Four Women

Today I am thinking about my G-mamas all four of them. Yes I am giving thanks that I got to grow up with these sweet, loving and fierce women. I will share each one and a little story about each. I hope that by sharing them, you will receive a bit more about why and who I AM. I am grateful that I had an opportunity to share and stand in the light of both Granny and Mom, as well as Shug and Big Mama.

Not sure which one to start with. I will begin with the one who knew me first(I think).


Jessie Mae Aloway--Mom; my maternal grandmother. A woman all vinegar and sugar, incidentally the name she was called when she was a girl, Shug-uh(sugar, I always said sugar girl). To all of us she was just 'Mom'. A true Sagitarrian woman, who loved hard and fast. She loved her boys, she didn't care for the "lil fas-tale guhls" too much. She could spank you now and five minutes later(while you still lickin your wounds) offer you a 'favorite sandwich'. I think she possessed true determination. I saw it when she decided she was going to buy herself a car and drive, she had to be like 60 then. A scary thing I tell ya, riding with your grandma. Her singing church songs and you praying; she holding on to the wheel and you just holding on. I have been trying to remember different scenarios with her, it's difficult. I remember her working for 'white folk' up until she just couldn't. I am glad I got to experience seeing her work hard, crack jokes, make Sunday dinner and make sure my granddad(they were separated for many years) had a plate. I wish I could've asked about their relationship. I am extremely glad that she stuck around long enough for Mimi to fall in love with her. They had a Sagittarian connection, I saw it. Mimi speaks of her often and waxes about her last moments with her. How she massaged and prayed on her legs and rubbed her hands and pressed her forehead to her hand and prayed for her. Shoooooot, my girl is deep! She come from a long line of spirit-filled women and I am thankful she is unafraid to stand in that spirit too!


Letha Mae Reese--Big Mama: My Maternal Great Grandmother. She was all fire and ice, I could tell. When I remember meeting her she just seemed to have this way about her, like she would kick some body's ass. Not outwardly. But in her silent and deliberate way. Her voice I can remember most, it was almost singing; slow and sweet. Her face and her hands held many folds and freckles of time, supple and soft. She smelled of the thick heady, sweetness of tobacco. She dipped snuff you see, I felt like anybody that dipped snuff had to be hardcore! She let me taste it once and I was bout drunk and sick. Didn't have to worry about me ever going down that road again. I didn't get to spend as much time with her as I did the other warrior queens, but the time I did spend was invaluable. As a small girl I was always around 'ol folks', I guess that's why I am.(period) So those few times that I can remember going to her house in Pensacola, Florida; were spent briefly hugging her up and sitting and listening. I see the house in my mind's eye; I only remember the living room. Chairs covered with fabric or blankets, old cabinet with 'stuff' on it, a spit can behind her chair....

Mamie Lou Jones--Granny: Oh I could go on for days about how this woman influenced my life. She carried the life-long nickname of 'Hawk'. On account, that she was so small and fast on the basketball court, like a 'skeeter hawk'. To everyone else Hawk and Ms. M.L.; to me just Granny. I spent more time with her than any of them. She was my rock. Talk about fire, whew! this lady was no joke! She loved real hard on you and always showed it. She was full of hugs and kisses. She spoiled me rotten. I was one of the first and only grandchildren to be in her midst all the time. Story goes, my mother after having me; my parents had some riff about my mom going out. You know, got a  baby at home you need to be there with her. Well not my Mama, she had just as much fire as his own mother. So she decided she was going anyway and he needed to watch me. He refused. She packed me up in a taxicab in the rain and brought me to my Granny's house and left me there.

Since then I was there almost every weekend plus holidays and most of the summers getting treated like a princess. With granny, I almost always got what I wanted. I remember once when I wasn't at her house, maybe during the week; I called her and asked her to bring me 25 cents to by a 10 cent freeze cup. Twenty five cents! My house was at least 4 miles away from hers. She said okay. She drove right over in her big 'Duece and a Quarter', not only did she bring me 25 cents she gave me 50 cents to buy my brother a freeze cup too. Plus then I could have money left over to get us another one the following day.

She loved me mercilessly! This is also the woman who had a pearl-handled 32 on her dresser, handled the church books, cooked the dinners for the church on Saturdays, went back to night school to get her degree in Math(sometimes with me in tow) from Rollins College, taught school and did hair 'ever now and then'. She smoked Winston cigarettes and inhaled like a movie star, she made it look so good I wanted to inhale like that--slow-slow-soft-circles rolling upward and in and back through her lips to make a circular puff of smoke. Chile!

