Shevaluable Life Lessons A Memoir of Love, Loss, & Faith

Copyright © Shevalle T. Kimber 2023

Cover photo © Kimberly Angel W.

Cover design © David Henderson, III

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Print ISBN: 978-1-66789-318-1

eBook ISBN: 978-1-66789-319-8

Authors’ Note

This book is nonfiction. Some names, characters, places, and incidents have been altered to protect identity. This work is a recollection of events that are true to me, and I have decided to share my truth with you. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, that one might see themselves in is entirely coincidental. This narrative is a glimpse of my truth, and I share it with you as my truth. This book is me, looking back at me. I acknowledge that my family is my family. And this book is not intended to disparage anyone nor tell any story other than my own while recognizing how others are indeed a part of mine. Additionally, all rights are reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

Note: All scripture is quoted from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Holy Bible.

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

-Maya Angelou

Contents

Preface

The Preacher’s Daughter

Honor Thy Father and Mother

Questioning God

A Darkness in Our Midst

My House, My Rules

Speaking the Truth

You Reap What You Sow

Keeping Secrets

Grown Folk Take Care of Their Own

Shining a Light on the Lies

Repenting and Coming Clean

Living in Truth

Taking Care of My Own

Turning the Other Cheek

Acting Out of Rebellion

Jumping into Marriage

Married Life

My Daughter is Born

Turning a Nightmare into a Blessing

A Blessing—and a Disaster

Breaking Apart and Coming Together

Going Back to Church

Opening New Doors

Maturing in Faith

Change Has Come

Making it Official

Another Great Loss

Blindsided by Disaster

Angry with God and Starting Over

Falling Apart and Rebuilding

Preparing the Path to School

Answering My Calling

Receiving My Testimony

My Final Year at School

Graduation Day for American Baptist College

Time to Go Back, Not Backwards

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

First, I want to thank God for the call on my life which I regard as a service to God and not a performance for man. More importantly, I thank God for loving me more than I could ever imagine by gifting me with people that God created especially for me. Without the love and support of my family and friends, this book would not be possible.

I am excessively grateful that I get to be Ronald, Shevalle and Savion’s mother. The moment you were born, you became the air I breathe and the pulse in my heart. Each of you being who God has created you to be, has taught me invaluable lessons about family, humanity and what unconditional love is. I love you more than I can say! To my grandson’s Sean, Tristian and London I love y’all beyond life and am grateful to be your Meme.

To my husband, Boise Kimber. The epitome of love! Thank you for loving and supporting me in ways that nurtured bravery and resiliency in me by being the example of that for our family. Never have I met a person who keeps me in awe by unselfishly giving himself, his life, love, time, treasure, and talent not only to me, our family, and the church, but also to the enemy. Boise, I love you more than words could ever describe.

To my siblings Genice, George, and Yvette. Thank you for being my first meaningful and lifelong relationships. Each of you hold a very special place in my life and heart and I love you and I am grateful for you.

To my mother Elma, thank you. I am the woman I am today not only because of who you are, but also for who you have always been to me. I Love you and to you I am eternally grateful. To my Aunt Gloria, thank you and I love you from the middle of my heart.

To my best friend Paulette Trimble, I am grateful for the day God allowed us to meet. I love you and thank you for being my sister/friend. To my accountability angel Willie M. Corley, I love you to the bones. To all my friends who will forever be my family, forgive me for not calling your name here but know that you mean the world to me and that I love you too.

To the beloved First Calvary Baptist Church, thank you for allowing me the space to grow and become the woman of God that God has called me to be.

To Fannie B. Stokes thank you for being an amazing editor and friend who understands how Iron sharpens Iron. Thank you. I love you and I am looking forward to what God has in store for us next.

Preface

I didn’t yet know God as I would come to know Him, but my father introduced me to God as the Creator of the world, a higher power who lives in the sky, and the one we thanked for our home, clothes, food on the table and for our very lives.

Reverend Shevalle Turner Kimber has taken on many roles in her life, from daughter to mother, business owner to housewife, and most currently a pastor at the First Calvary Baptist Church. She has become a beacon in her hometown of New Haven, Connecticut, in her own right. The road to success, however, has not been a linear one. In this memoir, she details the events, the trials, and the tribulations that have forged her into the woman who stands behind the pulpit today.

We start out with getting ready for church in the Turner household. Beds must be made, and food must be eaten. Life seemed perfect until one day her parents sat the children down to inform them of their separation—an apocalyptic event for any child. Her mother did what needed to be done to keep the household in order, and life went on. Soon Shevalle, a blossoming young woman, was set on living her life on her terms like her siblings before her. Shevalle eventually became pregnant with her first child, Ronald. Navigating motherhood while still being a child herself proved to be quite a test. While she persevered, it was not without its setbacks.

As she navigated life through cosmetology school, marriage, relocation, and eventually returning home to Connecticut, Shevalle learned what her mother meant when she always said, Grown folk take care of their own. Through separation, divorce, establishing a thriving cosmetology business, Shevalle learned to lean on her faith and understand that life has a lot of lessons to teach—it’s about what you’re willing to grow from and overcome.

