Tree Hives I really love my grandmother and her golden oldies jokes. She has one of those faces that Gordon Parks would’ve photographed to capture a poor black woman’s pains and joys at the same time. Beautiful rich, dark, wrinkled skin with a mold on the lower side of her left eye. She’s always smiling when she sees me, even though the teeth she has left look snaggled. Her smile use to bring joy in my face as a kid because it was so funny that she still had such a big smile, showing all of her few pearly whites she had left that didn’t seem white. Now she is sixty-nine years old with a rejuvenation in life. Every day at various times of the day she would call just to find out what I’m doing at that particular moment and let me know what she’s been up to, where she’s at, and whatever else she has to do later that day. It has become so routine that I’m dreading that I’m dreading the day when these sometimes aggravating call will no longer be made. Of course, there are times when the call can’t end quick enough, but conversation is the joy of old age which you rush. I remember the last time she called and reminded me of this inevitable fact on her sixty-ninth birthday. “Yo granma burday today” “Happy Birthday pretty lady, and how young are you today” “Yo favorite number” “Whatcha’ talkin’ ‘bout foxy momma?” “I was born in Nineteen-Thirty” “Oh nah, you didn’t say that did you?” “I’ll give you ten or fifteen mo’ years with me” She told me her plans for her birthday and asked me what I was getting her for her birthday. When she hung up the phone all I could think about was our endless conversations and how much she wanted my younger cousin, Pam who is barely seventeen, to slow down and do something with her life. From my grandma’s perspective the only way Pam is happy is if she was with gullible popular guy that she could use. Now my grandma is very happy despite having lost a long time boyfriend of twelve plus years along with her temporary sanity, which landed her in Thomasville Home for a while. Shortly after her then boyfriend, Bill, made her become a victim of domestic violence, she came to live with the rest of us at my aunt’s apartment, which was already crowded. My mom had lost her apartment, so the four of us, me, her, my two younger brothers, Anthony, and Christopher had no where else to go. My aunt had three kids of her own, Darrell, Calvin, and Pam. Darrell was three years older than me and two years older than Calvin. My aunt also had a boyfriend of eight years, Uncle Bobby, that lived there in the three bedroom apartment in the projects. The boys rotated two to a bunk bed, with one of us sleeping on the floor in a sleeping bag. My mom slept on the living room couch, while Pam resided in the day bed since my grandma had to sleep in her room. I remember the night I woke up to use the bathroom late one night and realized reality can confuse fiction in fear. While walking out of the bathroom I jumped in awe to find my grandma cowering seemingly at the sight of me. “I know that’s you behind that mask” “Whatcha’ talkin’ ‘bout grandma?” “I know that’s you, and stop making that noise” “That was just a movie grandma” “I see you behind that mask and yeen gone cut me” I could only stare at her, wondering why she was talking so silly and sincere with fear. The next morning my aunt told me that my grandma would be gone when we came in from school. I didn’t take it to heart until that afternoon when we came in from school to no one, but an empty house. None of us knew what was happening until Pam reminded us that they took grandma to a crazy folks home. My grandma’s absence didn’t bother Pam because she missed having the privacy of her own bedroom. Days came and went with frustrations, anticipating her return. Bill would come by whenever he was drunk to apologize almost every weekend. He’d tell us how much he love and miss his baby, while accusing us of hiding her from him because he needed her. The day of her release from Thomasville, patience was aggravating me seriously. I didn’t get a chance to see her on the day of her release because she wanted to stay in her house alone. Shortly after that Bill came back into her life peacefully and moved in with her. They still had problems as if they were a teenage couple, but he never hit her to my knowledge. About three months later, Bill died of a heart attack and left grandma alone in the house. She didn’t want to stay their by herself so we had to take turns spending the night with her, her migrated rats, and over populated roaches. Because of the smell that stanched in her house, we went back home in the mornings to take a shower after our night watch. She would walk with us down to my aunt’s house in the mornings since it wasn’t very far for her to walk. Her house wasn’t the most advanced, clean, or safest place a kid could spend the night, but each bee must attend their own to keep the hive. My grandma had two boys and two girls. My oldest Uncle Larry, then my Aunt Christine, my mother, and the youngest Uncle Curtis. They all had different dad’s supposedly, but Uncle Larry and Aunt Christine had the same last name. My uncles would bring their families to visit occasionally once a year. My grandma had three sisters and one brother to my knowledge, but she doesn’t know how many kids her dad outside of my great grandmother, which I never saw. My great grandparents escaped my eyes and I’ve never seen a picture of them. Outside of my grandma’s kids, the rest of our relatives were unknown to me, my cousins, brothers, and my younger sister Christina that lived with her dad’s parents. Christopher and Christina had the same