ancestry

In 1954 my mother donned her red uniform and stood still as a proper photographer from St. Vincent visited them on the hill. She retells the story to me each time i look through the falling apart family albums with her. I asked her if she remembers the day and she looks at me with worry on her face. I guess she was about 9 or 10 in the photograph. The more I study this photograph the more I see myself, not so much in any of the faces but in her gesture. She is at the top with her hands on her hip and frizzy hair making some funny expression.

I am wondering how much lies I am now convincing myself of as I squint to see the details. I am sure that a lot of her was passed on to me, if not then I would have to start from scratch, without her. I just finished reading Moyra Davey's "Long Life, Cool Bright" and i adore her writing. Her love for the everyday, for the things that fill her life and also the ruptures. I don't know if I can look at photographs that honor these quotidian scenes but in conjunction with writing I find them most fascinating. I also have her as a lecturer this semester and thrilled about it.

The kitchen is the other extension from the small house you see, my grandparents had seven children. Nine of them stored up in such a confined space of course most of the refuge and escape came from outside. I can barely imagine what Bequia looked like back then: sparsely populated, rolling hills of dry grass, small wooden houses, pineapple skirts on mothers, children everywhere, empty harbors, Jetty less. All sorts of blue and green.