My Ancestors Raised Me: Part 2
Blurry Beginnings
The mind is a very powerful mechanism it can forget things to protect the person and create more tolerable memories that make the person feel more comfortable about their existence. After some of the most traumatic experiences of my life, I shifted to memories of joyfully playing as a kid. I remember being one of the kids playing outside in the scorching heat of St. Croix. I didn’t seem to mind at all as long as I got to get my hands dirty. I remember the geckos at the time but all I saw were lizards everywhere. They seemed so much bigger as a small child.
Before we headed to St. Croix U.S.V.I. we made a brief detour to Miami, Florida and there I would meet some major players in my life some of them wouldn’t come back around until later, and some not at all. I met my dad‘s mom, she was such a sweet lady and always seemed to have a big smile on her face. I remember that gold tooth, in the front of her teeth gleaming every time she grinned. I seemed to spend most of my time with her. I remember my dad‘s father, and all I could remember is that he was blind, and he never wore sunglasses, and his gray eyes scared the hell out of me. I was too immature to recognize that his disability didn’t make him any less wise of a man, if anything, it made him a more rooted and spiritual man. He knew the sound of every grandchild and he would reach out for me to feel my hand as if he could receive metaphysical information from the touch then he would try to get me to sit on his lap. My little eyes, couldn’t take my eyes, off of his eyes and his reach and grab was like something from the Grim Reaper himself, little did I know that would be the last time I would see him. I may have had more encounters with him, but those are the last memories that I can recall.
There were three new players in my life, they were my three cousins. Three girls were about 10 years older than me so they were about 13 years old at the time and they were pretty tight. Two of them were twins we’ll call them Arrine and Rachelle and the oldest Riane was about 12 or 13 years older than me. They would babysit me sometimes when my grandmother was not with me. I don’t have too many memories of my dad at this time it was as if he was coming and going a lot but he was around, but not as regularly as these family members. I didn’t like it much when these two twins watched me they were rather mean to me. They seemed to be bothered watching somebody as small as me but the older one was pretty nice to me and seemed calm-spirited. In Miami I remembered the lizards, too, we didn’t have anything like that in Detroit. I’ll never forget the flying roaches, and everybody had an accent like my daddy. I remember being hot when I slept and having the fan pointed directly at me. I don’t think that central AC was a thing yet or at least we didn’t have it and I remember being escorted around everywhere with my grandmother.
The next thing you know I’m on a plane and I’m in St. Croix with a different set of family members. I hadn’t seen my brother and sister or my mom for a while but everything seemed OK because I was with my daddy and I was with family, I was always taken care of, fed, and had what I needed so life seemed okay. It had never occurred to me that I didn’t see my granddaddy, my grandmother, or any of the other family members that I would normally see in Detroit I guess I was too young for that to really compute in my consciousness.
One of Them
Life seemed a new normal, and it was OK with me. There were lots of kids around and I always had somebody watching me. I would wake up in the morning, that was my favorite part of the day because my daddy was always there. He would feed me this sweet bread and I would have a cup of Milo tea for breakfast. I was turning into quite the little island girl and I started getting that same accent like my daddy and everybody else there. I remember another cousin of mine her name was Stefanie. I hated it when Stefanie babysat me by this point I was about five years old and Stefanie was about 13 or 14. She was always mean to me and I felt she was jealous that my daddy paid so much attention to me. My Daddy made it very clear that no harm should come to my head or any other body part while he was away. I always felt like daddy‘s girl. I was and I am my dad‘s only child.
I can recall going to the ocean often, my favorite part of being on the islands. Sure they have oceans in Miami, but nothing like the islands and we didn’t go there often. My dad was like a whale in the ocean, he would swim so far out into the deep end and he would come up from the ocean and his eyes were bloodshot red from the saltwater. I would get worried that he would go out so far, that was much further than I was allowed to go out by myself. I was truly concerned about him when he stayed down for so long, but he always came popping back up like a whale. I kept my eyes on my dad. The most exhilarating time of my little life was when he would take me on his back on one of these ocean adventures out into the deep. I would cling my little arms around his neck for dear life. I was scared to death that I would slip off and be swept away in the waves of the massive and powerful sea but I never did. I never got to see much down there because my eyes were closed so tight and I was scared and excited at the same time. Talk about a larger-than-life experience for a five-year-old.
One day, Stefanie was watching me again, Oh joy… She was always saying mean things to me in a very sarcastic tone. Hell, I was five years old. What could I have possibly done to her in her short 13 years of life? This one particular day, I was being a little defiant because she wasn’t my mama or my daddy, and she told me to do something. I didn’t do it, and she took it upon herself to whip me with a belt. I could hardly wait for her mother to get home. I went directly to my auntie and with the most hysterical tears, I could crank up I told her what her daughter had done to me. Her mother was livid and commenced to spanking her with her shoe! It was a sandal but shit I had never seen anything like that before. Later that evening, my dad came home, and my aunt wasn’t around. My cousin went up to my dad with the most hysterical tears she could muster from her little soul to tell my dad what happened to her and why, and my dad started spanking me. I could count on one hand how many spankings I got for my dad and from that moment forward, she was a bitch to me. Life seemed to be pretty mundane after this, nothing really exciting, no real fireworks or action. I had become accustomed to the new life and then one day…
Another major shift, I remember my dad picking me up, he had a nervous disposition about him that day, and he was wiping away tears. Once again, I got no communication about what was happening or what had happened. He started telling me how much he loved me and to know that he would always love me. Once again it didn’t really click at the time until we drove to the airport and I was being walked outdoors to one of those small planes you see in the movies, definitely not a Boeing 747. There were three white people at the end of the stairs of the plane, and my dad hugged me and kissed me, and they came to get me and walked me on the plane, but wait a minute my dad wasn’t coming with me. I didn’t know what was happening, but the flight attendants were so nice. They got me on the plane and they seem to devote most of their attention to me.
They made me feel so comfortable and so safe. I didn’t even realize that my dad wasn’t there. I was having such a good time and it seemed like a very short flight. The next thing you know I’m back in Detroit Michigan. I commenced to get off the plane, I looked around and everything looked different from what I had accepted as my new norm in the Virgin Islands, to be back in the States was strange. I was looking around and began looking for some familiar faces and low and behold there’s a lady that looks familiar. I’ll never forget it. She had a very colorful sundress with Toucans on it, her hair was slicked back in a bun at the back of her head, and she looked a lot like my mother. She had tears in her eyes when she saw me and it took a little bit to register. Hey, that’s my mother! She seemed really happy to see me and she hugged me tightly and said, do you remember me? I did, but vaguely after all, I had spent most of the time up until that point with my dad. Just like that, I was headed home in Detroit MI for a new kind of normal.
To be continued…
The names in these reflections have been changed to protect the actual people involved in this story. This is a true story and a personal experience story, some of the events are traumatic but this is my experience and my truth, and sometimes the truth hurts.
Zipporah Banyay
3-24-24
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