COMMITMENT TO CHRIST ELEVATION CHURCH SECOND LIFE

The Wailers Wings of A Dove

"...3 little birds pitch on my door steps... singing sweet songs..."

HAPPILY EVER AFTER ..... The FUTURE is NOW...

✎📑📖📚

I listen to Motown classics, gospel  music and pulsating reggae, he unwinds to raw Hip Hop and Youtube Reality vids (without headphones no matter how I insist! )

Thirteen years of living (age difference) separates us but an island living experience weaves a binding thread that keeps us connected in myriad ways. 

When he looks at me he sees a younger version of his Grandmother who raised him and a mother who was often times physically absent but who loves him regardless. 

And quite often, the aroma of my cooking pulls him back to the house in Bellefield, Manchester, where he grew up before he left for Canada at the age of 15.

COVID'S GIFT - DREAMS TO REMEMBER

     

Nine (9) years ago, when I was clutched in the harried throes of surviving, a faculty support staff at York University in Toronto, Canada, where I was a student, looked me dead in my eyes and uttered words that would alternatively haunt and inspire me for years to come; "remember who you are!" 

I guess that was her way of encouraging me to continue to keep trying to land elusive jobs in my career field in non-profit program management and  implementation. 

At the time, her words rang hollow to me, who was a single mother, and mature student, who had recently relocated to Canada from Jamaica with the determination to carve out a better life for myself and my daughter. 

I remember having to balance the near impossible task of single motherhood with my role as a full time international student at YorkU, in fulfillment of the strict requirements of my then student visa. Initially, I did not qualify for a work permit, so I had to find legal and ethical ways to earn in order to financially provide for myself and my daughter including keeping a roof over our heads, all without a work permit. 

Despite the overwhelming odds stacked against me; by a combination of +Divine Favour+, strategic planning and determination, I managed to successfully complete my first semester at YorkU with qualifying grades that allowed me to apply for an off campus work permit. This meant I could then widen my search for jobs, which up to that point, had been restricted to on campus jobs, none of which I was able to get, despite the many times I applied for different positions.

In reflection, somehow, no matter what I did, the doors I tried to push open remained firmly closed despite the myriad ways I tried to advocate for myself. Self-advocacy was a honed skill which stemmed from my innate ability to lobby for improved circumstances for others and which, through frequent, applied use and proven results, had become a default setting. As I navigated during my early days as a new immigrant in Canada, self-advocacy was an instinctive and proactive mode which I switched to automatically, when faced with challenging situations  My ability to effectively self advocate is influenced by the many years I worked as a journalist and development advocate in media and non profit in Jamaica, the Caribbean and other parts of the world.

To help provide some background for context; I began attending York University in September 2012, but did not secure a job on York University's campus until April the following year (2013), one full year after I moved to Canada. 

How did I survive that first year?!!