She allowed me freedom to do whatever I wanted, within old school reason. I could play all day up and down the street, but I better not over stay my welcome at any body's house. And I better get back on the porch before dark. I played in all of her clothes, shoes, makeup and sipped beer from her can. We went to ballgames every Sunday to see her boyfriend Big Dike play baseball. She took me to the jukejoint along with her bestie, Mary Lee. She let me dance for the people to the latest songs. I took my first airplane ride with her on Eastern Airlines to New Haven, Connecticut. I got my first pair of wings(remember when they used to do that?). Which is also where I first saw a Black Dance Company perform and fell in love with dance. Also where I first saw someone with a pierced nose (I wanted one ever since). I must've been around 6 then.

This lady was a trip!! She is actually the one(along with my own mama), that I learned to cuss from(tee-hee!). She could cuss someone, curse them and make them think she hit them with her words. And if she didn't hit them, they wished she had, the words would ring on. She was a lightning rod. Damn it sounded so good coming off her lips, cuss and rock her head all while smoking a cigarette and shelling peas! Oh I loved it!!

Even on the spiritual realm, since she passed December 24, 1991; she has come to visit me. The night after she died, I called the house; still in shock and not really believing that she was gone. My great grandma answered the phone, and it was Granny's voice. I dropped the phone. I was sure of it, so sure I said "granny?!" and then Shug's voice came back. They didn't sound anything alike on the phone or in person. Shug said "girl, what's wrong with you?" I said "nothing." The next time after many years of grieving, she came back through my daughter. My daughter is named after her. I came home from the hospital, maybe 2-3 days, and I was playing with the baby and she laughed! 3 day old babies ain't laughing like that, they get tickled by gas bubbles. She laughed a hearty "Hey-Hey" just like my granny. I looked at this little thing and bout fell out. I knew she was pleased with this one and that she would always protect her. Sounds strange, but I am crystal-clear.

She was a real juju woman too, as I look back on the things she did; I know that for sure. She kept Florida Water in the cabinet, she swept with Orange water from the back of the house to the front, she had little packs of sewn-up fabric(with herbs and words/prayers written on brown paper), no woman could cross the threshold on new years day until a man had walked around and through the house for good luck and so many other fantastical things I am still remembering today! She taught me how to ring a chicken's neck, how to crack a turtle shell and preserve the eggs for good luck and that chewing the shrimp tail will make me have pretty skin. It seems to me she came from a long line of juju women, her mama was no joke either. And I hear tell that Miss Mamie, her grand mama was the truth! Plus I just found out that there was another Mamie, her great, great grand mama. They are a force and my little one makes the circle complete as number 4!

 Victoria Lee Booker--Shug: The daughter of a Georgia Peach and an East Indian indentured servant from Guyana. Shug was the sweetest and most endearing woman you ever wanted to meet. I never knew why she was called the "General", until I heard stories. She could've been called the chief, with her waist length hair and side burns, I didn't care! I loved this lady so much, she was always authentic with me. Even when she saw me with locs for the first time, she was not happy with my beginner knots. Told me "I better not come back here looking like that." Of course I knew what that meant too. (My Nappy Head Chronicles...poetry)
I am forced to remember how badly I wanted to live in Boston, on the Cape with her. Later I learned, that she was the maid for a wealthy white family there. They apparently took good care of her and made sure she wanted for nothing even when she moved back to Florida. From the stories I heard, she was no joke!  Now when she got to be somebodies great and great-great grand mama she had mellowed out considerably. Her younger days proved her to be a feisty, fighting woman. She was said to have runnins down in south Florida, with a lil' moonshine and it was rumored that she once cut a man from ear-to-ear, and he wasn't the first one...that's what folks say. Somebody even said that it was Shug that Zora Neale Hurston ran into down in the Glades. She would be what they call a 'ride-or-die' these days. All I know is that my last conversation with her, on my way to Egypt in 2000; was to tell me about her conscious leanings back in the day. She told me about Father Divine, she remembered folks talking about Marcus Garvey and she understood me and my need to be different.
I didn't know the picture my uncle told me not to take, would be her travelling on the journey with me to the pyramids. She passed away not long after I left. She was 93.

Although, Mom was the only one to physically see my baby, I am 1000% sure that they all had their hands on me when she appeared.... Giving thanks for these Four Women and the women that made them and the woman they all made me. It is important that I say their names, as it elevates their spirit each time. Its a statement to the effect they each had on my being. I hope to meet with them again on some of my astral travels, but until then I say their names aloud...Mom! Granny! Shug! Big Mama!

Jessie Mae Reese!!

Letha Mae Simmons!!

Mamie Lou Ward!!

Victoria Lee Booker!!

FOUR WOMEN!!