Memories And a Week of Hugs

Spending a week at home never seems long enough. Especialy when the days are short and noon may as well be dusk in the autumn light. I was unexpetedly able to spend a few extra days with my family and friends. So much about being in a familiar place can send you reeling through memories like a rewinding movie. As my grandmother and I sat on her living room sofa, skin prickling in the chilliness from the draught seeping in under the floorboards, I traced my finger over a map of St. Thomas and showed her town, Crown Mountain where we live, the airport close by, the beach across the way, and the east end where we catch a ferry to St. John once a week.

As I traced my finger over the 37-square-mile-island-scaled-down-to-37 centimeters, my mind traced its finger over the four and a half months.

There was the first night we fell asleep on our beds, dreaming of home perhaps.

There were D.J. and Jahnelle in the car eating ice cream as we came home from the beach.

There were Virginia and Virginia eating barbeque, and sitting in front of us a few months later on the ferry.

There was dear Jahweh, pouring her love into the room as we ate fish at Gladys and there she was again when we planted vegetables with the youth at her summercamp.

There were Sac'ha and Rheal, Mrs. Brumfield and Jan, Duck and Sticky, Sonika and Demaris, C'Neesha and Jevon, and the rastas selling breadfruits at the market square.

There was Nasim laughing in the passenger's seat of El Camion, Big Red, and (finally) Little Blue.

I saw Micah with his sisters across the courtyard where Lynn and I sat waiting for our children's class to begin.

In my ears beat the wild calypso as we ate chicken fry at Maia's birthday party, while the tons of kids, despite the pools being small and wilted with their weight, left the hose on the grass to create a mudslide while the thirty or so of them languished in the grassy water of their kiddie pools.

All the plans we made, all the excitement and tears and frustration and hopes, all the precious minutes spent telling God about what was going on and asking for help, all the spanish and creole, all the meetings at Tillet Gardens, all the loads of laundry and doors walked through and glowing lightbulbs and gas tanks filled, all the weight of long days and walks after consulting with mamas about the spiritual education of their children, all the quirky chats on the bus, all the chickens in front of McDonald's and goats in front of Cost-U-Less, all the strong women, all the anxiety over possible gunshots, all the songs on the radio, all the mystery of the future and pleasure in the past, all the pain and sorrow, enthralment and pleasure, all of St. Thomas and its 30,000 inhabitants, like pinpricks of interaction in retrospect, called me to a place I've now started calling home.

As the plane lifted from the runway I remember seeing the island dissapear in an instant and all the houses that stayed behind in the hills. It took only seconds to alight in the clouds and wonder where my home had gone, swimming in the ocean below.

"I can't wait to hold your little hand, hold your hand child, hold your hand."

Ben Sollee