1. >> By NOT listening to my childhood friend who I had attended high school with and who, when she became aware of the difficulties I was facing finding suitable work in Canada, candidly advised me to "dumb down" my resume by excluding some of the work experience and academic qualifications from my two page resume which I had already reduced from a five page CV! In retrospect, I feel fortunate that I did not listen to her, because it was the remnants of my 5-page CV (which I kept at two pages despite her advise to shorten/curate it even more), which ended up impressing an employer who visited a job agency where I had registered shortly after arriving in Canada. And that not only landed me the up to then elusive job I had been seeking, but would prove to be the beginning of doors previously closed swinging wide open to let me in. Doors which I had been desperately pounding on, even while I +PRAYED+, anxious to be let in, anxious and sometimes impatient for job opportunities that would take me back onto a path that was more towards the accomplished, professional self who I was, before I migrated to Canada and morphed primarily an International Student; which unfortunately, made little provision for the other aspects of myself I needed to be to survive in a full sense. I was able to successfully juggle the role of being a mother to my daughter and my other responsibilities,  because I am a Jamaican woman with a history of hardships and pain which I had learned how to successfully navigate in order to remain sane, viable and functioning from day today. This new experience of having to reinvent myself, from the very outset, seemed destined to simply add to my already lived personal traumas during a 50% lived life. I migrated to Canada when I was just past 40 years old, and was headed towards the BIG FIVE O = 50. So believe me when I tell you, that when I arrived in Canada in April 2011, I had LIVED!! I had LIVED and LOVED and GIVEN birth and MOTHERED and ENAMCIPATED so many persons from social and economic EXCLUSION in a Jamaica which struggled with the challenges of the remnants of a colonial past tied to slavery and the myriad social and other maladies that accompany that. Yet when I arrived at the Pearson Airport with my carryon luggage and a single suitcase as I had deliberately packed 'light' and my very precious daughter in tow, I had to mentally and psychological dial back all I had been and had become, and allowed myself to be morphed and moulded into something else. I had to be so pliable that there were times when I was simultaneously everything and nothing all at once. The immigrant experience is so complex, that it defies exact narrative or written explanation. Like they say: It id better FELT than TELT; meaning, it is more adequately experienced than explained / told.
2. ALSO, through +DIVINE INTERVENTION+, when another Jamaican student whom I had met in the tutorial for a course we took together at York University, forwarded an email to me with a call or invitation to submit an essay of 100 words. The essay should focus on poverty as an environmental issue in keeping with the focus of my then Environmental Studies Undergraduate degree program in the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University  As Providence would have it, my friend sent the email to me after the deadline for the International Student writing competition had been extended. It appears that they either had not received any submissions or were not satisficed with the calibre of any essays they might have received by the initial deadline. It has been my experience that whenever God has gifts for those who HONOUR him, he usually sends #DIVINE opportunities via specific channels and often, in the beginning, those persons who are God's emissaries, bearing beacons of #HOPE camouflaged as opportunities, usually realize that they have been given a DIVINE assignment which will last way beyond an initial contact. To make a long story short, I wrote and submitted an essay in the Writing Contest and was contacted directly by thecsenior Faculty member from The Faculty of Environmental Studies who had coordinated the writing contest, and advised that I had been selected as the Winner.  That #WiN sparked an AVALANCHE of opportunities that effectively took me from the desperate place where I had been existing, towards job opportunities that the Senior Professor referred me to as well as other job opportunities off campus which included a 6 month stint at my first ever job in a call centre working with a third party company on a Bell Mobility campaign for Bell Canada. That job qualified me sufficiently to land a job in a similar but expanded role at one of Canada's top five (5) banks working on an internal campaign for the bank's client . I worked in that position for close to two years. Before that, I landed two (2) part time jobs on the York University campus as a Research Assistant to one of my Professors who was working on a Canada-wide community research project and I also held a Knowledge Mobilization and Online Content Coordination Role with The Centre for Refugee Studies at York University for one (1) year (2013-2014).

The Bible says "A man's gift will make room for him." If anyone reading this is going through difficult times, keep going! Keep praying and believing God for miracles and rescues. God will come through for you in the end. 📿🙏📿

   

📿🙏🙏🙏🙏📿

#GENESIS' FURY: I AM MY MOTHER's DAUGHTER

MAMA
is MORE
than just a word...

It is
the woman lying there
beneath
that UNREPENTANT earth

Her now boned knuckles
clutched around
the off-white King James Version (KJV) Bible
we buried her with

Because it was her favourite book

Even though it had leaves
that were falling out;
it had many verses underlined
and I felt the words she read
to comfort her
during hard times alive
might help her
in her +CROSSING+
 
It was that same Bible that fed her Faith,
fueled her +PRAYERS+
and kept us FED

Her Faith; the most
enduring legacy she left us with
as she died without leaving a will

as, what would be the point?
There was nothing to be divided up or shared anyways!
My mother lived and farmed on ‘family plots’of land
handed down
from generation
to generation
unerringly.

I  also insisted that we bury her with her glasses
'Cause she could never see without them
and I figured
she might need them in the After Life
to read the Bible resting on her bosom

the same bosom which held icy mint sweeties
unless they were in her black bag hung on a nail behind her bedroom door.

Miss Amy dispensed
icy mint, Vicks, Vaseline cerrasee and ginger tea
as the cure for every ailment;
belly, head aches and other various cuts and bruises.

