Love Me as I Am Read online

  We landed in Boston during the dead of winter. There were mounds of blinding white snow everywhere. Everywhere it looked like the pictures I had seen of Christmas. Gone were the brightly colored fragrant flowers and the swaying palm trees. In their place, dirty, slippery snow and dripping icicles. It was unbearably freezing. If you know anything about Boston you know that cold is never just cold. During the first few days, I thought I had gained magical powers because I could see smoke coming out of my mouth whenever it opened. The magic faded pretty quickly when I realized that attached to this magically white wonderland were fingers and toes that were so painfully frozen, I thought I would die. My cute ponytails that I loved so much would freeze like ice cubes if they weren’t fully dried after washing my hair. This actually felt like hell compared to the tropical, warm paradise life I had just left.

  Another huge issue: I spoke Creole and French. I didn’t speak a lick of English—not one drop! This made me feel very nervous and shy at first because people would look at me and say something, and I would look back with a blank stare, blinking endlessly. I knew they were talking to me because they were looking right at me and moving their lips, but there was absolutely no comprehension. Completely white noise. I was a smart child in Haiti, so my mother told me. Because I didn’t speak the language when I arrived in Boston, I wasn’t able to attend school right away. It was the 1970s, and public schools weren’t set up to nurture and support new immigrant students and their families. I taught myself English by watching Sesame Street religiously. Try teaching a little immigrant girl, who didn’t speak a drop of English, how to spell Massachusetts! Thank God for Big Bird and the Count . . . they really had my back.

  The America, and more specifically Peabody, Massachusetts, in the 1970s that this little brown-skinned Haitian girl landed in was neither a kind nor a familiar one. Diversity was not a priority or on the radar of my town. As a child, I didn’t realize the inner strength I was building but, as an adult, I am grateful for my journey and the toughness I found through it.

  I remember being the only Black girl in my entire school. Think about that for a minute. There were no other kids that looked like me at all. Going from an environment where everyone in my school looked like me and spoke like me to an all-white school was instant culture shock. For a kid who was already shy this was the worst position to be in. I stood out like a sore thumb. To say that Massachusetts was slow to embrace cultural differences is putting it mildly.

  Once I started school, I loved it despite being different. I remember being so excited to start my new adventure and go to school on the first day. What I also remember is that adults and kids kept touching my skin and feeling my hair because they had never seen anything like them up close and personal. Despite the rough initiation, I assimilated well and began to make friends easily. I also enjoyed my usual milestone achievements, such as my First Communion. Mine was a pretty typical Catholic schoolgirl childhood. During my junior high and high school, I even gained enough confidence to become very active in the student council and joined almost every after-school club there was. I would sing, dance, and cheer louder and harder than anyone else. I loved being a cheerleader because I could be expressive and dramatic. I could yell, scream, jump around, and act crazy, all things I couldn’t do at home. This was a great way to release some pent-up energy and teenage angst. I also loved the energy you would feel from the crowds and the encouragement they gave when we performed. It was magical.

  Ignited by my love for cheering, I was developing a love of performing in general. I did every form of dance imaginable—jazz, ballet, tap, and any other class my mother could find. It married my two passions: music and moving my body to a beat. I would mastermind little plays and performances and coax my friends into participating. Yes, of course, I was always the lead and directing everyone into position and keeping them all on cue. I would excitedly gather my family around and sandwich them into our small living room to watch us perform. After a few awkwardly coordinated two-step sequences, shimmies, and some flamboyant twirls for good measure, we would take our final bows. We even had the audacity to request donations afterward. I distinctly remember my brother would only throw pennies at us after all our “hard work.” Even then, I knew my talents were being completely undervalued. What a cheapskate!

  My mother loved music too, causing me to love and dread the weekends equally because she would blast music and dance around all day long as she cooked and cleaned. At the time, it was even a little too much for me. Classical, reggae, jazz, merengue, compas—you name it, she played it. Religion, and going to church, was still a big part of our lives. Every Sunday, my mom would make sure we wore our Sunday best and religiously shuttle us off to church. Reflecting on my youth now as a grown woman, I see how the love of music my mom instilled in me has taken root. Music is all around me whenever I’m at home. It’s like another part of the family.

  The challenges of fitting in were not only happening outside of our home. My mother, who was a very proud Haitian woman, had a hard time loosening the reins so we could fully adapt to the new American way of life. Whenever she saw us doing or saying something that wasn’t “typically Haitian,” she would yell “Remember you’re not American, you’re Haitian!” This was such a confusing concept because as far as I saw it, I was here in America.

  As I got a bit older, I would defiantly respond by saying, “If you didn’t want us to be like Americans, why did you even bring us here?” Even though I was responding logically, I never listened to the unspoken meaning behind her words. I now understand that her statements had nothing to do with logic. They were uttered based on an internal fear that she was battling in her mind. It was a fear that must have made her constantly second-guess her immigration from her homeland. She feared we’d fall so much in love with American ways that we would forget everything about who we were and where we came from. That we would slowly lose our foundational roots. To her, it must have felt like we were in danger of losing our souls.

