16 years...
That's how long it took for me to go back home, to Cameroon. 16 years. It's a year away from being a strong parallel to when I came to France for an indefinite time. I was 17 when I left Cameroon and 16 years later, I will return home. It's a lifetime. it's a whole teenager. As I am going back home, I realize that I am terrified. Home for me has always been the people, not really the place. I can feel at home anywhere as long as I have my loved ones around. Yet, I have a very special bond with the country where I was born. The country I grew up in. the country I left for France. I am French, yes, by blood but I am also first and foremost Cameroonian and this is something I don't think would change over time. so I am excited about returning home, to visit my parents (instead of them coming to see us), to visit my old place, to remember how things were, and acknowledge where I come from and everything I've accomplished since.
It's exciting yet, a tiny part of me is still afraid. I've been thinking long and hard about the reasons for such panic. I'm guessing it's anxiety playing its tricks, perhaps depression adding something up but I think that it's mostly the idea of coming back home, a different person. It's to take a look back at everything I've been through. the good, the very good, the bad, and the ugly. Part of me judges me so harshly, speak of my life in terrible terms, throwing rocks at my confidence until it's nothing but dust. that's the usual shit I'm dealing with so I'm used to it. Another part of me can see all the good things I did, all the good things that I am but the clouds around me are still too dark for me to see the clear sky. the real sky. Come to think of it, I'm starting to think that what I'm feeling the most and the root of my anxiety is definitely Shame. I feel ashamed of not having been able to return before. I guess it was a mix of reasons and events that made it hard for my sisters and me to come home. I am aware that it was virtually impossible for us to return home before now, I still feel like a prodigal daughter. go figure.
16 years is a lot and it's difficult to process what's going through my mind. I am excited because I will discover a changed country (not so in terms of politics but very much so in terms of infrastructures), I will bask again in the warmth that I remember about my hometown, I will formally introduce my parents to my Main Husband. I will make new memories of the city that saw me grow up throughout 17 years. I guess it's poetic in a way. It's a neat end of a cycle. Tonight, as I write those lines, I am in full panic but I'm trying to organize my thoughts. (hence the text), I think that tomorrow when I would be calmer, I would be able to realize that I would have the privilege to come back and tell my dear beloved country just how much I have lived. I want it to know just how far I came from and how I managed to make a good life despite everything happening.
It's going to be beautiful, I cannot wait to document the trip next year.
May
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