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Sometimes I wonder what a man's life is for, when everything that we've built ends up turning against ourselves. I'm Moussa. I'm eighty-six years old. I lived a long life, full of effort, respect, hard work and honor. I served my country. I served my family. I directed, advised, supported, built. For decades I was the pillar of a large house, a name, a line. Today, I am only a shadow in the house I built.
In the past, nothing was decided without me. I was a senior official, a man of principle. I had lots in several quarters, apartments for rent, stable incomes. I made a whole tribe live: my three wives, my twelve children, and the extended families that were around us. I was the reference, the point of balance, the patriarch whom we consulted for everything, which we respected, sometimes even feared. When I entered the courtyard, the voices were silent. When I was talking, everyone listened. There was no argument that I couldn't decide, no need that I couldn't fill. I carried whole families on my shoulders, and never complained.
But life has its seasons. When old age came, it not only took away my strength; She swept away my dignity, slowly, noiseless. Since my retirement, almost twenty years ago, I feel the weight of contempt every day.
My body is weakened. My legs are shaking. I can't walk. So I stay in my room almost all the time, my chancelle, as I call it, this little corner that I occupy in a house that was once mine. I hear the noises of life outside: the laughs of children, the arguments of women, the engines of my sons' cars; But all this is happening without me. It's like I'm dead, not yet.
I eat alone. Often very late. Sometimes, you bring a dish, placed on a small table, without a word, without a look. Sometimes people even forget to serve me. So I sit on my bed, empty belly, waiting for someone to remember that I exist. If I call, nobody answers. If I knock on the wall, they tell me later that they didn't hear. When I need help to get up or to go to the toilet, it happens to stay long hours waiting for a hand to stretch. But these hands have become rare. They are always busy elsewhere, too tired, too rushed to take care of an unnecessary old man.
I, who have always been a maniac of cleanliness, who did not bear the dust on a piece of furniture or the disorder in a yard, now live in negligence that kills me with little fire. Sometimes, several days pass before one of my wives deigns to come and help make my toilet.
I'm ashamed of myself. I'm ashamed of my body, of my smell. I am ashamed to feel that I depend on others, and that these others no longer have the slightest desire to help. The man I was: clean, dignified, cared for, proud, no longer exists. There is only one old man trembling, locked in his own house, half abandoned in a room where time stops.
When I get sick, nobody cares. We still think it's nothing, that I'm gonna get over it. I can spend whole nights suffering from chest pain or leg pain, without any of my sons considering taking me to the health centre. I hear their laughs, their conversations in the courtyard, their televisions lit, while I fight pain, alone. It's a loneliness that hurts more than illness. A loneliness that burns the heart.
And the most cruel thing is that I gave everything to these same people. I paid their education, their marriages, their care. I fed their dreams. I supported their mistakes. I covered up their mistakes.
Today they walk in the house, proud of what I built, but without remembering the one who built everything. Sometimes I feel like I'm a stranger at home. A burden that is tolerated because we cannot yet get rid of it.
They're waiting. Yeah, I can feel it. They're waiting for me to leave. Let me go for good, so I can share my property. I have heard, with my own ears: whispers behind the doors, veiled calculations, half-spoken sentences on my « longevity ». What irony... once we prayed for a long life. Today, it's so impatient that I'm slow to die.
I thought about punishing them. I thought about selling everything I own, giving everything to the needy, to those who still know how to say thank you. I thought of writing a will that would deprive them of everything. But my faith holds me back. Imam of the mosque in the district said it would be a mistake. In Islam, one cannot disinherit his loved ones, even the most ungrateful. So I'm going to stop. I let fate do. But my heart remains heavy. Very heavy.
I look at my trembling hands, once so firm, so sure. I look at my house, full of people but empty of love. And I'm thinking real poverty isn't about running out of property. It's a lack of recognition. It is to have given everything, and end up alone, ignored, like an old branch that we let dry. Sometimes weeping, in silence, not to give satisfaction to those who would say: « The old man is losing his mind. » No, I'm not losing my mind. I only lose everything that made me a man.
If I speak today, it's not to complain, it's to testify. To tell those who will come after me that a man's greatness is not measured by his goods, but by the way he is treated when he has nothing to give. Let the sons who forget their fathers condemn themselves to be forgotten tomorrow. And let the house that rejects its patriarch lose its soul.
And I already know how this will all end. The day I close my eyes permanently, it will be the great agitation. In this society of a hypocrisy without name, each will come to play his score. We'll have a big ceremony. They will speak of me as an admirable, generous, pious, respected man. We will recite verses, we will shed tears, we will deliver beautiful speeches. We'll bring the griots, the imams, the notables. The court will be full, we will eat there, we will drink there for days. We'll say « Ah, old Moussa! What a great man! » But behind these words, everyone will have the same question in mind: how to share what he left behind?
Then, once we have buried, once the cemetery is emptied, once the last guest has left the house, no one will think of me. My grave will soon be abandoned. No one will come there to lay a shaking hand or a sincere prayer. Maybe a child one day, out of curiosity, will ask: « Who's resting here? » And we'll answer him vaguely: « He was your grandfather. » And that's all. The wind will erase my name on the stone, as time has already erased my place in their hearts.