  You see, that’s the love-hate relationship that many first-generation immigrants have with the process of assimilation. We are never running from the richness of our culture; we are running toward the hope of new perceived opportunities.

  I credit my trips to Dorchester, Massachusetts, to visit my cousins with giving me a love and appreciation for R & B music. To this day, it’s my favorite and it speaks to my soul. Living in Peabody’s mostly white community, I was never exposed to many Black people or Black culture. When I first met my cousins, I quickly realized that they were born in Colombia and only spoke Spanish, and I only spoke Creole French and very little English at the time. So what did we do? We would play, and there would be very few words spoken, but we still had a blast. Even though being skinny didn’t bother me as much anymore, I remember always being envious of my cousin, Josanne, who looked like Thelma from the show Good Times. God, I wanted to have a shape like hers! All the guys would adoringly flutter around her and give her all the attention. She had big, beautiful curves in all the right places—all the things I never had. I just loved being next to her and basking in the glow from her admirers.

  I couldn’t get enough of my trips to see my cousins. We would hang out on the stoop listening to the latest music on our boom box. We loved taking note of the people walking by going about their daily errands. I loved, loved, loved seeing all the Black faces and smiles—they were electric, and it reminded me of living in Haiti. It was like looking into a mirror all the time. They made me feel warm and at home. I treasured seeing how my cousins acted and interacted with each other and their friends. To me, they acted just like the American kids did, and I was in awe. It was all new and very different from the Haitian culture because these American kids were allowed to be a little loud and rowdy and inwardly I loved it. When we would venture out to Boston, I would see Black people working in stores and behind desks. It was positively mind-blowing. I couldn’t explain the difference, Boston was just different from Peabody, where I lived. Just m
ore relaxed, familiar, and more welcoming. These times visiting my cousins and venturing out of our bubble were transformative for me.

  My mom and I were very, very close. She was affectionate, but not overly affectionate. Her way of showing love was to buy me little things. Marie Claire—KeKe, as everyone called her—was an old school “girlie girl.” She loved to dress up and smell nice. She always put herself together and fixed herself up with colorful clothes and her hair was always done. She was a strong woman who took great pride in her appearance and showed me how to do the same. I would beg her for these cute pink plastic kitten heel slippers that I loved. She would buy them and I’d wear them constantly. Actually, I would love them right into the ground and they’d break and I would be a wreck. She would give in and buy me a new pair and the cycle would start all over again. I guess that’s how my shoe fetish started. A beautiful pair of shoes are my Achilles’ heel even until this day. I loved playing dress up in her closet, trying on her beautiful sparkly, colorful clothes, pretending to be all grown up with important places to go!

  My brother Maurice was the first to leave home. He chose to fully embrace American culture and enlist in the army. My mom was taking classes to learn how to teach and care for kids with disabilities. She was also a nurse who worked the 3:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. shift, which made me a proud latchkey kid. I would come home from school and I’d let myself in, or I would stay at home by myself until everybody else came home. Either my sisters would cook, or my mom would cook before she left and leave it on the stove. There were no sitters and helpers; we all pitched in and did our part to make the household run. At some point, my mom started dating a man named Kwaku, not sure how he spelled it. I remember him being a huge, sturdy man who seemed nice enough until that one questionable day.

  One day, I got home from school early and let myself into the house. My mom hadn’t made it home yet. As I entered the front door, I realized that I wasn’t alone because Kwaku was there too. I guess he had his own key. Not only was he there, I remember he was in the bathroom because I heard the shower running. Initially, I didn’t think anything of it. I nonchalantly made my way to the kitchen and made myself a snack, as was my normal routine. As I was taking my food back to my bedroom, I heard the door to the hallway bathroom slowly begin to creak open. It caused me to slow my stride because I was preparing to say a cordial hello to Kwaku. To my shock and horror, when the door fully opened, I saw him standing there completely naked! I mean not a stich of clothing to be found anywhere on him. The only thing he was wearing was a really weird smile, which made me super uncomfortable. For a split second, I was frozen in place because I’d never seen a naked man before. When I snapped out of it, I ran into my room, slammed the door, and locked it tightly behind me. I also made a point of sliding my dresser over to barricade myself in. The next day, when I finally saw my mom, I told her about the incident. I can’t recall exactly how the exchange between us went, but what I do remember is that the next day she broke up with Kwaku and I never laid eyes on him again.

  My mother was very protective of me. I wasn’t allowed to have sleepovers at friends’ homes. Even when it came to other family members, she never allowed me to sleep over at anyone’s house if she wasn’t there too. Looking back now, I think she was acutely aware of the unspeakable things that could happen to a young girl even at the hands of those closest to you. Perhaps she had experienced something traumatic in her own youth that caused her to be leery. I can’t say for sure, but I do know that sleepovers were her redline that she didn’t cross. Ever!

  When I turned sixteen, my mom decided to ditch Boston for warmer surroundings and moved us to Miami, Florida. During the time of our big relocation, I had a huge dance recital coming up that would have been thrown into disarray because of the shift. Remarkably, she let me stay behind with my dance teacher so I could do this recital and finish off my time in Boston, going out in a blaze of glory.

