Phenomenal Woman - Phenomenal mom!

The world can't contain them.

The world can't exist without them.

The world revolves around them. 

There's harmony in the world because of them -

Moms! 

Phenomenal women - Phenomenal moms!

Today we celebrate the phenomenal women of this world - our moms. 

Here are a couple of phenomenal thoughts about mom: 

What's phenomenal about your mom? 

- My mom had a brilliant smile and was always laughing.

- She thinks that she is the wisest person lol, she loves deeply. 

- Her strength, drive to succeed with the little that she had. 

- She has the strength of an ox and an unmatched determination. Her love for me is sacrificial. 

- Simply put, her unconditional love, patience, kindness and her ability to forgive. 

- She works where I go to school and she's my favorite mother. 

Mom's favorite thing to say:

..."you must make me proud!" D. AB

..."stop skylarking!" P. G.

..."I may not say I love you guys, but I do." M. C.

..."hello, hello, hello, let me tell you something, you just listen to me." S. B.

..."if you want good your nose have to run." O.AC

..."listen!" K.C.

What advice you wished mom gave you that she didn't? 

- I wished she was here to tell me just how awful this world can be, sigh...miss her.

- I wished she gave me more academic guidance to realize more in life. I felt alone in that respect as I didn't have a father figure or older sibling to guide me. 

- I wished she had been there to push me to the limits in education. She gave some good advice nonetheless. 

- She gave good advice about education, career etc. but I wished that she had helped me to be more marriage focused early or make myself available for a husband.  

- I wished that she that she had told me how difficult it would be to be a good mother. It was tough doing it without her.

Enough said! MOM you make the world go 'round, we don't have the words and we'd need ten thousand tongues just to tell you thanks. 

Acknowledgements to Debby AB, Paul G, Shani B, Milton C and KC for their contribution to this blogpost. 

Mother's Day May 2015

I love food and Things Jamaican

Things Jamaican - do you remember that place? Was it downtown Kingston, near to the sea? The Caribbean Sea. They sold woven baskets, placemats, coaster sets, irie island clothing, very cool artwork, carvings, bottled spices and the list goes on. I hope that I am not wrong because I remember going there to get some treasures before returning to my insane first world life some years ago.

What a sweet piece of view of the water when you drive along the harbor to where Things Jamaican is man! I am salivating right now for some Caribbean water, landscape, sun, sea and sand. Actually they can keep the sun, I'll take the rest of it. Pardon me loved ones who can't recollect because you have never been, simply put you need to go and get your own sun, sea and sand, bottle it and bring it back with ya dwl. 

So let me tell you this, on Good Friday I drove myself to the farmers market and as usual I went crazy picking up all things Jamaican. On this trip I had a chance to read labels. I made some discoveries that leveled me. More than half the items on the shelf are not products of Jamaica. They are not made in Jamaica or packaged in Jamaica.  They are NOT products of Jamaica. I became sad. I felt deceived. Sometimes ignorance really is bliss. Anyway, I picked up the ones that I believed were really things Jamaican. I intended to have a nostalgic Easter weekend including a Jamaican meal on Easter Sunday and bun all weekend. After I left the market and in a somber mood, I concluded that I need to go home - to Jamaica that is.  Gosh, I love Jamaica. I love things Jamaican!

Now you know, ilovefood.com lol. On Easter Monday I decided to do a juice fast. I was off from work and I figured I would do it on a day when all 999 of my 1,000 stressors were temporarily removed from me. It started out very well. I looked at all 6 bottles of juice and wondered how the day would really go. let me tell you, it started out on a heavenly high. The first drink was an orange pineapple combo. I licked my lips every which way after I downed 16 oz in only 2 gulps.  I felt great. So 2.5 hrs. later I had to move to the Detoxifier which is a combo of cucumber, celery, lemon and cayenne pepper. I wasn't rushing towards this one. That madness was as green as the rainforest on a typical day. Fear crept in. My daughter cheered me on. I opened the bottle and took a sip, allowing that half mouthful to sit in my mouth for a few minutes like the juice lady recommended. That would warn my stomach that the mean green was on its way and they'd send back up dwl - okay they'd send the right gastric juices to do their job efficiently.

I swallowed and told KC that this was one would "take some getting used to". In my mind I thought I was going crazy. I had 4 more bottles of that hulk-colored thing sitting on my counter. That's my meal for the day! Immediately I thought of mixed nuts, trail mix, raisin bran cereal, HTB spice bun, Golden Krust chicken patties, honey wheat bread with butter and apple jelly, Costco cranberry Chicken salad, Chick-fil-A  freshly squeezed lemonade, quaker instant oatmeal with too many spoons of nestle sweetened condensed milk, boiled yellow yam, fried plantains, ackee and codfish and all the other things that made my snack and mealtimes so climactic over the weekend. I didn't finish the second bottle of juice for another hour. The third bottle was delayed and all other bottles after that.

