Yes, Mother!
Every spring since we moved here, a mother Sparrow makes her nest on the perch of the main beam that holds up our little balcony. When it first happened, I felt how one feels when you see a roach in your good-good house or some insect. To be honest, it was a little gross at first; I considered it my duty to report it to management. For a second, I forgot I grew up in the bush around my grandmother’s barble doves and various bush birds. But in my present life,it was ruining the ambiance. How dare pests! I thought. But afterwards I felt bad, considered the socioeconomic climate of this world…the raw deal mothers get. My common sense, empathy and a little Robin hood heroism came over me, and I thought well there’s this huge rent; we are hardly home; we hardly use the porch, I may as well share the place with another mother. What’s the harm? And well mothers have to look out for other mothers when we can.
Now people who teach other people about figurative devices and other nonsense like this know what I’m talking about. Ascribing human characteristics to animals is known as Anthropomorphism. Some people call it personification, but it’s not the same thing. Anthropomorphism is unique to animals. We humans think of animals as having the same traits, emotions, or plans as we do. That’s why my grandmother used to cuss out the dogs and call them “ol ungrateful rectobate” when they’d fight over their dinner. My grandmother acted as if they were going to feel a way and examine themselves, then atone and apologize. I did know then even as a kid that dogs tend to have the personalities of their owners though…but okay Grannie.
So this morning, I woke up to power washers washing down the outside of the building and gushes of water knocking against the balcony door. Maintenance had been doing external cleaning and face lifting, touching up the apartment complex. (Obviously to raise the rent)When they finished, I looked out and everything was wet, power washed down and supposedly clean and ready for repainting. Do you know those monsters intentionally (or by accident) even washed away mommy bird’s nest? With all of her eggs?? I know…I know. It’s the people doing their jobs and we all know how that goes…but damn man! Not the nest!
It reminded me of something that happened when I was a little girl. It was about 1990, and my sister and I used to walk miles to school. We used to walk to school with the most beautiful little girl I had ever known in my whole seven year old life. HER dad used to walk with us sometimes. I was always whimsical, and I admired this little girl with a kind of jealous adminiration. Her little face was big and round and yellowish red and bright and pretty. Her hair was thick and long in plaits and bubbles, and she was always happy. Her name was Diana I think. The little girl was sooo pretty and precocious and fun and neat and clean and everybody loved her. U know sey…One morning when we got down to the little girl’s gate there was a crowd; people milling about, buzzing around. On top of the little red dirt hill, the family’s little board house was now a small blackened mound with thin swirls of smoke coming out of it. We couldn’t go look, but apparently in the night her mom had gone to the shop. She left the babies in the house, with a lamp or candles, and the house burnt flat to the ground with Diana and her little sister inside. I imagine this mother bird felt the same way that mother did when she came back home. Imagine! They reprobate them destroy the woman whole nest with her babies and tings. The twigs she brought one-by-one to build the nest were down there on the floorboards, and everything mash up.
About thirty minutes after the great demolition when everything was wet and mushy out there, did you know the mother bird came back. She flew back to her “nest” only to discover it gone? The poor thing sat there like a little, brown lump of clay staring out into space on the wet, empty beam perch wondering what the fuck is this life and how people can wicked so. I went back inside to make eggs for breakfast, and she eventually flew off into the nearest tree chirping, bawling, wailing and knashing her teeth, and I don’t know what she’s gonna do now, but dammit man…
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In the last week or so one of my lil ones from Wolmers sent me some articles and such about one of her school mates, a young mother Tiana James who died at 25 years old, and days later her baby also died. This was particularly sad because my best friend used to teach her, and I still remember her little 13 year old self running around from Computer Lab to lunch line to form class: young, happy, big life ahead and didn’t expect no shit like this to reach her. Someone said it was childbirth and complications and neglect and wickedness. Then, because trouble no set like rain, the very same week, same week, I was scrolling through Twitter and saw a hashtag about #justiceforjodian where like deja vu another young mom, Jodian Fearon again died. Only 25yrs old, she was rejected from Andrews Hospital where she was scheduled (SCHEDULED!!) to give birth, yet turned away by not only the ol germs dem up at the hospital responsible for her but by several other hospitals. Wait! Wait! This is the good part: the woman was turned away from the hospital because she was…wait for it…she was sick! Really?? Do you remember how the innkeepers turned away Mary and Joseph when they were looking for a place to birth baby Jesus?? And they ended up in some nasty, unsafe stable somewhere? Same way.
