Parents are supposed to love their children no matter how many times they make mistakes, sin, or do less than stellar things. As our heavenly father, God loves us regardless of how many times we sin or break the commandments.
Minnie & Mickey (the adopted parents) do not practice unconditional love as they are more preoccupied with their status and reputation within the Jamaican diaspora.
I have heard through the grapevine that my adoptive mother’s biggest pet peeve with me is the fact that I was often attracted to bad boys and many of my relationships may have incurred “racy” undertones.
In the grand scheme of things it isn’t her business to judge me as she often told me that if I wanted to experiment with intimacies I should go to a hotel. Meanwhile, she encouraged her niece and grandniece to have sex in the bedroom adjacent to the one she and my adoptive father occupied.
The truth be told, these wild men only came into my life once I had been living with my adoptive parents. As an adult, I know that certain energies do not manifest unless one or both parties are capable of clandestine actions.
Someone in that home was bringing their lascivious, wanton spirit, and I was just the medium that absorbed it all. When I lived with my aunt in Jamaica, boys were never on my mind and I never as much as spent an hour alone with one. My adoptive mother would like people to believe I was a prime one from my tween years. She also pretends to be holier than thou and acts as if she lived a Mary Magdalene life.
The truth is she was dating even before she was fourteen years old. She happened to get lucky and met my adoptive father when she was 14 years old and although she had misadventures with other boys, he decided he would make an honest woman out of her.
My grandmother was not initially keen on her as she wondered what type of 14 years old would seek to take on a man several years older than her. She would often wait at my granny’s house for him and my grandmother would usher her home hoping to save her reputation.
Even when she was making a big to-do about being infertile due to my adoptive father’s philandering ways, it was found out that in her earlier years she ended pregnancies and that is why she had a difficult time conceiving.
Therefore the question would be, are her sins lesser than mine just because she did things covertly and a good-natured man came along and made her an honest woman? Throughout the years I sensed she had a quiet disdain for me but I just could not decipher what it was.
Even though she acted as if her nieces were Polly pure bread I knew as a fact that when they were not doing drugs they were taking other women’s boyfriends and maybe even husbands.
But, as they say in Jamaica most people never say look here, there are always pointing at someone else. After I became of age my adoptive mother never sat me down and explained the birds and the bees.
She never told me what kind of behavior was acceptable from men and what was not. Most of what I learned about male-female relationships came from books and first-hand experiences.
I used to think it was because she did not care. But now I know it is because she did not know better. Her mother did not give her the fundamentals. Therefore, she did not know how to deal with me.
When things got dicey she was more than willing to throw me to the wolves not thinking about the repercussions. When I returned with less than stellar traits she then decided she would much rather alienate me and pretend the adoption never happened.
Over the years I have been privy to my adoptive father accusing her of having affairs. When his prized car was stolen he felt certain that she provided a Latin lothario with the motive to do so.
My adoptive mother comes from a family who loves to bully people and they are also aces at covering up their wrongdoings. So, I am sure they antagonized my adoptive father to the point where he just forgot about the whole sordid ordeal.
Minnie, the adoptive mother would like for people to believe I am a wild oat who is of bad repute. I have never done anything I am ashamed of. If she feels that I have embarrassed her in any way then it is herself she has to blame not me. I was put in her care by my biological parents and my aunt and she could not do the one job she was given properly.
It is the age-old story of the fox calling the grapes sour when due diligence was never done. In my formative years, she was remiss at grooming me in the way she wanted me to be. All her talk was that of forcing me to live a colorful life.
Who in their right mind would send their girl child to a hotel to fornicate? She was hell-bent on discrediting me from day one. Regularly her nieces bring strange men into the house like a revolving door, participating in all sorts of strange sexual acts right next to her and my adoptive father and she dares to put the scarlet letter on me.
Where I come from that is indecent and disrespectful. My adoptive father knows that my grandfather would be rolling in his grave if he knew that his wife allowed fornication under his roof. Yet, she allows her family to do it all the time without any remorse or rebuke.
As a teenager, when the weather was bad and I would ask her if my beau could stay over she would tell me emphatically no. I would then have to borrow money from my aunt to put him up in a hotel.
Yet she has allowed her nieces and nephews to disrespect my adoptive father’s home with unwed sex at all hours of the day and night.
She has never been a fair person and is the sort that looks for any excuse to welch out of deals that no longer serve her purposes. She wants people to believe she is this immaculate person while condemning others.
My adoptive father was instrumental in putting her up on her pedestal and paving the path for her to seem above reproach. A lot of good it did him since every chance she gets she conspires with her family to treat him like her indentured servant.
I have been trying to figure out this woman for decades as I find it preposterous that she believes she has the right to be pious and make me seem as if I am the biggest sinner since Jezebel.
Fighting For My Life Memoir 