It feels like Christmas in the summertime and I’m so excited I almost can’t stand it. I’ve been unwrapping tissue paper from all kinds of beautiful things I hardly remember buying and I’ve been trying on one thing after another, including each and every bathing suit, and I remind myself to get myself waxed tomorrow after I get my pedicure and fill. I look decent enough in my bathing suits considering I am forty-two and all and I absolutely love these new Wonderbra pads they’re putting in this year. I mean I am really vavavooming. I’m standing here admiring myself in the mirror and wondering if when the time comes would I really have the nerve to have any or all of those surgical procedures to improve restore and replenish my youthful image or would I just be like an imitation of myself? I think that’s the phone ringing but this music is so loud I’m not sure. I pick it up anyway.
“Oh, you’re already partying, I see, huh? Can’t you call nobody back?”
“Vanessa, didn’t you just leave the message a few minutes ago?”
“Yeah, but why come you couldn’t call me back?”
We always change our voices like we’re from or been living deep in the hood all our lives, like we’re young and hip and not even close to being educated, but this is like our very own special way of expressing our love and endearment toward each other plus deep down inside we don’t ever want to forget where we came from, that everybody has not been as lucky as we have in terms of growing up. I mean we did do the projects a long long time ago but then our parents moved us to a nice suburb outside of Chicago where we never witnessed any tragedy except when Daddy left and then when Mama got killed. Most of our relatives still live in the hood and some of them even came right out and told us to our faces that we think we’re All That just because we live in predominantly white neighborhoods now. But this is not true. I personally live in a mostly white neighborhood because they have the best schools with the most qualified teachers and I want my son to get the best free education available since my taxes are supposed to cover the shit and besides I don’t feel like I have to live in the hood or in an all-black neighborhood to prove how black I am. I don’t want to live anywhere close to where they have drive-bys. I don’t believe the hype or the stereotype that all black neighborhoods are dangerous and crime-ridden but a whole lot of them are on their way thanks to guns and crack and heroin and no fathers in the house and mothers trying too hard to do it all and failing and then sometimes there is no authority no role models and so respect isn’t high on their things-to-do-today list because who has time to like go to church anymore which is one good place to learn about humility and compassion and love, and I’ll be honest, I am scared to go some places in the hood and it hurts me because I remember when the hood was the safest place for us to go because we were among our own and it was who we knew we could trust—each other—but times have changed and we are all a threat to each other though I don’t get why, but I also don’t want to get shot on a whim or get my feelings hurt because I still believe that we are all out here in this knee-deep together. I also don’t want my son growing up calling women bitches and ho’s and thinking it’s cool and he’s down and all that and I’d die if he ended up being a victim of gang warfare and all that bullshit because to be honest I want him to understand the streets and all but the shit they learn out there is not exactly the kind of survival skills he’ll be needing to get over in college, in America, in the whole wide world.
I go off sometimes and I know it. But I can’t help it if I’ve got an active mind. Yes you can, Stella, now shut up and listen to what your sister’s trying to say.
“I just want you to know that I’m proud of you, Sis, for finally doing something spontaneous and doing something for you. It’s about damn time.”
“Thank you, V, thank you. I can’t believe I’m doing this.”
“Who are you telling? But let me ask you something. Can I drive the BMW while you’re gone?”
Always wants something. Damn. “Okay, but don’t try to put it through a regular car wash and don’t drive around on R either, bitch. And don’t put any of that generic gas in my car. Only use premium. I’ll be able to tell if you didn’t. The only catch is could you bring in the mail feed Phoenix and Dr. Dre and change his litter box and their water and maybe drop a few flakes in the fish tank every few days?”
“Ain’t no thang. And thanks, Sis. Wild Kingdom’ll be under control. Now, have you started packing yet?”
“Have I ever.”
