“Hurry
up and put some clothes on! Your Pop pop is coming to visit!” My mother yelled
up the steps. “Ugh!” I moaned. I loved Pop pop but truth be told – that man was
going crazy. His hair, white and fuzzy like cotton balls, his hands old and
wrinkly, his potbelly always round and full. Every time Pop pop came over, he
always wanted to tell me about his day at the senior citizen center and bingo and
shit. To be honest, I loved Pop pop but I was not in the mood for the today. I
was tired, hung over and just really trying to eat and go back to bed but of course,
I knew mama was not going to let that happen.
“I
said get up! Pop pop is-“
“Mama
I heard you!” I screamed back down the stairs.
“Watch
your tone with me boy” Mama yelled back up the stairs.
I never understood my mother’s
logic. She’d scream all day to get her point across and as soon as you as you
start using your voice box and digging deep into the baritone of your voice –
she always felt a need to put you in check. But that’s mama for you. Throwing
on my black addias sweatpants off the floor and slithering over my legs and
tossing a white tee across my chest- I was heading down stairs. To be honest, I
was quite happy to be out my room. The smell of food was luring me closer and
closer to the kitchen. The smell of southern mac and cheese, fried flounder,
collard greens, sweet yams and apple pie filled the kitchen.
“Jesus!
Ma! You in here cooking up a storm for ya boy!” I said playfully kissing her
fore head.
“Boy,
This wasn’t even made with you in mind! This is for my father; he’ll be here in
three minutes! And comb your hair boy! You looking all kinds of crazy” Mama
said petting my dusty brown curls.
“Nah,
I like my hair ma! The ladies love it” I replied, being cooler than ever.
“Well
when you living with them ladies, you can do what they like but up in here – I like
my boy groomed and looking like perfection like your father” She said matter of
factly.
“Come
on mama bear, Papa bear aint nothing but a square!” I joked her off.
“Yeah
but a square that got it going on!” Mama joked right back.
“ew ma” I shot back.
I hated to hear my mom even talk
about sex like come on, that’s my mother. She pose to cook me food and bake me
cookies – not do the nasty. It was just wrong. I begin to hear the keys of the
front door open and when I looked up, there was my dad and Pop Pop. My father
was just like me, tall dark and handsome. My father and I had all the same
traits from the big lips, blue eyes, and wet sand skin and arched eyebrows. I
had my mother’s dimples and eye shape, so they say. People always said that I looked
like the combination of them both.
Pop
Pop was standing there looking at me. A bag with fruit in one hand and a cane
in the other. It was kind of hard to see him with it. As long as I have known
Pop pop – which is my whole life, I never ever saw him walk with a cane so to
see him with one now was a little, disturbing.
“Aye
what’s up Pop Pop?” I said, leaning into him to give him a hug. His chest
leaned into mine because simply that was all he could do with all his hands
being tied up. One glued to a bag a fruit and one leaning on a cane.
“Hey
son, how are you!” He greeted me back.
“Let
me take that fruit from you” I replied feeling sorry for my little feller. He
seemed more fragile than I ever seen him before.
“Oh
thanks son! The church gave it to me. I thought you might like it. Its gots
oranges, pears and stuff. You like that stuff right! I have lots at home! So feel
free to come and get some whenever you like okay, sonny boy!”
“You
got it Pop Pop!” I answered back, ushering him into the table.
My mother was done fixing plates
when we all arrived into the kitchen. After kissing Pop Pop on the forehead,
she said grace and we begin digging in. For the first time in my life,
observing my Pop Pop and mother at the same time – I realized how much they looked
alike. Both the color of wheat bread, eyes big and the brown color of sweet
tea. Pop Pop’s freckles and my mother’s freckles both danced on the same exact
places on both their faces. It was incredible how much they look alike to the
straight eyebrows to the button noses. Mama was just Pop Pop with a wig in my
opinion. All of us too hungry to talk
while eating – we dived into our food. The only thing that could be heard was
the sounds of forks clanking on fine china and the fish aquarium purifier
roaring. After washing down the
delicious dinner with sweet tea and apple pie, we all climbed into the family
room to watch family feud, Pop Pop’s favorite show. After two episodes, I grew
tired from good food and laughs and found myself climbing up the stairs to go
back to bed.
“Hey!
Wake up sonny! I wanna ask you a question” Pop Pop shook me softly.
Shaking out of my sleep I leaned
up, one hand on the bed and one hand rubbing my sleepy eyes.
“Yeah
Pop Pop , What’s up?” I asked.
“Hey,
can I have this picture?” He replied, holding the picture with his old hand
quivering.
It was a picture of my grandmother,
his wife, Jamie. She was wearing a beautiful turban hat with her hair in pin
curls. An expensive, long leather coat gracing her curves – her hand gently lying
on her fresh face. Her eyes soft and gentle, how I always remembered it. My grandmother’s
eyes always made me feel at home – it’s like they always screamed “I am your
nana and I was made to love you!”
‘Sure
Pop Pop! I don’t mind , you can have it” I answered but my curiosity couldn’t help
me catch my tongue fast enough so I asked “ I’m just curious, but why you want
it”.
“Do
you mind if I take a seat?” Pop Pop asked.
“Please,
yes! No problem” I exclaimed moving to make him some room on the bed to get comfortable.
Pop Pop cleared his throat and then
he began: “Well I don’t know if you know this or not but this is a picture from
me and your grandmothers first date. I told her if she didn’t take a picture
for me then I wasn’t taking her for ice cream after dinner. Ha Ha Ha! She always
had a sweet tooth. But I’m going to be honest with you sonny – I miss your
grandmother. I miss her like hell. I miss her like the sun misses the earth and
how the earth misses the moon. I miss her voice, her laugh, her soft hands and those
eyes. Sonny, I tell you those eyes are the reason I married her. She stole my
soul every time she glared at me with them big things. I miss those beautiful
lips and that cute nose. I miss the way she smelled like vanilla right after
the shower or how she would get flour on the handle of coffee cup in the
morning while she was baking pies. I miss the way she leaned on my chair when I
was watching family feud and how she would lay the blanket on me when I would
fall asleep on the couch. But what I miss most sonny, what I miss most is being
able to look at her and feel okay – to feel safe. She always had this positivity
about her that made me know everything would be alright. I would lose my job
and come home furious - she’d kiss my hand while holding it and say “We gon be
alright, honey” – she always knew how to keep it together when I felt like losing
it all. Jamie was my best friend, my light at the end of the tunnel, my world,
my wife and I’m lost without her. I was at McDonald’s the other day just
sitting there with a two hour old coffee , as if McDonalds coffee isn’t bad
enough, stuck – because I didn’t know what to do with myself. I go to the
doctors sometimes and I don’t know what’s wrong. I don’t know if I am really
having chest pains or is the pain of losing my heart, my soulmate. I know I’m losing it. You
probably think I am crazy sometimes – but understand that my sanity left when
she did. A lot of times I didn’t understand how god could do that to me. Just
take my best friend and leave me. To just take all I know and up and leave me
to fend for myself. But she was suffering and I could no longer let my
selfishness keep her here. I couldn’t bear see her in that hospital – at times I
felt like I needed a bed myself. She would always say “baby I’m in pain.” And I
never knew what to do or how to keep it together. I wasn’t the strong one – she
was. So you see sonny, mentally I have
been lost a long time. I’ve been gone. But I see this picture sitting on your
desk and for the first time in five years – I feel okay, I feel safe and I don’t
feel lost. I feel with her and let me tell you something. That is something I haven’t
felt for 1,826 days and 21 hours.
