Musings: Fight or Flight

Inspi­ra­tion hails from any­where. It’s not a Caribbean thing. It’s not an Amer­i­can thing. It’s a uni­ver­sal thing and if you want to be blow-your-mind-don’t-care-who’s-reading-this-post-honest—It’s a God thing!

My mother has a col­or­ful way with words. One Fri­day night not too long ago with fans whirring and an oppres­sive heat beat­ing down on us on the inside of peach walls, I sat at the com­puter and recorded her as she fought for what­ever she thought she had lost, in that moment, after 16 plus years of mar­riage. It was an exer­cise in patience and not jump­ing into the fray.

She is still mar­ried, and not unhap­pily (shout out to my step­dad who has man­aged to keep the fire burn­ing). The fol­low­ing is not the actual con­ver­sa­tion. It is not even the actual after­math. But for my mom and her way with words, here is my artis­tic license tak­ing flight (with per­mis­sion of course).

Fight or Flight

“Imag­ine this…”

“I don’t wan be involved!”

“Just lis­ten… Imag­ine this…”

“What?!”

“You, a woman, mar­ried to this one man six­teen odd years…”

“Mommy no!”

“Ok fine, you and one of your ‘friends’ deal­ing seri­ously for some time now.”

“Come on man mommy! I know where you going and I don’t wan hear this.”

“Well lis­ten regard­less. God knows I lis­ten to you every day, all day for years. The least you could do is pre­tend. Now come listen.”

“Is a won­der you carn get you way in this. You so pushy.”

“You lis­ten­ing?”

“Yes man! Yes!”

“You think dem tings is right?”

“What tings?”

“You think a woman have to always stay ready and depend­able and not lose it? How he fig­ure I ain’ gon be insane just from see­ing he face day in and day out. As if the whole world and me ain’ know.”

“So what the world know? What you know mommy? What you really know that ain’ she-say and he-say and dem-say?”

“I know what a feel!”

“So why me and you need to hash this out? Talk to de man!”

“You want me to talk to Lover Boy? Good ole Lover Boy, who hold­ing the same head wid Min­is­ter Man? You want me to inter­cept de man on he trav­els to save the world? And tell him what pray tell?”

“Tell him what you always tell him. Just use another voice instead of the ban­shee woman one that would make even the devil run.”

“Well eh eh. If this ain’ a mother wuk. Miss ‘we’re just friends’ wants to tell me how to mend a marriage.”

“This is exactly what I doan like. If you doan want hear ama­teur advice, why you talk­ing to me then?”

“Oh, so now I can’t talk?”

“’Tain that mommy. Is more like you know, you know, but you want him to see you work­ing like a dog and not lift­ing a fin­ger so you could scratch you head and bang up you chest…”

“I know he don’t care!”

“OK fine, only you could vouch for that, but same time you say that you have you ways too. You can’t just stand fast with a man years and years and then wants instant change.”

“And why not? De Bible talk long and hard about instant change. He preach it, why he can’t adopt?’

“And you won­der why I only have friends.”

“And you won­der why you sit­ting here on a Fri­day night!”

“Imag­ine that.”

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