Accompanied by poignant scripture, we are invited to experience her family celebrations, Sunday worship, hardship, and heartbreak. Through it all, Shevalle has had to remind herself that we all slip, but it’s what you do once you’re on the ground that counts. It is with unflinching honesty, razor-sharp wit, and humor she describes how God has guided her into living her own truth, in public and in private. Shevaluable Life Lessons is a powerful confession of an independent-minded woman of God in the twenty-first century, a woman on a mission, whose story is just beginning.

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the conviction

of things not seen."

~ Hebrews 11:1

The Preacher’s

Daughter

My Daddy was a handsome, brown-skinned man who stood 6’4" and weighed about 260 pounds. As assistant pastor of our church, daddy was a cheerful man who loved to make people laugh by making silly faces and cracking jokes. My daddy was the best daddy a girl could have.

For as long as my family attended church, I don’t ever remember my father preaching a sermon. What I do remember is watching him as he sat in the pulpit on Sundays and listening to him teach Bible Study on Wednesday nights. My first understanding of God and interactions with the Word of God were learned through my father’s teachings. In our house, Sundays were always special days. I would wake up to the smell of coffee, grits, bacon, and eggs as my mother was always in the kitchen, humming along to the Shirley Caesar’s song No Charge playing in the background while preparing breakfast. It was a custom in our house to have all our church clothes ironed and laid out on Saturday night so all we would have to do is wake, make our beds, wash our faces, brush our teeth, and get semi dressed until we finished our breakfast. Semi dressed means, my sister and I had on our underclothes, slips, and tights under our house robe so we wouldn’t soil our good church clothes at breakfast.

We all had to be in the kitchen at the breakfast table by 9:00 a.m. because church began at 11:00 a.m. We all sat together at our chrome-draped oval kitchen table with a faux marble top. The chairs were covered in red pleather, and we almost always sat in the same spots. Daddy sat at the head of the table, me to the left of him, Tubby sat to the right, Genice next to him, and then Yvette between me and Genice. Mommy never sat down to eat because she was busy cleaning the pots and washing the dishes once we finished eating. We sat, ate, and listened to music. There was no talking at the table because Mommy said we couldn’t talk with a mouth full of food. We also had to eat everything on our plate whether we liked it or not. After breakfast, we would go back to our rooms to get fully dressed and head off to church.

Church was a celebration. We gathered with our community to celebrate God and His work in our lives. We gathered to celebrate making it through another week and back into the house of God. At a young age, I didn’t yet know God as I would come to know Him. My father introduced me to God as the Creator of the world, a higher power who lives in the sky, and the one we thanked for our home, clothes, food, and for our very lives.

My oldest sister Genice was six years older than me, and my brother George, whom we all called Tubby, was five years older than me. Then there was Phyllis who was two years my senior. She couldn’t stand the name Phyllis, so she went by her middle name Yvette. I was the youngest, and I was Daddy’s little girl.

As the youngest, I was a bit spoiled, but I was also very aware that I had to mind my place. My siblings made it clear that I’d better not even think of snitching on any of them, no matter what! As the youngest, I was expected to do what they wanted me to do. If not, I would get a beatdown or get left behind. When we went out into the neighborhood, Mom would often admonish them, Y’all better not come back home without her! She wasn’t playing; she literally meant that they better not come back without me!

My mother was a curvaceous woman who stood about five-foot-eight and wore huge framed glasses. Her pretty brown skin glistened, and red-pressed hair framed her beautiful full face. I vividly remember her as she prepared for my fourth birthday party on Halloween in 1972. On that day, she wore a sleeveless lavender bell-bottom jumpsuit. Her strong beautiful arms extended over her head as she set up the decorations. Her smile always felt like summertime to me.

On that day, I remember being as happy as I could be. I had my beautiful mom, my handsome dad, my siblings, our wonderful three-family home in New Haven, Connecticut, and my birthday/Halloween party.

Mom invited the kids from our all-white neighborhood, as well as their parents, to my birthday party. The fact that we were the only black people at my party did not strike me as strange. In fact, I didn’t even question it. My friends were Italian and Irish, and they were the ones who came to my party. The Faruccis lived to the left of us, the Saccos lived next to them, and the Sweeneys were the next house down.

In our house, the kitchen was the first room you encountered when you walked through the back door, and that was where my birthday party was held. The only time anyone ever used the front door was when a stranger rang the bell. Mom had strung apples from the ceiling for a party game that was like the standing-up version of apple bobbing. We played the game in twos, with our hands tied behind our backs. We also played Pin the Tail on the Donkey.

Since I was born on Halloween, everyone at my party came dressed in a costume. My mother had a beautiful huge orange-and-black Halloween cake for me. It had a witch on top, and it matched my costume. Even though Daddy was a Baptist preacher, he had no objection to us celebrating my Halloween birthday. Subsequently, every year after that I had an awesome Halloween birthday party and never once thought about trick-or-treating.

