Chapter 19-My Reasons for Tracking My Birth & Life

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=125 BGCOLOR="#006699" TEXT="#080000" background="0c3085a3.jpg"> <div> Jamaica~Noamie's Negril.Com</div> <div> <I>Welcome to the Noamie's Negril Web Site</I> ~Noamie's - Jamaican Tea Room...An Innovative Walk into Traveling & Reality </div> <div> <I>                                             Negril: The Place I'll Rather Be</I><FONT SIZE="4" COLOR="#FF66FF" FACE="Arial Narrow" ><I>...</I></FONT><FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#FF66FF" FACE="Desdemona" >Jamaica ~ Negril             </FONT><FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#CCCCE4" FACE="Eurostile" ><A HREF="id48.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="My BookWest Cliffe"><U>Home</U></A></FONT></div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" width=210 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" background="0c4d2e83.jpg"> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" height=355 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <I>Chapter 19-My Reasons for Tracking My Birth & Life</I></div> <bR> <div> <B>West Cliffe</B></div> <div> <B>My Reasons for Tracking My Birth & Life-    </B></div> <div> <B>Predictions of My God-Mother:  Miss Addie  </B></div> <bR> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B> </B><FONT SIZE="6" COLOR="#6666CC" FACE="Dauphin" ><B><IMG SRC="0f701370.png" border=0 width="257" height="55" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></FONT></div> <div> <B>Chapter Nineteen</B></div> <div> <B><IMG SRC="1c378670.jpg" border=0 width="120" height="103" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <div> <B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>My Reasons for tracking my birth & Life</B><B>:</B><FONT SIZE="4" COLOR="#6666CC" FACE="Baskerville Old Face" ><B> </B></FONT></div> <div> <I><B>Beauty is that which ones perceived as beauty. The word 'beauty' should never be confused with 'good-looking', as there are differences and variances. </B></I></div> <bR> <div> <B>Growing up, every one in Orange Hill always say that 'I was different, that I was a special child.' And so I looked at my hair, I looked at my hands, my feet, my body, and it was no different from any one else. I had 'that special Godmother, and even then, I didn't see my difference. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>When my Godmother, Miss Addie was about to depart this life, I got news of her last days. I don't recall going to see her, although, I may have seeing her house was right across the road from Miss Winsome shop. I was always visiting Miss Winsome shop. In Miss Addie last breath of life, she would take the time to remember me. It was a message, her final words, for me that she would utter. Cita would bring the message to my grandmother and have me to sit down and listened to them. I was too young to understand; yet, seeing it was the hushed talk, I listen. Later, I took a walk to West Cliffe, to ponder those words. I was only six or seven years old, when she died, seeing when she became my Godmother, she was already up in age. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>How could she have left such a message about a child, me, such admonished, such tough words, in that my elders should lead me, to watch over me, to not let any harm come near me, and to protect me, for it was the will that I, little Noamie be protected. With tears for me, she left this life. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I took a walk upon hearing those words, to West Cliffe. I need to diffuse those words. Why me? Why Noamie?</B></div> <div> <B>Somehow, she too knew of my way, the way that I should go, the way that I would have been called, been chosen, having the spirit of God to walk in perfection, and to be 'a star '; 'a light' amidst darkness. Yet, she would become a light in the darkness for me.</B></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>West Cliffe-</B></div> <div> <B>My Reasons for tracking my birth & Life- </B></div> <div> <B>Predictions of My God-Mother  Miss Addie: ~ 131</B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>1990 in the Hours of Darkness:</B><B> </B></div> <div> <B>In the hours of 'darkenness' I listed to hear this woman praying. It is this hour that she must arise from off her bed to pray, to pray for me, to become my intercessor before God, to reach out for me, in the time when I need an earthly physical contact as well as a spiritual one. Did she not know that I know? Did she know that I know as silently, I watched her got off from her bed, and made her bed on the floor, to watch and pray? How sweet it was to have the mind and eyes of God, 'in the hours of darkenness'. I saw her even while she could not see me. I was not alone. For she was the same woman that was assigned to sent me to school on that of my first day. She was the woman that was assigned the spiritual responsibility of my life in Orange Hill, upon the death of My Godmother. For she is the niece, the sister, of my Godmother. For she is a spiritual woman, a woman of God, ~Miss Lucille~. </B></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>Light-Post Along The Way</B><B>: </B></div> <div> <B>Who is Noamie, this child so full of life that every one loves? Who am ' I ', is the question that I had asked too many times? Each time that I ask myself this question, the answer would come to me in the form of dreams, and visions. I have to smile, as it is too heavenly to share. Furthermore, one has to be on the spiritual level, the level in God to see what I see, and to understand this spiritualness of which I spoke. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Going home from Mt. Airy School, I would stop and make credits at selected shops along the way. I took care of my sisters and brothers, making sure that even without money we were fed. My credit was good, even then. The shopkeepers would give me credit, knowing that 'in secret, in silence' that upon Daddy's returned from England, that they would be paid.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Once as I went in Miss Winsome shop to get my evening meal before heading home, I glanced at her credit book. In a column, I saw a sign. I smile, even without saying anything to her, as to do so would be to spoil her fun, in why she cares, even though I knew she care even without her getting paid. For before I was to know it, I knew it, my father had made his rounds, had left money for me. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I was not selfish. I was entrusted to caring for my sisters and brothers. Our mother was too lazy to cook us our dinner. With nothing to worry about, I had already eaten at different places. I had two grandmothers, my own biological grandmother, as well as my present stepfather's mother. She Miss Campbell always kept my dinner beside the fireside, waiting for me, even when I didn't stop. She knew the hours that I would pass. </B></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>West Cliffe-</B></div> <div> <B>My Reasons for tracking my birth & Life-</B></div> <div> <B>Predictions of My God-Mother  Miss Addie:  ~132</B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <I><B>~Indeed- The Road That Got us here ~</B></I></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>Miss Laurel Barrett</B><B>: </B></div> <div> <B>Whether in the beauty salon, whether on the street walking, where-ever she may be, her face would lights up when she sees me. If she were sitting down, tactfully, she would make room for my head to nestled in her lap. She knows me all too well, and she welcomes me. I was her child. She who was one of my teachers, my uncles, cousins, a friend who became a mediator, she had my back. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>However, her words shocked me in 1990 May 13, to be exact when she told me that "Cleve knew what he was going when he gave me the money to put on my house, a room for you." What? Was my shocked response. How did my father know? How would my father know that ten years after his death that I would have found myself homeless? Yes, I WAS alone and homeless. And no one wanted to take me in. I was an outcast. I became a throwaway. I was discarded, through the eyes of raging jealousy. The people, who should have loved me, hated me. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>The people, who should have been caring for me, distanced themselves from me. And all in the name of jealousy. Deep seated jealousy. My grandmother Emma had turned her back on me. My aunt, who was sending money to take care of her, was sending message that she didn't want me living at the house. She, who did not, and have never, ever, in all the many years, ever sent a penny for the upkeep of that house. The nerve of the heifer. She who took my sister's husband and marry him, after pressuring my sister, to the point of almost calling immigration on my sister Babbeth, she who in the end, whose marriage lasted only six month (no shame, no shame) was suddenly throwing stones at me, and for what? She who with all her shame, now wishes to criticize me, out of jealousy. Truly, in a way, I had laugh at all of this. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>What I didn't laugh about was the criticism that was coming against "this man" who was not psychological equipped to handle their criticism. Thus, he was determine, even in my own pain, in dealing with my family, he choosing to take out his anger on me. I was never able to convince him that I had nothing to do with the criticism that was coming forward from them against him. </B></div> <div> <B>That 'I was me', Noamie who is the black sheep, </B></div> <div> <B>so to speak of the family, only in this aspect, </B></div> <div> <B>I am the only white sheep, like a flower amongst </B></div> <div> <B>thorn and thistles.  