For a while I was very dismayed
that her best friend; Aunt Dor
insisted that we give her the glasses
as where ‘Amy was going she naah go need dem!’

I barely held my peace
when some years later,
my brother Dave told me that Aunt Dor had gone blind

Mothers make the world seem a better place.
Less frightening somehow.
She is tangible, VISIBLE confirmation
of the portal through which we entered this world.

The ceremonial goddess whose templed body
hosted our second most important rite of passage.

#Remembering and Missing my Mom: Miss Amy Downer. RIP.

 

I                                                        
AM 

My Mother's 
Daughter
Flesh of Her Flesh
Bone of her Bone
Cut from the navel string of her belly

Sometimes I hear her voice in my head 
and spilling from my lips
When I borrow HER #Praise 
In the Hallelujah choruses
She used to sing

I smell her in the aroma of my kitchen
And on the THUNDER I ((( ROAR))) from DEEP within my Belly

 I                                                      
 AM 
My Mother's daughter
#GENESIS... 
Where SHE #ENDS 
I #BEGIN 

Death: The Eternal Silence: Of DEATH .... DYING & COUSINS

Jeffery McIntyre 

When the people who used to beat you if you misbehaved on your way home (including your mother), starts dying, it bothers you.

However, when the ones who you grew up with begin to die, you become incredibly alarmed, saddened and reflective. It reminds you of your own mortality when someone your age who you share memories with, die. In an unnerving and sobering way it reminds you that it could have been you and it becomes hard to separate the fact that you are still living with the fact that they are dead.

My cousin Jeff died a few weeks ago and was buried yesterday in Lapland, Catadupa, St. James. I grew up in Belfont, one of many neigbouring districts to Lapland that all shared the same post office, Public Works Department, Clinic and Basic and All Age Schools. Those essential public domains connected us and were the reason we met many times a week when we went to collect letters, go for a check-up or to dress a cut or get a baby vaccinated and to learn. But my cousins and I who lived many districts away, were even more closely connected by My mother (Ms. Amy) and their father; (Mass Hubert .. who we called Uncle Ubert) as they were both VERY close. They attended the same church Pastored by Elder Davis (Now deceased) and they shared the same mother: Miss Harry, a woman I have never met but who is as real to me as my mother. Miss Harry, our maternal grandmother, was always there like a hanging shadow, especially because my eldest brother, Phillip always spoke about her. He is extremely nostalgic and the truth be told, he is the one who keeps us connected with the parts of our familial history that happened before we were born or from a time we were too young then to remember.

I have often wondered why she came to be named after a man and what her other names were. Next time I speak to Phillip I must remember to ask him. (*Note to self*)

But my mother and Jeff's dad were very close and Uncle Ubert would come to Belfont maybe once a month or so to help my mother in her grung (especially to dig yam banks) which was a pretty strenuous undertaking and more suited to men with more muscle power than women. He would arrive early in the morning, (usually Saturdays) with most if not all of his many children in tow (he and his wife, Miss Merline had between 9 & 10 children from my recollection) and our yard would erupt into a bevvy of activity and laughter and fun and 'cousiness' that is hard to describe. It just felt happy and crowded and nice. In those days, large families were the norm. My mother gave birth to 13 children.

My bigger cousins like Samson, Patrick, Bunny and Jeff as well as my bigger brothers who still lived at home; Earl, Winston, Pete and Paul, would follow Mama and Uncle Ubert to bush (which is what we called the place where the grung was) and as you can imagine, is pure bush over or round there which is why it was referred to as such. Bush and mud and ticks and cow doo doo and mud and just.... eeewww!

Anyways it is where most of the food we ate was planted and reaped so I'm not going to stay here and act all stoosh. My mother's grung is what helped sustain us.