That's what I had to say. Me, Moussa, old, tired, forgotten. I'm not asking for anything anymore, except that one day someone, somewhere, remembers that I existed. Just say that I was a man. A real one. And all they have today is with my hands that they hold it.
And that one day, when silence has covered everything, perhaps a sincere prayer, one, will rise for me, the patriarch that time and forget have buried twice.
« I gave everything, and here I am alone » : what old Moussa tells us about our society
The words of a Senegalese patriarch abandoned by his own – the psychologist's gaze.
The silence of an old man, a reflection of great malaise
His name is Moussa. He's 86. A former senior official, he served the State, built a large family home, married three women, raised twelve children, supported an extended family. Once, everything went through him: decisions, conflicts, expenses, blessings. He was respected, listened to, consulted. Today, he lives alone in a corner of his own house, like a shadow no one sees anymore.
When he told me his story, I didn't hear an old man complain. I heard a man devastated inside by a society that dropped him. I saw, behind his tired voice, a psychological distress that thousands of fathers live silently in this country. He spoke of loneliness, indifference, betrayal, ignored pain, a family world that became deaf to his presence. He said: « I gave everything, and here I am alone. »
And in this stifled cry, reveals a painful part of our collective reality.
A man erased, an authority worth nothing.
Moussa has no more power. Since he retired, since his legs betrayed him, since money no longer flows into his hands as before, he is no longer consulted, no longer listened to. He lives in a narrow room, at the bottom of the house he built himself. He said to me: « Even my space shrinks, like my voice ». There are hours left without seeing anyone. He eats alone. He suffers in silence. And above all, he's watching.
He watches his sons go to business, their wives ignore, his own wives go to the youth side. He hears, sometimes behind the doors, the discussions on his « Amazing longevity », as a disguised way of questioning: « When will he leave? »
He knows what's going on, what's getting ready: the sharing of his property. What he says only in half a word is this icy conviction: No one loves him for himself anymore.
Polygamy and the war of silent heirs
Moussa married three women. He loved them, protected them, respected them. But today, this polygamic structure has become a theatre of tension and hidden alliances. Each wife protects her offspring. Each pushes their children to position themselves, to anticipate the post-Moussa. The family home has become a felted arena, where everyone calculates their future share.
Co-wives no longer fight for the heart of the husband, but for the safety of tomorrow. And children, who have grown up, no longer share the respect of one father. They live under the same roof, but in clans. The figure of the patriarch was dissolved in this broken organization where solidarity gives way to rivalry.
Age difference, wear and tear of marital and filial bond
Moussa was 31 when he married his first wife, 22 years old. He was 58 for the last 31 year old. Today, these age differences have turned against him. His wives are still active, dynamic, taken on the concerns of their children. He said to me: « They are closer to their sons than to me. »
The man who was the head of the family is more than an old man who is dependent, unable to walk without help, to buy his medicine, to wash himself alone. This body that once commanded became a burden. He sees in the eyes that he is tolerated, without affection. He said to me: « When I suffer, no one will accompany me to the health centre. I'm standing there alone, enduring. »
The poison of money
It's all about money. That's what Moussa understood. In this society where traditional landmarks mix with economic hardness, the value of a man collapses as soon as he can no longer give. He said to me: « As long as I opened the faucet, everyone surrounded me. Today, I have nothing to give, so no one comes anymore. »
This perverse logic has infiltrated the blood web. The child no longer helps his father out of love, but out of interest. And when interest dies, the bond dies too. Poverty, unemployment, economic frustrations fuel resentment, sometimes cruel indifference. We want to take his share, not take care of an old fragile man.
Society of false homage
But Moussa knows one thing: The day he dies, everything will change. The house will be filled. The women will cover for mourning. Neighbors will run. We will recite verses, we will weep publicly, we will talk about his generosity, his intelligence, his great heart. It is said that he built, that he loved, that he was a man of God. We'll eat. We'll drink. We will organize a great religious "thirty".
But he knows it'll be theater. He said to me: « They will bury and forget immediately. No one will come to my grave to pray. No one will remember. » He doesn't believe in these apparate tributes anymore. What he would have wanted was a presence in his lifetime. One hand on the shoulder. Hot soup. An attentive ear.
What Moussa says about us
Moussa is not an isolated case. It is the face of a deeper malaise. In our Senegalese society, the figure of the old man, once sacred, is increasingly marginalized. The race for comfort, family tensions, polygamy, social divides have emptied the homes of their collective soul. We live together, but separated. Relations of respect have been replaced by short-term interests.
Old age has become a shame. Weight. Charge. And when money no longer speaks, the words of love die out. Solidarity is no longer a moral obligation, it is an option. The hypocrisy has gained ground: the dead are celebrated that one could not love in their lifetime.
A society that forgets its old is a sick society
What Moussa leaves us as an inheritance is not a land, nor a bank account, nor a house. It's a lesson. He tells us: « Love your parents when they're still here. Respect them when they can't give you any more. And pray for them when they don't see you anymore. »
Human dignity is not measured by what one possesses, but by what one inspires; even in silence, even in weakness. A society that rejects its old people condemns itself to becoming a jungle.
