we come together on yet another Mother's Day

1

After dinner the family was all gathered together

between the kitchen, the family room,

and the room Mama built when all of us

grown kids finally dispersed from home.

“Mama’s Retreat Room” complete with a

full wall of windows, tropical plants,

an overstuffed bookcase with gospel,

self-help and dog literature, not to mention

collectibles from cruises and national ushers conventions,

designer wicker furniture,

and a computer she never touched.

Of the five generations present were these:

our 90 years young Matriarch, Grandmama Ruby

who was in no position to leave her Alzheimers at home;

my sister-in-law Catrina and brother Phil

with their new baby born on Groundhog Day, )

the newest branch to the May/Cooper freedom train. 

–         and  ‘Trina never looked like she gained a pound

after her pregnancy. Perhaps she’s waiting

for the midlife spread, but we are all tickled amber

that she was the one give birth to the only child

in the family who was lucky enough to be blessed

with those missing link gray-green May eyes,

just like Uncle Ted’s.

My sister Colette, who decided since nature

cheated her she’d go to the mall and buy her pretty eyes,

is still staunchly single in her early 40s.

And content. All she chooses to deal with are some

anal-retentive co-workers from 8-5 and a stack of books,

two temperamental felines and Comedy Central after the workday.

As for my baby brother home, we were all fortunate

enough to have him home from flying

the less-than-friendly skies these days. It was

nice to see him wearing something more

relaxing that his pilot’s uniform.

Jason still owes me $10 bucks.

And there was daddy who beat death

with his bypass operation. Everybody, even the mayor,

was praying for his recovery. That’s what happens when

a black man does the right thing and people notice.

And then there was me, the first one to l

eave the house back when I thought I was grown.

As usual, Colette was searching for things that never

existed and came across a page of residents from Grandmama’s way,

she still called it “down home” and most of the time

in her mind that’s where she was.

And we humored her kindly.

(What else could we do?)

2

The residents were land tenets of the

Helicon Missionary Baptist ChurchCemetary. 

I recall visiting that cemetery. It was a memorial garden of

Ppeople whom some you wanted to be related to,

and others. . .well. . . .

It was just down the road a piece from where

Grandmama and Granddaddy built their retirement home.

I know Grandmama would remember the old

pecan tree we just to sit under on the old aluminum swing,

all rusted and faded aqua with a lattice design

in the back panel so we could catch a

quick breeze just passing thru in the heat and humidity.

That was before Grandaddy had the cancer, It was the kind of

corporal culprt that eats up your insides, the kind that will be

“doggone” – like he used to say--if you can’t keep your food down,

and all you can eat is soft unseason’d foods like

jello fluff fruit salad and mashed white potatoes

and maybe a friend chicken wing and a spoon or two of

mixed collards and mustard greens at family renunions.

Dare I mention the HBP and “the sugar problem?”

If one could die of over-sweeten’d red kool-aid,

lemon pound cake and sweet ‘taytah pie,

then “Mr. BJ” cheated the odds.

Probably would have been alright if the dialysis treatments

didn’t spread the cancer.  But you know black folk don’t

tell anybody their business. . .That’s why we invented wakes,

just ain’ polite to talk ‘bout the deceased during the actual funeral.

After seeing that nothing but the NBA was on TV,

Colette said “hey y’all come on an’ look at what I ‘dug up’. . .”

She was a weekend comic that knew not to quit her day job.

Just don’t get her involved in a game of Monopoly.

She’ll keep you up all night and nobody goes home ‘til she wins.

We all gather’d in “Mama’s Retreat Room”

While “CoCo” sat at the computer and typed

in a long address that I could never recall by memory

—praise the Lord for bookmarks—

and we all witnessed together the names of all

our relatives from down in ‘round the foundation grounds of

Grady,

Lapine,

Luverne,

Rockdale,

Snowden, and of course,

Helicon.

and all the other historic stompin’ grounds in and around

Crehshaw County from who-knows-when ‘til 1990.

Granddaddy’s name just missed it. Death won the last round

of the Monopoly Game of Life in fall of ’92 and just missed “the list.”

We called Momma to come check out some of the names and

she knew practically every one. She even talked about a girl in her class—

musta been in third grade—whose “good haiah” she almost

snatched out because it was “flippable”  like a white girl’s.

Funny, she said the teacher didn’t exact any punishment. 

Perhaps the teacher, like my Momma back then,

--probably didn’t have “good haiah” either--

We learned about cousins of whose names we’d heard before,

found out how many folks cheated on their women

like a common everyday expected practice, and how many

“missing cousins” we must have as a result of their infidelities

out of either a drunken testosterone test, rape, or both.

We found out about things that only a black family

would know and tell in public

(for those of us who were not fortunate enough to be at the wake.)

Then Colette talked about how her and cousin Ronnie

walked thru the graveyard, several yards away from the church after

Grandaddy’s funeral was over. And how they just shook their

heads when they saw pyramids of family trees with names of people like

May,

Mays,

Mayes,

Johnson

Freeman

and Provitt

 and even some

with no name at all

and other with unmarked

 slave graves, or first names with

“Birthdate, Unknown.”

It made you proud to at least have a birth certificate

with two legally married parents. It made you reflect about

the white folks bodies on the other side of that little 18-inch bent over

Fence who had the exact same names but were

too good to share the same plots as their bastardized progeny. . .

and the whole irony of it all is,

if not for that bastardization, no one would be reading this saga right now. . .

for this saga was destined to be legitimized

with even more Master’s degrees and PhD’s and

accomplishments that could even create a cure for cancer,

and this saga shall be boldy. . . .

CONTINUED

 
 © 2004 by cynth'ya lewis reed