So while they went to bush to work, My mother and Miss Merline would get busy in the kitchen cooking lunch and us, the younger children, Me, Garfield, Dave and Donnette would mostly run each other around the house and make each other miserable anyway we could and sometimes we would go down to the river to bathe and catch crayfish but for the most part our activities were confined to the yard while we waited impatiently for lunch to finish cooking and share out. The two bigger girls from either family, Precious and Joy; I am not sure what they did with themselves during this period of grung planting and waiting for lunch. As I was younger, I didn't really pay them much mind, nor was I encouraged to try to find out what they were up to but I suppose they kept themselves busy as well.

The younger children from each family, Kevin from ours, and Karen and her twin brother Owen, were not born until years later I believe, long after the informal monthly family get togethers had stopped.

Mass Ubert was one of a few people in those parts that went away to America on Farm Work every year and whenever he came back he would always send and call us to come for things he brought back for us. I loved that man and still remember the hats he wore and his booming bass as part of the Sunday morning choir at church. His eyes were piercing and kind and always held a twinkle. In a world where my mom and dad were separated because he was an insufferable drunk and she was in church, Uncle Ubert for me represents for me, my earliest memories of a text book dad. He died before all his kids were grown when he feel off the back of a pick up driven by Desrick while on his way from someone's funeral in another Parish. His death was unexpected and made no sense. I still miss him.

Read more about my Dad and his strange death here

Jeff is the first of his siblings to die but I guess his dad now has some company up in the skies or wherever dead people go. He has been alone a long, long, time. But that is no comfort to me for having lost one of my best cousins whom I loved dearly and I cannot begin to imagine how his brothers and sisters feel. He died leaving children, all of whom are grown and none of whom I have met yet. And it reminds me how fragmented we have become generally as a society within which families exist as we move away from our rural communities to seek opportunities in Montego Bay or Kingston and then further away to various foreign countries to pursue our personal and professional goals. If any of Jeff's children ever read this I would like to wish you heartfelt condolences on the passing of your dad and hope I get to meet you all soon my second cousins. I hear one of his daughters worked at CVM; a Jamaican television station, (pursuing an early career in journalism which was my main career path) and is now studying law at the UWI. That is awesome news.

I would also like to send deepest sympathies to Miss Merline, Jeff's mom, I am a mother and I cannot begin to imagine what it would feel like to lose a child. Only God can give you the comfort you need in this very difficult time. To Denise, the mother of Jeff's children, (I remember her as a dark beautiful, petite girl with a shy smile and the sister of my very good friend Sharon Smith). To Denise, I also offer condolences. It is hard to lose someone you share memories with and made babies with even if you were no longer together. When certain life experiences are shared with someone, they become intricately linked with who you are. Interwoven into your personal history and emotions.

My favourite cousin: Garfield McIntyre and my mother on the verandah of the house in Belfont that I grew up in. He had traveled several miles from Montego Bay and braved the really bad roads in Belfont to come and give my mother a lift to church as she usually had to walk many miles, mostly uphill, on arthritic feet to get to and from Church on Sundays. A journey that took minimum 1 and a half to 2 hours minimum each way.
The person beaming at them both from the doorway is my brother Dave, who always accompanied my mother to church. He still attends the same church and tells me whenever we speak that he has been praying for me. His prayers work! :)

To his brothers and sisters, especially Garfield, who is my favourite cousin of all is siblings; I am truly sorry you lost your brother. I have lost two of my brothers so far, both to tragic circumstances and I know it must be a difficult time for you all. Life continues as I know you all already know and time heals.

Last night when I saw my niece Trish-Ann posted pics from the funeral, I wondered how it felt for him to be out there there under the earth in the dark and cold night all by himself and I mourned for him. Death is still the unconquerable divide that separates two worlds only one of which we know. I always get sad when I have to watch a loved one get covered by heavy dirt while encased in a wooden box and then further encased in concrete and left all alone to the elements while everyone turn and walk away after the burial headed back to the business of living until it's their turn to be left alone like that while others leave. It is sobering and jolting and a bit scary to say the least. Death: The Eternal Silence from which no one emerges except in dreams.

Makes me think that an idea I saw circulating on Facebook last week via a video post of planting our loved ones in pods that would then morph into trees might not be a bad idea. So much better to imagine your loved one as a thriving, vibrant tree then a silent presence encased in so much and buried underground. Makes it even hard to breathe when I visit my relative's graves.