While I seek to lay no blame on my </B></div> <div> <B>father, I would lay all the blame on him, seeing he was </B></div> <div> <B>my father, he was the man that God fist gave direct </B></div> <div> <B>instructions to, about me, my birth and my life. </B></div> <div> <B>My father had disobey God.  </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>My father would die for his disobedience.  Miss Laurel </B></div> <div> <B>Barrett words of  1972 would have come to pass.</B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>West Cliffe </B></div> <div> <B>My Fathers' Grave :  133</B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>   </B></div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>        </B><FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#6666CC" FACE="Dauphin" ><B> </B></FONT><FONT SIZE="6" COLOR="#6666CC" FACE="Dauphin" ><B>Chapter Ninteen</B></FONT></div> <div> <B>Part  II </B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>Why I Use My Mother's Best Towel To Wash</B></div> <div> <B> My Fathers' Grave, And Laugh About It</B><B> </B></div> <div> <B>"I made my way, holding Brad's hand around the first stretch, and to the </B></div> <div> <B>North side of the house. </B></div> <div> <B>I made my way to the back of the house down toward the place I will </B></div> <div> <B>always visit. My father's tomb. "Quote from </B><B>my trip report</B><B> , July 2003.  </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>2001: September</B><B> </B></div> <div> <B>Visiting that side of the yard, is never pleasant. There sits the tomb, white and visible to all eyes.</B></div> <div> <B>I walked alone. I could not hold back the tears. Even after 23 years, the pains never leaves. Yet, it is at this same place that I gain my strength to do battle. </B></div> <div> <B>From the corner of my eyes, all passersby would stop, stood still and watch the movements of my feet. Why?  Why watch me?  </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Do I hold the clue to something, or is it here that they would get to observe something beyond who I am. Even in my deepest moment of peace, someone would stop to call out to me, welcoming me, acknowledging my presence, letting me know that they are happy to see that I came, once again to my father's home, this my father's resting place. </B></div> <div> <B>I was hurting and in pain. Pain from the hurts that my son was feeling. Pain from a family who is filled with jealousy and envy.  Pain that I have to be in constant battle with them for nothing beyond who I am. A girl, a woman whose smile they envy. Pain from knowing that my father's death still  lingers in the air. </B></div> <div> <B>Pain from a mother who was an  adulterous woman, </B></div> <div> <B>who  abuses my father.  </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I saw the paint that I would use to repaint the now </B></div> <div> <B>depilated grave. What can I use to wash the grave? </B></div> <div> <B>Ah aha! There's that beautiful plush yellow towel. Perfect! </B></div> <div> <B>I could almost see Daddy smiling. I smile too. </B></div> <div> <B>My stepfather watched me in silence. My mother had </B></div> <div> <B>vacated the property, (ran off to Florida), no sooner </B></div> <div> <B>the news reaches her, that I had arrived on the island. </B></div> <div> <B>What a joke! </B></div> <div> <B>My stepfather knew better than to utter a word to me. </B></div> <div> <B>.....................</B></div> <div> <B>                                                                                                </B></div> <div> <B>  </B></div> <div> <B>My Brother Honey sitting on our father's coffin. The day: November  1980</B></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>West  Cliffe-</B></div> <div> <B>Chapter 19    Part II                             </B></div> <div> <B>It Was Easter of 1969: ~134    </B></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>It was Easter of 1969:</B><FONT SIZE="4" COLOR="#6666CC" FACE="Eurostile" ><B> </B></FONT></div> <div> <B>My father had returned to England. It was a Sunday night. It had rained heavily, and so the earth was drenched with water. That night it was pitched dark. The whole earth appears to have taken on a thick cloak of darkness.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Then I was awakened by my mother. She had come into the room where all three of us girls slept. That night we would not sleep. The demons in her would not allow her to sleep. She reached underneath our bed for her suitcase of sewing things. From one of her many unfinished dresses, my sister Paulette had cut a piece from one of her prized dress, a dress she was making from her. Well the woman and her demons seek to blame me. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>She had it all planned. Unbeknown to me, she had already come with the weapon, a thick black coat-brush with a long handle, one the size and length of a bowling pin. This night, she had come to do damage on me. There she dragged me from my bed, and began to beat me. Clad in a thin pink nightdress, the woman attempted to sit on my head and beat me. I was hit everywhere. </B></div> <div> <B>I manage to get away from her by jumping down into a 'drop kitchen' and headed for the back door. Outside, the night was pitch dark. I had to run. I must keep running. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I made my way, badly beaten, barefooted into the night. I was making my way to my grandfather's home in Tillbery. My grandparents will receive me. They have been the only parents that I have known for my first eight years. I was still that eight-year-old child. They are still my parents. They are the parents that I had bonded with. They have to receive me; they have to help me. I was alone. I was running to my comfort zone, the only comfort zone that I have known.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>There was nothing in sight, but darkness. Still blackness. I walked that lonely black night, that dark lonely road, until upon turning a corner, I saw shadows. I saw a huge torchlight. It was coming towards me. I started to cry. Sista Pee Lindsay was on her way home with her sister Stella and a brother. They stopped me. I was badly beaten and my arm appears to have been broken. They saw that I could not turn back. I told them where I was heading. They became afraid for me. They promised not to hold me and forced me back to my mother's house. So they too turn-back to accompany me to their sister's home, that they had left earlier. Joyce Lindsay gave me water to wash my feet. I must sleep the night there. She would allow me to leave in the early morning to continue my journey. Joyce kept the kerosene lamp on that night, in order to help soothe my fears.  Shock herself; she did not speak a word. None commented on my bruises. Blank faces of my own pain, would have registered on their face.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I did not sleep that night. I could not believe that my mother would have done something like that to me. I could not understand why she would want to hate me, her daughter.</B></div> <div> <B>I arrive at my grandparent's home at 5:30AM. I called to them from the gate. They woke up, and were shocked to see my bruise and beaten body. I detailed to them what had happen, and that I would have arrived last night, however Miss Pee and Joyce delayed me.</B></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>West Cliffe-</B></div> <div> <B>Chapter 19    Part II</B></div> <div> <B>1980 - It Was a Time of Sadness: ~135     </B></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>My grandmother began to talk to my grandfather. Grandfather told my grandmother to wait until daybreak to go see my mother. My grandmother was in raged. Grandfather got up from his bed, never to go back to sleep. Instead, he stood at the back door-way and watches at the morning give way to dawn. Later, I would only hear stories of what took place between my grandmother and her daughter, my mother.  It was from this incident that I would began a journey, my own research into understanding my mother's madness. I would also learn to understand her adulterous behavior with my father and as my father's wife, that rage that had her on a path.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Words got to my father months later when he learned that I was living with my grandparents.  He would make the journey home to see me.  He already know the story.</B></div> <div> <B>My mother would confirmed to all of Tillbury, just how evil and insane she was.</B></div> <div> <B> ..................... </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>1980: November 13</B><B> </B></div> <div> <B>I arrived home for my father's funeral. News of his death came when I was on my job. My aunt's husband came to get me from my workplace. Somehow, I know. I had a strange dream the night before. I saw my grandfather, and two other family members waving to me. With a smiling glance, they were gone. Only, I didn't know it would be my father. It was my father. My father had passed away November 11, 1980. My father had said his goodbye to life, to living, and in his own way, a way one could describe as not just with pride and dignity, but with a deep sense of spiritualism.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>November 15: 1980</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>This day, I stopped at Mr. Russell's shop. Mass Stanley [Russell] told me he had a message from my father for me. I looked at him with 'questioning eyes' knowing that my father had died suddenly. Up until this point, I felt that he died suddenly, with only hours to spare. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Before Mr. Russell could give me the message, I asked him how did my father get to stop at his store to leave a message there. He reminded me of something that I never know. That over my life, my father knew more about me, my habits, my behavior, much more than I knew or think he knows. Mr. Russell replied by telling me, or perhaps reminding me that 'even after travelling the world', upon my trip home, I would </B><B>ALWAYS</B><B> come back, to 'stop by' to see him and his wife. That my father knew it, and so, it was with him, and his wife, that a week before my father's appointment with death, that he would leave his heartfelt message for me. I wasn't sure whether it was the message or the "keen observation of my path, my footstep," that my father had noted about me, that shocks me.  I accepted the message with a sense of fulfillment, wondering nothing, yet understanding the love my father had carried in his heart for me, so much that he would seek to leave a message for me, just before his death. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>It was in that message that I gain even a deeper understanding of the jealousy of my mother towards me, the jealousy of my three sisters, and the depth that they would go to seek my hurt. Upon my father death, I was to gain a deeper understanding into who I am. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>West Cliffe -</B></div> <div> <B>Chapter 19    Part II</B></div> <div> <B>1980 - It Was a Time of Sadness: ~136     </B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div> <B>The church service was long. The church was full. I went for a walk. </B></div> <div> <B>We arrived back at the yard, to be confronted by an even bigger crowd. The street, the huge yard was filled beyond capacity. The priest looked, and waved, and announced that he would go to sit in the house until another full viewing could be completed. I walked away from the crowd. I could not walked away. Every corner was filled. </B></div> <div> <B>The sun was setting, and the coffin was finally lowered. The covering was about to be moved into place. Just then I saw a man. He was running. He came running, and proceed to crawl through the fence. He was crying. Everyone watch in amazement. I was standing from a distance. I was standing off in the dance hall. He cried, "I need to see my son; I need to see my son." </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I looked in shock. Or was it in bewilderment. I was already in a state of shock from the death of my father. There was nothing else that could shock me now, or at this very moment.    I heard someone say, "you are late, you are too late bass."  </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>There was no time for asking what had happen to him. How could he be late to his own son's funeral, his first born? Yes, I could understand.  HE HAD WALKED all the way. He had walked all the way, those many miles, the same long lonely road- way that he had walked to court my grandmother; the way he came to have fathered my father. In my own pain, I admired his guts. Kaya had walked all the way from Little Bay through the woods; alone, alone to see his son, only to be late. </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>I looked at my brother, Honey. I signal with my hands; no words spoken. From a distance all eyes turns to see who gave the orders. The undertakers commence to retrieve the lowered coffin. My grandfather would be allowed to see his son's, his first born son's face. </B></div> <div> <B>It's no one else's business that he was late. </B></div> <div> <B>Later, he would tell me and my brother Honey, that his ride never showed up to take him to his son's funeral. He may have forgotten to tell someone to pick him up; I'm sure. We understood.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>It was dark when they seal the grave. A chapter of my life was over. It was a lived life.</B></div> <div> <B>Earlier on that day, around 2:00PM, the Hurst had driven by slowly. I heard it coming from the distance. I ran from the bathroom hurriedly finishing my bath. I run to the porch, as the Hurst slowly passed the house. Something came over me. Reality had hit home. That was Daddy's. That was the road, the last journey of daddy, in that hurst, going down the road, heading to the church up at Mt. Airy. </B></div> <div> <B>The sun had set on a day, a life, a lifetime..... </B></div> <bR> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B><IMG SRC="1c378670.jpg" border=0 width="120" height="103" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <B>The Circle</B></div> <div> <B>1994: I gave birth to a son. His birth would fulfill the answers to the mystery. </B></div> <div> <B>His birth would begin another chapter, of jealous amongst my family. </B></div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <TABLE BORDER="2" CELLPADDING="1" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="688" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#C0C0C0" BORDERCOLORDARK="#808080" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" > <tR> <tD VALIGN=CENTER BGCOLOR=#000000 HEIGHT= 57 WIDTH="678"><div> <I><B>This site and its pages are Copyright 1998-2008. Noamie's Negril- Jamaican Tea Room. All Rights Reserved. Web site Designed by: Noamie</B></I></div> <bR> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>