“Well, last night things were real slow around here so I went over to my neighbor’s house, Cynthia, do you remember her? She’s the Mexican chick whose husband won’t send her kids back from Alaska and she’s gonna have to go to court to get ’em back and shit? Can you believe it? Anyway I told her you were going to Jamaica by yourself and—”
“Vanessa, don’t be telling people all my personal business, and especially my whereabouts, girl.”
“Look, you don’t even know the bitch. Anyway she told me to tell you to pack enough clothes to change at least three times a day because first you have to dress to go to breakfast and then you lay out on the beach and then you change into something for lunch and then again for dinner and then if you party later—and you better party later, bitch—you should change again, into something nasty. But that’s four. Make it four. And take a different bathing suit for each day and is your period coming anytime soon?”
“Just had it,” I said as I looked down at the rainbow of swimwear lying across my bed.
“Good. She said you should also take some Fleet with you cause you’ll probably get bloated and backed up because of the difference in the food and stuff and you probably won’t be able to go the first few days cause you’ll be so excited and not believe you’re on no fucking island. Even though she’s only been to Cabo San Lucas and Maui she said the tropics is the tropics but anyway you better cross your fingers that you get as lucky as Cynthia, honey, and this other girl at my job who works over in cardiology.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Well, Cynthia went to Maui six months ago by herself and met a man on the airplane and he’s in the military and he has sent her six airplane tickets in the six months since she’s been back. And then the girl in cardiology is a sister and she went to Paradise Island which is supposed to be in the Bahamas or some-damn-where with her mama and daddy—why I don’t know—but anyway she was just splashing around in the water minding her own business and met this guy on the beach who turned out to be her scuba-diving instructor and he ended up diving real deep and he also found that black pearl and every day afterwards they were doing something different in the water and honey now they are like totally engaged and shit.”
“That’s all well and good but I’m not going over to some tropical island hoping or trying to find a husband.”
“They weren’t looking either. That’s my point. Just make sure the radar is on though cause you know how you can be: blind as hell cause you always looking up when you should be looking around you.”
“Thanks for the sound advice, Ricki. Now I hope you don’t mind but I’ve gotta go. I want to finish packing today.”
“What are you telling them at work?”
“Well, summers are our slowest months and hell, I’m telling them I’m going to Jamaica for nine days.”
“Okay. I guess that’ll work. Nice to know that some of us got it like that.”
“I’ll talk to you later.”
“Wait a minute! What’s up with that tired hair? Do something to it, Stella, please. Don’t go down there with that nineteen eighties hairstyle. Do something extreme. Be a little scandalous. Go on over to the hood and get your hair did, girl. Get some of those Jamaican braids or any kind of braids so that when you come out of the water dripping wet you look like those chicks do in the magazines: better than you did when you went in.”
I’m laughing now and ironically or coincidentally R.Kelly is singing “Back to the Hood” and I’m thinking maybe Vanessa is onto something and
I hear myself say, “Maybe I will.”
“Go to Oh My Nappy Hair in Oakland, girl. They’ll hook you up.”
• • • •
Which is exactly what I do. It takes ten hours for Fiona who is from Senegal and Dreena who is from Richmond to make me feel beautiful, but this hairstyle also takes about five years off of me which means I’m definitely coming back. These women almost yank my brains out when they grab at least a hundred little braids and pull them into a ponytail on top of my head which I discover gives me sort of an African-Asian look which I wasn’t exactly after but when I realize it also works as an instant face-lift I just grit my teeth and keep my mouth shut until they’re finished.
