Encountering an ancestor #9

it’s a hot sticky day, the kind that makes it feel like water is in your lungs because the humidity is so high.  I twirl in wide circles in the dirt driveway of my grandma’s house trying to master a hula hoop. There are several women of my family sitting on the front porch of the small country home. My grandmother is there. She’s wearing a pink house dress with a floral design. Her feet are covered in house slippers that don’t quite fit all the way, leaving her heels exposed. There’s blood on the ground near the steps where a fish was recently gutted. Every so often, the wind blows and I’m greeted by a stench. 

it’s all very comforting.

midway through my 700th spin, I see him. Perched on the far-right side of the porch, he is there. At first in my daze I assume he is an extended blur of the other folks. After a few more spins he doesn’t dissipate. Eventually, I stop completely and just stare at him.

He’s just under 6 feet tall and has a head full of thick dark black curls that coil close to his scalp. His hands trembled, his feet shuffled back and forth with a nervousness I haven’t seen in an adult before and His back is hunched over. His hands have canyons in them dug by rivers of hard work over the years.

But he was beautiful.  

He smiles at me. 

I just stare and return an awkward “hi.”