cooking separate "feast" meals for us and another for her"

I couldn't immediately give a response as she looked at me for answer when Karl who just walked in on that conversation offered to help with some money,

 "My mom promised to send me some money tomorrow, so being the last working day before the sallah celebrations, I'll cash it and that should help out with the things we need"




We all smiled happily as Mom ruffled his tousled jet-black hair like a child!

 "Awww! That's so sweet, one could almost assume you're his black mother who gave birth to an almost white mullatto kid"

I said with a loud laugh, Mom smiled and replied as she left the room,

"He's my son, your father's son is my son, there's a reason fate and Natalie allowed me take on the role as his mom"

 I went, "awwww" again. On sallah day, everything went pretty well...ok, almost well because, I had a bathroom emergency at the Eid praying ground when for some weird reason, I had to quickly use the toilet to poo and being far from home, I quickly became sweaty and bothered as there was no public restroom in sight as Eid praying ground by Islamic standards are meant to be located almost outskirts of town or at least a neat and secluded area of town unless if the town planning or other reasons of security, etc doesn't permit it but in my case, it was actually within close proximity to residential buildings to the south and a sparse open land to the north  and had to run and look for a hidden corner in a bush to defecate...don't judge me... thank goodness I was with tissue paper and I still felt unclean and had to rush home, leaving my brothers wondering what the hell was wrong with me, so as to avoid "skid marks" on my boxers....if you know what I mean.


 I have to state here that this event came before MAZE OF THE MIND. On getting home, I turned on the tap and no water came out, I groaned with displeasure, the water authorities had seized water and on a day like this when muslims were celebrating a feast? I had to quickly go and fetch some saved water from a water drum we keep for such occasion when there's no water, took it to the bathroom and washed myself properly, changed my boxers and washed my hands, thereafter, I felt clean and okay, but unhappy I had to manually fetch water into the kitchen to cook rather than just turn on the tap in the kitchen zinc to use. Thankfully, the fried rice was deliciously done, I had my heart in my mouth while preparing it for it not to flop, I'll hate that everyone eats my food and wring their lips with displeasure at the taste but it went well and that for me was the highlight of the celebration.

Once done and eaten, we had excess food left and Mom and I decided we share out food to our neighbors as it is customary during festive period which we did, including taking some to my grand mother at my aunties' place. Mom was a little disappointed her own mother didn't show interest in visiting her at her new place even during this festive period, nor do her sisters, although she suspected her sisters might have told her they couldn't bring her to our place. She asked me how her mother was doing and all I said was fine,

"I'd thought my sisters would at least use this festive period as an excuse to come know where I stay...apparently they don't care that much"

She said, I sighed with a shrug, QT who was sitting with us expressed disgust at Mom's obsession with her sisters coming to visit her, he let rip,

"...What do you care if they don't show up? I couldn't care less and quite frankly, don't even want then around"

The next day, staff of water corporations arrived and claimed that we were owing a huge amount in water bill, we were aghast, we quickly fished out the recent water bills we had paid lately but the men claimed it wasn't the current bill they were talking about but the outstanding bill, probably owed by previous tenants at the house, I was like, so how are we suppose to pay for a service we didn't consume,  they asked us to take it up with the landlord but then again, they will have to disconnect the water connection, my brothers and I protested angrily, Karl quickly went to check his wallet but the money he had left after changing the dollars his mom sent to naira wasn't up to the basic balance we were to pay, sadly, we watched as the water corp. staffer disconnected the water pipe! We were so mad but nothing we could do. I quickly put a call across to Mom and informed her of what had happened, she was shocked and asked me to end the call so she will call the head of the delegation of water corp. staff who had come to our house, so they could negotiate what could be done. In the meantime, I needed to cook and use water and we needed to figure out what could be done to get water, Hamz then stormed out to look for water sellers known as Mai ruwa, they sell water in jerrycans in areas suffering from lack of water and as a sweat soaked Hamz came back home from the hot sun with the Mai ruwa in tow, I just knew the next couple of days or maybe even weeks will be tough.

 Mom got back home exhausted and angry because of the events that had happened during the day, she narrated to us what she had discussed with the water corp. guys, she said there was nothing they could do and they didn't have anything against us but against the house as it is the house who owes them money, in other words, the landlord and when she called the landlord to inform him, the man said Mom should pay with her own money and deduct it from her next rent...Mom was exasperated.

We had to for the next couple of days, put up with buying water from water hawkers while at night, stealing water from a sealed pipe and locking it back once we were done, in the midst of this all, reprieve came when Mom finally got money to pay the water bill we never consumed, as we called the water corp. guys to come fix the pipe and we pay, they sent someone but asked us to be patient with the money for payment  until they bring a current bill...they never did. Mom then informed the landlord of her intention to pay for the water and he was so grateful and he waived it from our rent, which means, we don't have to settle a previous balance of rent we were suppose to pay because he had recently found out Mom is a widow and himself being a widower, understood how that must have been so stressful and hard to cater for the family all by herself. It made us all happy, it was a streak of relief.

When the rain stops, it drizzles, the weather is cool, the rain pressure slowly reduces to intermittent drops and then stops, the wind calms down, the rumbling thunder slowly murmurs now, there's a  Moonbow....Moonbows are rainbows at night, it is a sign by God to remind Him of his promise never to flood the world with water, in our case, although it is still dark because of the night and cold, a rainbow at night gives reassuring feeling of calm that at least, there won't be no more rain!

 KEEP UP!