• • • •
Vanessa is totally outdone when she sees me and tells me I look like a real hoochie and I give her the keys to my car. I am so glad that Quincy and Walter aren’t home when I call and I simply leave the number of the hotel and all the details. I have a driver pick me up at 8 A.M. and he puts all three pieces of luggage in the back of his Town Car and my eyes are burning because I didn’t sleep at all last night and my heart is pounding like crazy when I close my eyes and look out the window of the first-class cabin as we take off and I’m really wondering what might be out there for me. I pray that I’m not going to die up here, because I’m finally doing something for myself, but when I wake up to see that aqua water and an irregular-shaped stretch of green land a thousand feet below and the plane touches down on that runway in Montego Bay and the heat is already swimming up in silver slivers and I am the third person to step off this plane and the force of the sun is already draping itself all over my body and straight through this sundress and I look down and see at least twenty or thirty black men of different shades heights and ages standing at the entrance to Gate 6 and, as I approach them with my braids which seem to be tossing themselves over my shoulders, they all smile at me with those beautiful and chiseled African cheekbones those white white teeth and every size and shape of lips imaginable and one right after another and in unison they carol out to me, “Welcome to Jamaica,” and I think for sure that while I slept the plane probably did in fact crash and somehow I have simply landed in heaven.
IT WILL TAKE almost two hours to drive the fifty-two miles from Montego Bay to Negril and it feels more like I’m on a bucking bronco than in a van. The road is two lanes of meandering pavement that runs parallel to the ocean for long stretches but as it grows darker—pitch black to be exact and it’s just seven-thirty—I can no longer see or hear the ocean at all, and folks are appearing out of nowhere on the sides of this road. At least ten times during the first hour I think for sure we are going to hit somebody. A slew of bicyclists taking their lives in their own hands appear to be having a hard time staying on the pavement. The driver is driving like a maniac and he seems to think everything is funny, like when he almost hits a goat that was standing in the middle of the road, or when he asks each of us if we’ve ever been to Jamaica, then chuckles as if he knows something we don’t know. When he honks his horn at folks he chortles, and I will find out later that just about everybody on this part of the island knows everyone else. I’ll find out that when you see kids women or men standing on the side of the road walking with an arm extended out like a flag during the daytime nighttime or whenever, they are trying to hitch a ride home and somebody will always stop and give them one until they get to their turnoff. And I will be shocked to learn that women can do this any time of night and still feel safe and nobody ever gets raped or shot or robbed and I’ll be thinking that this is how it used to be in America, this is how black people used to treat each other a long time ago when I was a kid, and before I leave I will envy them in more ways than just this.
• • • •
I am the only black person in my van besides the driver and of the five white couples three are obviously newlyweds and the other two are old and fat and have southern accents and—I am not making this up—are wearing big straw hats. Right after we got on the van at the airport they interviewed me. “Darling, is your husband gonna be joining up with you?” one woman in a hat asked.
“I don’t have a husband.”
“You mean you’re here all by your lonesome?”
“Yep,” I said. And I wanted to say, Got a problem with that?
“Aren’t you brave,” this skinny Barbie-looking woman said. “I’d never dream of traveling anywhere like this alone.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“Well, it’s so foreign,” she said.
“And?”
“I’d be afraid.”
“Afraid of what?”
“I don’t know. Everything.”
“Well, watch and see how scared I am when I’m on the beach or at dinner or on the dance floor, okay?”
“And who will you dance with?”
“Whoever asks me or whoever I ask. Maybe him,” I said, pointing at her husband.
“He doesn’t dance.”
“I’m going to try while we’re here, honey. I’ll dance with you as long as you don’t laugh at this stiff Virginian.”
I laugh. He laughs. We all laugh and then stare back out into the darkness, each of us wondering how much longer how much further and where oh where the hell is our hotel, because we can’t see the twinkle of anything that looks like a resort for miles ahead.
Luckily the driver has on some kind of fabulous reggae music. I can’t believe that even though it’s only eight o’clock and it’s pitch black outside and there are no streetlights, children are playing outside. There are also clusters of old men sitting around makeshift tables made of old boards and doors, playing cards and dominoes. We go around a bend and out of nowhere the van’s headlights shine on a group of teenagers just standing around like they’re getting ready to do something. Some of them are kissing under heavy trees or sitting on big rocks—there’s a head in a lap, a head on a shoulder, and when I see this I remember when and I hurry and turn that little air-conditioner vent so it hits me directly in the face.