Near midnight I was determined to get to the last bottle of Carrot Ginger so I gulped the last Detoxifier. Whoa! I solemnly declared that i don't want to see another bottle of that meanness for a long time. Carrot Ginger was smooth. Carrot Ginger was good to me. I finished her while blowdrying my hair. Way to end the day, sigh.

In retrospect, my will power is quite good. I did not eat anything all day. I did not reach for any treats. All the smells and aroma of the evening's dinner did not sway me. I held up! I proudly said that I will do it again for 3 days the next time. The Detoxifier with those ingredients? Heck to the no but juicing? Oh yes, I am ready to give my digestive system a rest. But friends, in those few hours of drinking only, I got reacquainted with the fact that I .....LOVE..... FOOD!

I grew up with the best food items. Some of my best memories are from Saturday soup days, Sunday morning breakfast smells and Sunday afternoon coconut aromas mixed with fried or steamed fish. Weekdays smelled of curry and brown stew chicken. I learned how to prepare these food from the best - chef mom! 

Well cheers to all things really Jamaican and to .... good nutritious food! What are your food memories? I want to hear them.

Full circle

The earth is round for a reason. Everything seems to transpire in a cyclical manner. There's day then night, and day again or whichever comes first. Then of course theres the New year, Valentine's Day, Spring break, tax season and April Fool's, Mother's Day and Memorial Day, Father's Day, fireworks and barbecues around July 4th, tax free weekend for back to school shopping, Labor Day weekend, this guy....ahhh yea Columbus Day, Veteran's Day, then come the final two seasons that we love to love - first, Thanksgiving and feasting which runs right on into tinsel, garland, wreaths and all those blinking lights, Christmas shopping, gift exchange and need I say more feasting? Then we pause to ring in the new year and begin to do this all over again. By the way somewhere in all of that you had a birthday, and you probably celebrated for or with loved ones and dear friends who had birthdays.

What goes around does come around for us. I have wondered about that quite a bit. Are we supposed to learn a lesson from the circular nature of life? I haven't stopped to get the answer so when you figure it out you tell me please.

I do think that I have had my aha moment however. There are many things in this life that make me go hmm but this one made me go hmm, hmmm, hmmmm. I am....becoming my mother. And confession is good for the soul lol. You see I spent a lot of my late teen years and my young adult life vowing NOT to become her. Mommy was strong, resilient, wise, hardworking, compassionate, firm, tough, giving, comical, humble, God fearing, an entrepreneur, a hustler and beyond that, she was a CEO. A CEO and head of household and that kept her saving only to spend again. She participated in lending circles (partner plan for us yardies) just to survive. She didn't have tax refunds to look forward to - no, absolutely not. She did it the Jamaican way where according to her one hand washes the other. She helped others. Her generosity had no limits and so many people helped her in return. On the flip side, she was also, scared, one tracked, fearful of the unknown, timid, economically/financially challenged and to top it off, a single parent of 5 children.

As I grew older and eventually separated from her, I recognized that deep inside her was an unrequited love. She gave it all to us in the best way she knew how and did not demand a return. At the end of every day, she had nothing left for herself, no social media to unwind with friends near and far, no telephone (for a long time) to catch up with family far away, no television (for the most of my early years) to indulge and vicariously live through her favorite characters and she did not have a companion to be the sounding board for her long, arduous and dull days. She lost herself in work, planting flowers and vegetables, household chores, her relatives, her children and later on grand children.

She had challenges that bring tears to my eyes just thinking about them now and I am sure that I don't know the half. I am not the key keeper of the family by any means so I don't know all the stories but I lived some of them and they were not pretty.

Mommy did not venture out- she missed several opportunities as a result. Mommy did not take risks - she missed several opportunities as a result. Mommy did not even enter secondary (high) school - she missed a plethora of opportunities as a result.

Me? I have been scared, one tracked, fearful of the unknown, timid and financially challenged. Oh but I'm.....comiiiiiiinnnggg......out! Yes like Diana Ross I'm singing......I'm coming out!!  Out from under all my inhibitions.

In a way, I have come full circle. What my mom would've been is who I am today. I am becoming mommy, I am realizing her dreams. I am definitely not worthy because she did one heck of a job with the scarce benefits that she had. Today I have what she can only smile at. She thinks that I am not her because, I have so much more than she ever did but, I am becoming her, I am her.

This blog is for mommy and the rock (really a gem) that she is - the rock that I am approaching.

From my heart to yours

If you really know me then you know I love connecting. Chatting face to face is my first choice by far. Chatting by phone takes second place. Texting has become the order of the day and that is not by choice about 99.99% of the times lol. Conversations are sacred for me so I always want to catch up with you.

Usually on holidays I try to reconnect, especially if you are more than an hour away by car. But sometimes the day ends and I didn't get around to you.

Well, we will wait on holidays no more. We can meet here in between phone chats, text messages or meet ups and there will always be a dialogue, from my heart to yours. It will be a little bit of everything. Some days it will feel like you are driving with me on the way to or from work, the grocery store or to get my hair done. Either way please feel free to talk back!