I was telling my friend that trust and believe, sometimes when the only thing you know is trauma and horrific conditions, you become accustomed to it so much so that you don’t know anything else and accept it as normal. I remember giving birth at UWI in July 2016, and during labour I kept passing out so much that I was in labour for maybe 7 hours, and to this day I can only remember maybe an hour of the day when they wheeled me in for an emergency C-section. The surgery went well, but the aftercare was so shitty that I do with it what I do with awful memories, bury them deeply until something triggers. I’m telling you, I thought at the time that that was perfectly acceptable condition for childbirth. After all, that’s what I knew. This was until at my big age, my friend gave birth last year in a good,good hospital and I was like wow! Then wait dey, I gave birth in the pits of hell then?? I remember asking the nurse after Emma was born, and she basically chuck her on my chest after my C-section, I was like how come I’m not seeing milk running down. I thought that your milk automatically started flowing once you gave birth. The woman gave me a dirty look, rolled her eyes, and said something along the lines of: if you don’t breastfeed how milk must come? Ask anyone, the post partum period is one of the toughest stages of mothering .
Baby, if you are like me and didn’t grow up around babies…well…oooh baby! Now I’m not blaming the hospital for my subsequent depression and ignorance and feelings of illpreparedness and dread. My life wasn’t necessarily great either. In hindsight, getting pregnant, deciding to become someone’s mother isn’t any ol simple milestone, and you need three basic things: money, money and some more money. I had none of the above. I’m simply saying when you are sick and sensitive, hospital care is crucial: someone being kind to you, helping you, clean bathrooms, a quiet environment, good facilities, soft words, someone checking on you and baby, showing you little things you wouldn’t know. These do a world of good for your body and mind and recovery. When I was in my late teens and twenties with nobody telling me what to do and frolicking from pillow to pillow, I remember these urban legends about childbirth. People would say midwives at Jubilee hospital would beat young mothers as punishment for getting pregnant. And that you would have to give birth on the floor if you weren’t lucky to get on one of the two-to-a-bed beds. They say myths and legends have basis in truth so I’m not sure, but can you imagine the current pain of the mothers of these deceased young mothers? I told my sister that if it were my family I’d kick out someone’s throat because things would have been different if it were say (insert rich uptown lady’s name) daughter. Now I can’t even fight except with words, and I’ve never been in a real brawl yet, but wickedness like this would make even Jesus bex and tun ova tables man! A friend of mine scoffed a little at what she feels is the ‘extraness’ of the whole momma bear concept with people and their children. You know, the whole I’ll kill you for, I don’t play about my baby, animalistic, savage urge to nasty up someone over your kid?
Reminds me of the epic Anglo Saxon old poem Beowulf: typical big strapping hero man fighting the huge scary monster who was terrorizing the village and gobbling up the residents. In these stories, we always hear about the monster or villain and immediately develop repulsion for this character in lieu of cheering on the hero. Who has time to think about the villain and his feelings, and how his daddy was a cruff, and so he grew up angry etc etc.? Anyway, after Beowulf murders the monster Grendel and thought everything was dandy, he was in for a rude awakening. The monster’s MOTHER buck him up the next morning, and a blood bath of epic proportions ensued. Talk about being “extra”…and she almost won too- driven by the need to avenge her son’s death. You see, every monster’s mom sees her kid as…well…as her kid. It really is that simple. And extra or not, once you go through childbirth for most of us it’s a very instinctual, animalistic urge to kick out someone’s throat over your kid. Im saying I do hope the mothers or the family of these women rip the hospitals a new asshole and create a major scene: blood bath and mangled body parts and demolition. Metaphorically. I hope they go for their throats and keep at it even if it takes years and years. Hey! To show you how they fucked up and don’t give a fuck, Andrews Hospital had some goddamn nerve to issue some glib bad grammar briefing on a little piece a dutty paper with a likkle letter head basically saying “ummm…oooops!!”
Consider the socioeconomic climate of this world…the raw deal mothers get, the raw deal poor and working class mothers get, hell…all women and you’d get sanctimoniously mad too. One of my stay home Covid reads is “The Testaments” by Margaret Atwood. It’s the sequel to “A Handmaid’s Tale”, and it is a really good book about the different perspectives of womanhood in a rigid regime. At one point, one of the little girls frustrated with the feeling of mystery, duty boundedness yet powerlessness of being a woman says, “the adult female body was one big booby trap…If there was a hole, something was bound to be shoved into it and something else was bound to come out…there were so many things that could be done to it or go wrong with it, this adult female body, that I was left feeling I would be better off without it.”
Right???
Look, my cousin’s wife is having a baby at Andrews in maybe another week or so…and she’s in perfect health and everything, but I’m just saying Andrews Hospital and the Ministry of Health in general. SOCIETY. Need to get their shit together, and do better for the citizens…the mothers of Jamaica. The world.
Period.