The one thing I can’t help but notice is that everybody here is black.
Finally, after we’ve all passed out, the driver honks his horn and yells, “Welcome to the Castle Beach Negril!” I open my eyes and see that the hotel is even prettier than the photo in the brochure.
The white people get out of the van without tipping the driver because of course the ride is supposed to be part of our package but even so I think this is so tacky and downright inconsiderate and when I hand Donovan the driver a brand-new twenty-dollar American bill he nods over and over and says thank you and he gives me a look as if to thank me for showing him some respect. This is like a black thang: You take care of me, I’ll take care of you.
Our bags are whisked off and as we all walk toward the lobby I hear loud music coming from outside which is down a long marble ramp that leads somewhere I want to see, and am about to, when we are greeted by two young Jamaican women who offer us a cold wet cloth for our forehead and whatever tropical or regular drink we would like until they get us checked in. I order a virgin piña colada because I don’t like the taste of alcohol even when it’s camouflaged. Two drinks and I’m drunk anyway, so I stopped trying to get a liquid buzz years ago.
It’s now about nine-thirty and when I sit down in my chair I realize I’m beat. But after the young woman who is assigned to me whose name is Abby brings me my frothy white drink with a giant piece of pineapple on it and asks if I’d like to see the rest of the hotel I instantly get a new burst of energy. I follow her down that ramp and can’t really believe my eyes. It is like a modern tropical version of Casablanca: people are swarming around the dance floor while up on a stage a band is playing something with a funky get-up-and-dance beat and everybody is laughing and clapping and totally oblivious to anything except the music.
Hundreds of white tables with white chairs are mostly filled with suntanned white people dressed colorfully. And then there is the food. A buffet about a mile long is filled with every kind
of seafood salad pasta dessert you name it and Abby says follow me and I follow her outside and all I’m thinking as I watch folks partying is that I’m going to like it here and as we approach the deck that leads directly to the beach we walk around the pool and here are more tables and I see smoke and smell barbecue and there are about a hundred people standing in line with plates and everybody looks happy and healthy and folks are feeding each other from fingers and forks and everybody has a drink it seems and they are all waiting for what apparently is prime rib chicken shrimp steak being grilled in front of them. I’m just taking this all in; it turns out to be Jamaica Night. I sip my drink all the way down the pathway that leads to my room and apparently my building which is only two floors is right next to the nude beach. I kind of chuckle when Abby tells me this and she asks if this’ll be a problem, and I say, as I’ve already learned how to say in the last hour: “No problem, mon.”
My room is pretty but not as spectacular as the rest of the hotel. I do have a lovely balcony with, no shit, big giant rocks and crashing waves right below like in the movies. There’s a ghetto blaster so thank God I brought my Seal and Mary J. Blige among others and I put Seal on immediately and take my clothes off and stand on the balcony and inhale some of this thick moist tropical ocean air and it’s real this is so real I made it I didn’t die yes I’m really here in Jamaica and I hang up all my clothes and then I take a shower and listen to Seal some more and I put on some pretty white shortie pj’s and I lie on my bed and listen to some more Seal and the rolling waves until my body loses me and my mind is clear and soothed and when I open my eyes it is daylight and Seal begins to seduce me all over again. I sit up and realize that yes I’m still here and I call room service and order some coffee and juice which will be here in only ten minutes’ time they say and I put on one of my cute peach jogging outfits and look at the clock and it is only 7:30 A.M. which means it’s only 5:30 A.M. at home. I should call Quincy but it’s too early plus I forgot I can’t call him and maybe I should wake up Angela—no, to hell with Angela—and I don’t want to bug Vanessa just yet. I now have my gear on and there is a knock on the door and I say thank you and offer a tip but the young black woman refuses to take it. I will find out later how to do this so they will accept it without losing their jobs.
How Stella Got Her Groove Back Page 4
