Frances Robin

storytelling

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Taking that Crucial first Step...

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Ten Things to Discover about Yourself...

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How Did I Get Here: Cricket and Rounders

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Cricket and Rounders were the sports I played in my youth. Imagine my surprise when I learned that these sports weren’t played widely in the States. One afternoon after school, a friend invited me to try out for softball. Softball? That was the first time in my life I had heard those two words used together to describe a sport. 

It was interesting to see all the students try out with gloves, bats, and cleats looking so official. After observing the first round of hitters, softball looked like a combination of Cricket and Rounders. When it was my turn to hit, imagine my surprise when I reached for the bat only to realize the softball bat designers had made a mistake or faulty bat designs. How do you hit a round ball with a rounded bat? 

The bats weren’t made of wood, they were made of aluminum, and they were round. When the ball connected with the bat it ricocheted and it stung pretty badly. I looked at all the bats on the ground and tried to find a flat one. Since there were none, I had to do what we have been doing since arriving in America, make an adjustment. Each hitter was given ten tries. After about four hits or so it became very clear that I would be the gold champion for fouls and my hands hurt.  I made another adjustment. I switched to a smaller bat, and moved away a bit from home plate. 

My goal was to hit the ball at the widest end of the bat without missing. With about four hits left in the first round, I finally hit the ball without scoring a foul. I adjusted again, this time I switched to a bigger bat, then moved away from the plate a little bit again. The last three hits were home runs. I had two more rounds, almost all the hits were home runs. So how did I get here? I’ve made adjustments. I am still making adjustments. I’ve learned that nothing is wasted, skills and talents from our previous experiences can be transferred and used in new or even challenging environments. I made the team. Wait until I tell you the part where they made me catch the ball with a glove.

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How Did I Get Here? Hurricane Maria and a Resilient People

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In 2018 Hurricane Maria left a trail of devastation in its path, leaving very few structures intact. One of the structures that succumbed to Maria’s high winds was my grandparents’ home. The home where I grew up during most of my childhood. Where weekday mornings caught me running late for school. Where friends walked by calling out my name asking if I was ready only to eventually give up. The few friends who waited struggled to understand what kept me preoccupied for so long, every day! 

They also eventually left, not wanting to arrive late at the school. If a student arrived late, if it was at the government school (equivalent to an intermediate school) the headmaster would be waiting in the doorway with a belt in hand. Yes, we had corporal punishment at school and the hits weren’t spanks in the hand, they were leather belt lashes across the back. I somehow made it before the lashes were handed out. One time, I got a beating not because I was late but because I was asked to take out some rubbish; on my way back, I entered through the only opened door where the late students were in line to get their beatings. The headmaster did not believe I was early and gave me three lashes. That was embarrassing. Good memories and bad memories all happened at that house

It’s there that almost all my childhood memories are linked. It was in the halls of that house where we packed bags and suitcases lined the hallways in preparation to emigrate to the states. It’s the space where I barely slept that night because the excitement of getting on an airplane was better than any sleep. That house holds the treasured moments I spent with my grandmother. The amazing thing is, my grandparents never finished high school yet they built that house from working hard at menial jobs in St. Thomas where they lived for several seasons. When I returned to Dominica in 2019 to celebrate my father-in-law’s life, the evidence of the destruction of hurricane Maria was still visible. Our home, like many others in the village, still lacked a restored roof. The pain of seeing the legacy of my grandparents’ hard work uninhabitable strained my soul. Our village has been rebuilding. Devastations from hurricanes aren’t new. My village is made up of resilient people who know how to rally to rebuild. I know village life. 

I grew up in a community that lacked certain comforts and amenities. What we lacked in ease or comfort,  we made up with ingenuity and community. My grandparent’s legacy may have been gutted by Mother Nature but what they have taught and shown me through their examples, no force of nature can destroy.

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How Did You Get Here? A Pattern

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There’s nothing more exhausting than keeping track of which parts of yourself you’ve shared or what you have approved others to share. Instead of all the tracking efforts, why not tell your story yourself?

Last December around the holidays, a friend asked, how did you get here? After a short pause, I started what seemed like a response only to have her interrupt my thoughts to ask another question. Have you ever told this story to anyone? No, I said, I have never told all of it. Only parts, and it was either based on the space I, or we occupied.

Since then, I have been working on the answer to the question, how did you get here? You can listen to the podcast series of the same name where I’ve shared the first three episodes or you can read some of it here.

This photo was taken in the early ’90s capturing a pattern of departure from home. The other photos are of my first home, a place of humble beginnings. My home is Dominica. My home is my village, Wesley. Home is my grandmother, childhood memories, friends, and food. Home is the freedom to be. My departure from home often occurs about three or four weeks after reconnecting.

The reconnection and the departure evoke extreme and opposite emotional responses. The reconnection is warm, its laughter, appreciation, joy, and a knowing that it won’t last but for only three maybe four weeks.

The departure is emotionally violent. It’s sorrow and tears. It’s leaving friendships, and family behind. It’s the reality that I may not see my senior family members alive again. It’s experiencing a headache, turned into a migraine from the tears I cry from take off until landing in Puerto Rico to make my connecting flight to Washington DC.

If you miss it so much, why can’t you go back or stay? That is often the question that is asked after I’ve shared the above. It’s easy and difficult to understand and to do. So how did I get here? It took the sacrifice of my grandmother and the appreciation of my village for fostering my formative years.

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