Jeff, you have made the transition, you have moved on to where we all are headed inevitably. Rest in Peace my cousin and hopefully, we will one day meet. I hand't seen you in years before you died but I remember everything about you and I still hold you dear.

      Capsula Mundi - Burial Pods

The house I grew up in in Belfont, St. James and where my cousins and I would meet once every month when their dad came to help my mother with her grung. This pic was taken by the driver who took my 2 nephews and niece up to the country sometime last year (I believe) when they went to Jamaica to bury their maternal Aunt (Miss Beryl) who had died. These 3 are My brother, Phillip's (Whom I mentioned in this post) children.
Pictured here are: Desmond, Audrey and Little Phillip or (Phillip Jnr.)

Somehow the house seemed bigger then. Everything seemed bigger when you were little. LOL

POST SCRIPTS TO MY MOTHER

P.S.

My mother never hugged me much
or not at all

I cannot ever remember
being enveloped in my mother's ample bosom
and held there for a while

Among my carefully kept memories of her
is not one solitary recall of a time
I felt the soft folds
of her flesh against mine
as I huddled in her lap

My mother wasn't one of those 'lovey dovey' mommies
that gave out hugs willy nilly
We learnt to look for love from her
in other things

Like how she would smile indulgently
or laugh uproariously
when something one of
of us said or did
amused her

or how she would always manage
to give us dinner
to ease the hunger pangs in our bellies
Although she never earned a wage
in the 60 years she lived

My mother was a woman of God
and prayed often
especially at nights
So we learnt to look for love
in her nightly supplications to God
on our behalf

And the many letters she wrote
by the light of the kerosene lamp
and the letters that would arrive in response
through the post office
with money in them
For sending us to school
For buying groceries
For doctor bills
For medicine

and when she would tiptoe like a hanging shadow
among us to make sure
that those of us that slept bad
weren't squeezing the living daylights out of each other
And that who ever had a tendency to wet the bed
was shaken awake and made to urinate
at intervals
We felt her love
And were grateful
when we all woke up dry in the morning

and if it was a Sunday,
to the rich aroma
of her creamy chocolate tea
made from cocoa pods she had picked herself
from the cocoa walk below our house
beside the tumbled down building
that was the old Sunday School
and cut and put out to dry in the hot sun
on half sheets of zinc for days
then roasted in the dutch pot
over a fire with acrid smoke that brought tears
to her eyes when she bent over it
to make sure the beans
weren't being burnt too much
and then pounded in the mortar
she kept in the corner of the kitchen
which doubled as a seat turned upside down
When it wasn't being mercilessly pounded
by her arthritic hands

My mother never hugged me
But I felt her love
in how
as she walked with me
to the bus stop
and on the long ride
to Montego Bay
to hand me over to the old couple
that I lived with in Goodwill for several years
she explained why she had to do it

So that I could have a chance to learn
As she didn't have the money
to send me to school
And how I was very bright
and would amount to something one day

All my life
I have felt the need to prove her right
In the lonely months and years that followed
I read every book in sight
And grew attached to words

I filled my days, nights
and the yawning emptyness
within my heart
for my mother
my brothers
sister
cousins and friends
with words and books
and thought of faraway places
including Belfont
the place I still called home
even though I only returned some holidays
for short visits

Her letters that came often
through the post office
consoled me
made me know that I was loved
and remembered
and missed

My mother never hugged us
Never hugged me
much
But I felt her love
Every night during mango season
When I would come home from work
To find a pot of freshly washed and very ripe mangoes
Under the cupboard in the kitchen
instead of my plate of dinner
because she knew I loved mangoes more than food

My mother never hugged me much

But every day
when I am not too busy
with making sure that I 'amount to something'
I wish she were STILL here
so I could love her back in the
ways that she loved me THEN

And NOW
Every night
I walk through my daughter's room
and make sure she is still in bed and breathing
and kiss her cheek
and when she is awake,
I hug her
until she is sick of it

Maybe
the hugs
I am giving her so freely NOW
are the hugs I
I wish I had received
from my mother
THEN.