I have a memory -- I must have been about 8 or 9 years old -- of coming home on a summer afternoon after playing in the woods behind our house to find the most amazing man I'd ever seen standing in our kitchen. He seemed tall as a giant, with perfectly tanned skin and tons of dark hair... this wondrous mustache... wearing a shirt that looked like silk -- unbuttoned to expose his hair-covered chest and gold chains. His voice was like velvet -- just thick and deep and kind. He was with a woman who looked like a model to me -- all legs and breasts with waist-length hair.... the two of them looked like they'd just stepped out of our TV set... they looked like late 1970s movie stars.
As I stood there -- mouth gaping -- my mother introduces him as my Uncle Johnnie and I suddenly felt like all the air had been sucked out of the room. My uncle??!? In OUR house?!? I had heard his name before -- I knew all of their names -- I had made up faces for them -- these mythical uncles and aunts and cousins and grandparents who lived in a magical city called West Bloomfield.
He was nothing like the man that held his name in my head. He was beautiful -- the most beautiful man in the world... and as he hugged me, I clearly remember my thoughts --- my mind filled with visions of holiday suppers with my aunts and uncles -- of grandparents telling me stories, of cousins to play with and -- oh my goodness -- family portraits!! The horrible years of exile had ended!
In my childhood head, I thought Uncle Johnnie's appearance in our kitchen meant everything -- it meant an end to lying to classmates about my lack of relatives, it meant an end to coveting other people's families. It meant acceptance.
But I was wrong. It meant nothing. I never saw him again.... and 10 years would pass before another of my mother's family members would appear in my life.
About two years after his visit, I came home from school to find my mother holding a pudgy dark haired baby... Uncle Johnnie's little girl, Norelle. I'm still not 100% sure what was happening with Johnnie and his wife at that time -- but their daughter stayed with us for weeks. I fell IN LOVE with Norelle... I carried her and fed her and would creep into my mother's room to watch her sleep... every minute that I was home, I was holding her. She was my COUSIN -- I had a cousin.... And then one day, I came home from school and she was gone. I was devastated. I mourned the loss of her for weeks -- til my mother, desperately trying to make me feel better, bought me a guinea pig. Which I -- without hesitation -- named Norelle.
It would be almost 25 years before I saw her again. When my mother re-introduced us, I burst into tears... she must have thought I was insane, but I couldn't even begin to form the words to make her understand. She's beautiful -- she looks exactly like photos I have of my mother in her 20s, photos I've spent years wishing I looked more like --- she looks like an Abbo. I cried because I had missed her, because she had meant so much to me as a child.... but I also cried because her looks gave her a culture and language and history that I never got to have. Her looks... gave her a family.
Sixteen. Coming home from school as my mother is leaving the house in tears... "Johnnie's dead." That week was a nightmare of watching my mother come and go... Chaldean's have this intense, involved wake process which requires the family to spend DAYS sitting with their dead as people come to pay their respects. Every morning when she left the house -- I begged to go with her -- I wanted so badly to comfort her and see him again. But I wasn't allowed to go. I was to discover, years later, that -- at the time -- half her family didn't even know I existed. My showing up at Johnnie's funeral was NOT an option.
One night during that week, the house phone rang in the middle of the night. It woke me up, and I heard my sister answer it -- a moment of silence and then she's calling my name. My friend, Karen (who was pretty much living at the house with me at this point) and I get up and go out to find my sister, standing -- holding the phone out to me.... "Listen!" I put the phone to my ear -- the connection is horrible, and there's his voice, coming through the static... "Baby, it's your uncle. I'm sorry, I'm sorry I wasn't there more. I'm sorry I wasn't there. Love you -- always did. Don't you forget that...." and then nothing. When my sister answered the phone -- she had heard the same thing.
Yeah, I know it sounds crazy.... but it happened.
I am a clumsy, accident-waiting-to-happen kinda girl. I cannot count the number of close calls and near misses that I've walked away from. And every time I find myself on the other side of one of those moments, unscathed, but shaken.... I thank Uncle Johnnie. Some people believe they have guardian angels -- I believe my uncle looks over me.
On Monday night --- while driving back from Tim & Katy's house, I was about to make a left turn on a light that had been green for a good minute before I approached it. Clear as day, I hear a voice in my head say "Wait" and as I tap the brakes... some guy skids, tires squealing, into the intersection... running the light. Our cars are almost touching, and I realize that if I hadn't slowed up -- the front of his car would have been in my lap... without even thinking, I open my mouth and say "Thank you, Uncle Johnnie" out loud and before driving off.
When I mention the incident to my mother last night -- she has often told me that she asks him to watch out for me -- she tells me that yesterday, the 26th, was the 21st anniversary of his death. I spent most of last night, sitting on my porch, thinking about him -- how things might have been if he'd still been here. I spent a lot of time thinking about family, what it means to me, how I've spent my whole life building one out of friends to replace the one that I'd been banished from.
I spent a lot of time --- just thinking.
This morning, I went to the Cathedral to light a candle for Johnnie. I go there alot, actually -- the Catholic girl in me still clings to those bits of tradition. I light my candle and thank him for taking care of me. As I'm getting ready to leave... something makes me pause, and I light three more candles -- for my mother's parents and older brother.... people that I never knew... and I get on my knees for the first time in YEARS and I pray. I ask for guidance and peace of heart, I ask for understanding and acceptance.... and I asked for the ability to forgive these people, my family, for refusing to love me -- refusing to MEET ME -- because of the color of my skin. I'm exhausted from carrying the pain of that around in my heart for the past 37 years --- but I just cannot lay it down. So I prayed.
When I got to the shop.... I found this truly amazing, huge praying mantis just sitting on the building next to the door.
Five hours have passed, and he's still out there... just standing on the ground looking at the shop. I went out there a minute ago, and it crawled back up to the mailbox to look at me. I spent some time this morning reading about the symbolism involved with them.... they are thought to be divine messengers, a blessing, and in Africa, they were once thought to be able to bring life to the dead.
Whatever you believe ---- something about finding it at my door after praying for the first time in decades makes me feel a whole slew of things that I can't begin to explain and a few that I can: hopeful and happy....
... and heard.
And for all of that, I find myself -- once again, thanking Uncle Johnnie.
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