Our family was not rich, but we certainly never went hungry and we could afford some luxuries. My mother was resourceful, so we always had good clothes that she purchased at Kmart, and we had an immaculate home. Mom sewed a lot of our clothes, and she even made the robes for the church choir—and we were all members. The robes looked like graduation gowns, except they were light blue.

My sister Yvette and I shared a room decorated in a Raggedy Ann and Andy theme with matching twin beds. Mom painted the bottom half of the walls red and the top half white to match our theme. Even though we had a Raggedy Ann and Andy bedroom set, in which the characters are white, all of our baby dolls were black, including Barbie and Baby Alive. I’m sure our bedroom set would have featured black characters also, but I guess they didn’t have black Raggedy Ann and Andy comforter sets.

My childhood home was filled with joy and love, but we did have strict house rules. For example, our mother did not play about sitting on the bed. All of us kids knew that beds were for sleeping in and not for playing on. If we wanted to sit down, we found a chair or sat on the couch. If we wanted to play, we played with our toys on the floor or went outside. To this day, there is a chair in my bedroom, and I have no desire to sit on the bed nor will I let anyone else sit on my bed.

Some of our other house rules included not talking at the table while we are eating. All beds were to be made as soon as we got out of it. Then we had the Eat everything on that plate rule; we had to eat all of our food before we could drink our Kool-Aid. There was no washing the food down in between. We couldn’t use the front door. No sitting on the front porch, and no tattling.

As a child, I had no idea just how much I was learning from my father—lessons that would stay with me long after my father was gone from our home and from my life.

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put away childish things.

~ First Corinthians 13:11

At four years old, I didn’t understand how God was molding and shaping my life through my experiences even at this young age. Looking back, I see that God was moving in my life and planting seeds of faith that would only bear fruit later in my life, a life that was about to change dramatically.

Honor Thy Father and Mother

Once a month on a Saturday, Mom used to take us out for a movie and pizza. On one such occasion, we were eager to go on our outing, but instead Mom and Dad called us into the bedroom. As we stood before them, my mother said without hesitation, Kids, Mommy and Daddy can’t live together anymore. So, when we get back from the movie and pizza, Daddy will be gone. Now get yourselves ready to go.

I was shocked and so were my siblings. I loved my father dearly, and he was leaving. I didn’t understand. We all started sobbing and climbed into his lap, clinging to him, and kissing him on the cheeks while he hugged us and kissed our foreheads.

But why? Why? we kept asking.

This has nothing to do with you children, my mother said, showing no empathy. Mommy and Daddy love you all very much, but we cannot live together anymore.

She repeated, So, when we get back from the movie and pizza, Daddy will be gone. We are sorry. That was that, and she turned and left the room as we desperately clung to our dad.

My parents were the epitome of a loving couple, and I hadn’t noticed any conflict between them. As far as I was concerned, we were the happiest family in the world. I just couldn’t understand what had happened that was so terrible that my parents could no longer live together.

Soon, it was time to go to the movies. We dried our tears, and Mom loaded us in the family station wagon and took us to see Charlotte’s Web as if it were any other movie-and-pizza Saturday. I loved the movie. By the time we pulled up in the driveway at the end of our outing, I had forgotten all about Daddy being gone.

When we went inside, it hit me again: there was no sign of my father. His closet was empty, no huge shoes or large coat in the hall closet. His toothbrush was not in the toothbrush holder in the bathroom. Neither was his Right Guard deodorant or his Aqua Velva Cooling aftershave lotion. It was like he never existed.

That was the end of our happy family as I knew it. My father moved to Florida, and I wouldn’t see him again until I was sixteen years old. That day, he showed up at our house and rang the front doorbell. Mom and I were the only ones home in the kitchen, so we looked up at each other because only strangers rang the front doorbell. Mom nodded for me to go and answer the door. As I was walking through the front hallway, I could see his handsome face standing looking through the front door window, with his hand above his eyebrow as if he was blocking sun from his face. I darted to the door fumbling to unlock it and then jumped into his arms! I held on for dear life. Tears of happiness began to flow down my face as he laughed with joy swinging me back and forth in his arms. Finally, we stepped back to admire one another. Grinning from ear to ear, he reached out to hand me a crisp $100 bill. Happy sweet sixteen, baby girl!

I was so overjoyed. Thank you! Thank you, Daddy! Wow! Thank you! I exclaimed. Meanwhile, Mom was standing midway in the hallway. Will y’all please come into the house and get off the front porch please. Holding hands, we walked down the front hall, me leading while he closed all the doors behind us. We walked through the dining room straight back into the kitchen where Mom and I were sitting. We really didn’t say much to one another; we were speechless and smiling.

Dad finally spoke, I am staying at the Super 8 Motel, and I can’t remember how to get there. Would you mind if Shevalle rides with me? I’ll bring her right back.

Sure, George, my mother replied. Not a problem . . . and it’s good to see you. She smiled.

Although that day would be a joyful experience, in my childhood years the reality of my father’s absence grew with each passing day. I didn’t see him the next day, the day after that, the week after that, or the month after that. Now, we only talked on the phone.

The phone would ring,