dad, while Anthony never met his dad, and I visited mine every other summer. Years passed and everyone matured in different directions. Darrell moved to Atlanta after he got out of the army and got married. Calvin also moved to Atlanta with a female friend who is now five months pregnant from him. Anthony joined the Marines for a change of scenery. Christopher lived with his grandparents along with our sister, they are in high school. Pam dropped out of school and was in limbo, moving back and forth from Tifton to Miami, Virginia, and Texas. I was at a small junior college in our hometown, Tifton, playing basketball, anticipating transferring to Atlanta. My Uncle Bobby left my aunt for one of her so-called friends. My mom was no where to be found except on holidays or when she needed something. On summer Sundays people walked the streets and cruised around town having fun to pass time. I usually participated in these activities, but found great joy in walking my grandma to the store across from the car wash where everyone would eventually stop at. Grandma was in great shape for her age physically, but we only wonder about her mental condition. One Sunday as I was opening the door to the store for my grandma, I heard her say, “The same path I walked, she gone trample in” She was looking across the street at the car wash when she said this. Initially I was hoping she wasn’t having a mental relapse, but thank God that wasn’t the problem. She was staring at my cousin Pam who had snuck back in town without visiting her folks. She was already in the streets with her girls flirting with some guy driving a convertible sixty-seven Impala that had been put in the game. Grandma walked across the street to the car wash where Pam was. As I stood at the store watching her, I noticed my boys were also at the other end of the car wash trying to get my attention when suddenly, I heard a familiar voice raised, shouting, “I’m grown and I’ll go over their later. I don’t have time to hear this right now” I ran to the car wash to see what was transpiring. Pam was yelling at grandma in front of everyone. When she saw me coming up to her she hopped in the car with someone and they took off in a hurry. She knew my temper and how I felt about her disrespectful ways. My anger was evident as I walked my grandma home to my aunt’s house. I tried to be peaceful, but when I got there, for some reason, my mom was also back. I only looked at her when my boys pulled up outside to see if I was ready to roll. “All I can say is pray for her” “Pray for who, she ain’t nobody!” As they talked about Pam and her situation, I didn’t care anymore. Nothing redeems being disrespectful to your elders, especially your grandmother. I was mad hot, thirty-eight degrees Celsius. If Pam was a dehydrating in the dessert, I wouldn’t have pissed on her. I didn’t pray for her that night and the next day my aunt told me that some guy left Pam stranded at a distant motel. She had to call a cab to get come home crying on my aunt’s shoulder. They guy left her there since she wasn’t worth his time and money he spent on her. I thought about what my grandma said at the store when she first saw Pam at the car wash with a shocked expression on her face. Since grandma had been through so much maybe she knew this would eventually happen. She didn’t even mention the car wash incident to Pam. She did let her know that a poor loving man can give you luxuries money can’t afford and popularity can’t replace. “Everyone knows love when you have nothing to offer but attention and mental support. You love negative attention. The pot can’t call the kettle black, but a good man would not have done this. Heed my words by my experience or find out the hard way running the streets.” Standing on the porch at this time, my grandma’s words made the anger in my heart for Pam criticize both of them. My grandma which I viewed so highly despite her lessons learned shouldn’t try to help this girl who thinks she’s grown. My grandma probably was Pam at one point in time, but if that is the case then how did she put up with Bill? If she learned her lesson then why did she end up with this old womanizing drunk who didn’t appreciate her until after she was sent off. There were good men and women in the community that hadn’t got caught up in the street life, even though it surrounds them daily. I’ve seen old guys winking their eyes at my grandma when we use to walk to the store. People worked eight hour jobs, legally stable, not accepting short term fame, money, or illegal security. They started safely while they were young to build a slow steady foundation that still stands strong and secure now that they have kids. Was my grandma a hood rat that viewed these type of men too boring or not cool enough for my grandma to give my grandma the kind of attention she desired. Pam still hasn’t kept in touch. She usually just calls collect or drops in as a last resort of stability after someone has kicked her out or she has no money. Was this my grandmother? Maybe that’s why we have such a distant family and she no longer has the things she bragged about in her picture albums. So many different hives in the branches of the tree have fell off. Even though we have different parents, grandparents, cousins, aunts, uncles, lifestyles, and ways, we should find time to keep the hives in communication in the same tree. There can be more than just prodigal sons, but also prodigal families, daughters, cousins, and distant relatives that find a way to keep the hive going on a different branch of our family tree….If they are willing!
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