Clay Street

Before I write anything about my life, I often start off with a reality or a so-called flaw about myself. It's my way of working through my own patterns and behaviors and simply being as transparent as I can be as I navigate my relationships with other people.

Last night, I spent time talking to my youngest sister. We often go on and on about things from dating to goals to family, and our conversations leave me with so many ideas and so many questions at the same time. See, she and I are half sisters, but blood couldn't make us any closer. However, we've had such a rocky road when it comes to building and cultivating relationships with our dad's side of the family. There's so much that we want to know, but it's a little harder for us to actually ask those questions. I think it's in part because we are afraid that we won't get answers or maybe that we won't get answers that we like. Well tonight we got on the subject of our grandmother and how we wish we knew more. Out of nowhere, I recited her address and we looked up a picture of her house on Google. My sister asked how I knew it, and it dawned on me that it was just one of those things embedded in my memory.

There's such a wild coincidence that I recall when I think of that house. I met a friend in college. My ex-boyfriend and her fiance' are best friends to this day. She and I hit it off instantly, and we're still really good friends. Well, for my 30th birthday, we went to New Orleans with another friend and two of my sisters. After much talk about any and everything, we discovered that my college friend grew up right around the corner from my grandmother. She knew her! I didn't meet my friend until we were about 19 years old, but she had known my grandmother practically her whole life, before she even knew me! Tears flowed at that realization. She talked about how sweet my grandmother was and how everybody loved her. That ended up being a super emotional day because the mimosas were flowing, and our feelings were all over the place.

Now, that aforementioned flaw in my personality is the fact that I can remove so much from my memory that I forget its value. Not just ideas or concepts, but also people and emotions. I forget to feel. It's not an inability. I can feel if I want to. I just really have to think about it. Isn't that strange? I just straight up forget to feel. I believe I've used this as a coping mechanism. I can highlight some of the best parts of my life, but I've spent so much time blocking out the things that hurt that I forget everything in the middle. It's kind of like that Adam Sandler movie, "Click." A lot of the in between, the things that require mindfulness, I've missed because of pain. I used to associate certain songs, certain days, certain pictures with the pain from the time period, and in an effort to heal, I would avert.

I met my grandmother for the first time when I was 13 years old. My father took me to Washington, D.C. during the summer. He showed me where he grew up. Where he went to school. He told me about all the things he enjoyed. After traveling to some of his favorite parts of his city, we stopped in front of a cute, tiny house on the corner, surrounded by a fence. Clay Street. We knocked on the door, and my grandmother greeted us with a smile. She was so regal, so spiritual. I had never met a person alive who actually celebrated Kwanzaa or talked to the ancestors. I was intrigued by her. She was so humble when she told me that she was a sign language interpreter, and she learned sign language because both of her parents were deaf. When I first met her, she taught me how to sign "I love you." We took plenty of pictures together, holding up the sign. I was fully aware of her light.

We kept in touch for a little while after that. She often sent birthday cards, and Kwanzaa cards. We called each other from time to time. Little did we know, we'd be burying my father two years later. That was a rough time for us both, for us all, really. My grandmother wore his clothes for over a week straight. I spent most of my time inside my own mind, and my heart was literally aching. After we buried him, it felt like several relationships were buried with him. They were either severed or strained, including mine with her. We never really could get back right. I do remember her attending my high school graduation, but once I went away to college, we had a misunderstanding and stopped speaking. She and my uncle made sure that his wife's nephew looked after me because he had already been going to the school, but we all barely spoke to each other. We didn't even try.

I graduated. She didn't come. I had a baby months later. She didn't see my daughter in person until my daughter was about two or three years old. It was what would've been my father's 50th birthday, and she decided to get all of his daughters together to honor and remember him. That trip was a disaster, but that's a story for a different day. I'll just say that that was the last time I spoke to her. Then three years later, in 2017, she passed away from complications from West Nile Virus. I was pregnant with my son at the time, and he was kicking my behind. I couldn't travel. I was miserable. I had to miss my grandmother's funeral.

The pain that I felt from losing both my father and my grandmother, along with some other things, sparked my desire to forget what hurt me. I feel like my heart has literally been broken over and over again. Whether through death or just rejection or abandonment, my heart just contined to break, and I didn't want to go through that again.

The consequence of forgetting to feel is that I missed out on key moments in her life and in the lives of others that I'm supposed to love because I had my own selfish need to suppress. After talking to my sister and doing a light Internet search, I realized that I didn't know much about her, but the world did. She wasn't just a sign language interpreter. She was a famous one. She was the first African American woman who had a career as a professional interpreter. She had interpreted for Maya Angelou before. Harry Belafonte. People created programs for the deaf in her honor. The New York Times wrote about her. People loved her dearly. I mean, seriously. Just Google her.

I wanted to love her dearly, but I forgot to. I would say it back if she ever said it to me, but I forgot to feel it. I'm not saying it with regret now because of the fact that the world knew and loved her. I'm saying it because I'm upset that I didn't really know her. I knew she was a part of Sweet Honey in the Rock, a performance ensemble based out of Washington, D.C. She had been a part of them for about 37 years before she passed. I saw them perform once, but I didn't realize the depth of her impact on others around the world. A part of my own creativity stemmed from a legacy that she created, and I had no idea. I forgot to feel.

Since all of this, not only have I lost my father and my grandmother, but I've also lost my other grandmother, my mom's mom. I've lost my mom's sister. My grandfather (my father's father) passed away just last year. I have one living grandparent at this point. I've grieved both family and friends. I've grieved the loss of relationships. There are so many unspoken words just floating around with an intended target, but they are no longer with us, and I can only speak them aloud with the hope that somehow, some way, they hear me.

So now, when I remember to feel, I feel deeply. I actively practice mindfulness. Sometimes I miss the mark, but I try again. I love urgently. I got that concept from a Jhene Aiko song. I knew that that's how I approach love, but I never could articulate it. In her song, she mentioned how hard it is to love somebody that ends up passing away. She said that the problem with everyone else is that they think they have time. I agree. That's why people take advantage of it. They think they'll have an opportunity to love genuinely at a later time or that the people they love will be around forever. But Jhene said that she loves urgently. As do I. And it's scary. I'm afraid that if I love too hard, my heart will be broken again if I lose yet another person in my life. However, I do it anyway. I do it while scared.

When it comes to family, I want better. Though my familial relationships are a bit dysfunctional and strained, I have children of my own, and I want them to feel real love. I chose to be a teacher because I want other children to feel real love. I have sisters. Four of them. Although we didn't grow up together and our relationships are also a bit strained, I want to show them real love. I want to appreciate the people who genuinely care about me. And despite the fact that I hadn't spoken to her in years and I feel like deep down, we never knew each other as well as we should have, I want to make sure that I give the world the warmth that Shirley Childress Saxton gave me when I first set foot on Clay Street. I'm going to spend the rest of my life loving genuinely and urgently and remembering to feel.