  Now, this was living! This geographical move made more sense to me. I instantly took to the familiar warmth, vibrant colors, and palm trees. I was also super excited to go to a more diverse school again where kids looked like me, had hair like me, and shared similar cultures. Or so I thought. At the time, she had other family members living there too. Initially, I was enrolled into Norland Senior High School in Miami. When I got to the school, my transition wasn’t all roses and lollipops, as I had imagined. I stood out because I was the new tall girl, but also because I apparently spoke proper English, or like “a white girl,” as the kids coined it. Instantly the girls hated me and constantly threatened to beat me up after school. According to them, I didn’t fit in because they said I thought I was white. Imagine the irony. Me, a little brown girl from Haiti who loved her Blackness “apparently” thought she was white . . . go figure. This was another dose of culture shock and a real head-scratcher for me. My mom, on the other hand, saw that there were a lot of girls popping up pregnant at the school, and that was enough for her. She promptly said, “Oh no, you’re not staying in this school!” Quick like a bunny I found myself enrolled in North Miami Beach High School.

  Did I say earlier that I never saw my father again after he left for “ice cream” when I was about three? Well, that’s not 100 percent accurate. Just like the puff of smoke he disappeared in, he returned in the same mysterious fashion when I was around fifteen. I came home from high school one day and he was just there, assuming the role of head daddy in charge!

  When he returned to our family for the second and final time, there were no explanations or apologies for his thirteen-year absence. No signs of brain damage or amnesia to potentially explain his absence. He just jumped right back into the driver’s seat and took the reins of control. This man who knew nothing about me was there trying to tell me what I could and couldn’t do.

  Candidly, I admit that I never connected with my dad. If I had to describe this stranger in five words, I would use “distant,” “cold,” “stern,” “bookworm,” and “quiet.” I remember the first night he came back, and we were having dinner, just me, him, and my mom, who was standing by the kitchen sink and I said, “Mom, can you grab me a fork, please?”

  Before she could even get a chance to respond, he jumped in and said, “No, you go get the fork yourself!” Immediately, a wave of disgust ran through me. All I could think was who the heck does this guy think he is? I didn’t understand why he was back in our lives and definitely didn’t see the need for him. We had been doing just fine; my mom had figured it all out. He brought a negative type of energy to our home that had once been a happy one.

  His presence definitely caused noticeable fault lines and cracks in the relationship between my mother and me. Nothing I could do was good enough or right in his eyes. If I would bring home a B on my report card, he would say, “It should have been an A.” I remember my mother going out of her way to include him by inviting him to a play or dance recital and he would turn around and ask her, “Why do I need to go to that?” He never came. My father hardly smiled and created such an oppressive cloud over our house. If a boy dared to call me on the phone, he would be on the other line, trying to listen. I’d quickly hang up once I realized he was eavesdropping. Whenever I had friends come over to the house, they would pick up on his unwelcoming energy and it would mortify me. He actually earned the nickname Ayatollah from my friends and me because he was notoriously unfriendly and scary. My mother was suddenly no longer a factor because she conceded her power to him. She receded into the background in our household and became invisible.

  Axel Jean-Pierre had missed out on so much of my life and never exhibited any regret or pangs of loss for doing so. He never saw my use or value and sadly gave me the impression that he never thought I would amount to anything. One day I would prove him wrong.

  At some point, I stopped interacting with him completely and things became really frosty at home. This spilled over to my relationship with my mother, and I became disconnected from her as well. My new routine would be to come hom
e from school and go straight into my room. I began to release frustration by creating drawings of tombstones with my name, birth date, and the current date drawn on the front. I was signaling that I was dying. So dramatic, I know; no wonder I became an actress! I prayed that they’d find the pictures and think I had died. I was hurting inside and felt like I was dying a slow death. Was it just the dramatic antics of a teenage girl, or was it a not so secret cry for help?

  I would have nightmares that he was very mean to my mother and physically abusive to her, but I can’t confirm if I actually saw anything in reality. Was it a waking nightmare? Have I suppressed some memories too difficult to face? I also remember consistently dreaming of a far-off doorway that I could never reach. I felt trapped. All I know is that when he lived with us, I developed very protective feelings for my mom. It was weird because this was a woman who had protected me my whole life. The roles had been reversed when he returned.

  I recently saw an old picture of me with my dad when I was really young. My sister sent it to me because I had to use it for The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (RHOBH). I was laughing in the picture, but I don’t remember many times like that between us. I felt no connection to that laughing little girl sitting on her dad’s lap. I wish I knew what she was laughing at.

  I don’t understand what my mother saw in my dad to make her love him so much. I got the feeling that he was the love of her life out of all four of her husbands. Correction, three husbands. She married that bastard twice! Don’t ask me why. To me there were no redeeming or endearing qualities. I couldn’t grasp how my mother could be so strong, confident, and decisive before him and then flip the switch to crawl under his thumb. Haitian tradition is that the men rule the roost; or so they thought. My dad ruled everything. My mom always waited for him to get home before we could eat, and he would always get fed first. He didn’t wash a dish or a cup in our house. He just looked on from his throne on high. And he was short too.