Shak Shaks From The Motherland

There are sights, smells, and sounds that are tied so closely with memories, that I can't experience one without the other. With the smell of Perry Ellis perfume, I'm sitting in my post Hurricane Ivan bedroom staring at my molding carpet that's been soaked from the rain and pulled up into a pile. My mother isn't there with me, but there's no electricity, so I'm hoping she comes back in before the sun finally disappears and sinks me in darkness. The room, the house, my island feels different. It smells different. So I spray the last of my perfume on myself to forget that everything has changed, and that the smell of molding carpet is now my new life.

When I heard the chak chak sound in church yesterday, my ears moved a little bit, and, suddenly, I disappeared down a worm hole through time and space. Within a single moment, I was a shadow looking at my younger self holding a tambourine for the first time. 

It was a big moment for me. All I kept thinking as I touched the tiny cymbals on this beautiful wooden instrument was the woman who sat next to Pastor Baker for years. She was medium height but bent over a little, making her look stout and so strong. With each praise song, she'd stand with her tambourine. I'd watch her listen for the beat and pull up her tambourine to her chest and make that first momentous hit against her palm. Most times, she'd close her eyes a little, block out the sounds of the piano, drums, bass, and singers, and play to her God. Just her and Him, in perfect harmony—Him reaching down and her lifting her sound in adoration to His goodness and kindness. She never got it wrong; never shook her instrument off beat and always had a melody to match the sobriety or joyfulness of each song.

Even though she never had to learn any musical scales or chords to play her tambourine, I respected her above all other musicians.

She wasn't just submitting her gifts for God's glory. For me, she was a symbol of womanhood.

Only the maturity of life and age could give someone the talent and apparent wisdom she had. Only a woman who's lived through the complexities of life could understand how important it was to respect such a loud instrument. This wasn't something she could play quietly—the only way to play a ring of cymbals was to do so with incredible confidence, humility, and skill. Because no one can stand to hear such a loud thing rendered with disrespect and nonchalance. Everyone has a mouth they can run to the ground and back. But there's a reason that only she was trusted to introduce the tambourine to our worship.

Every time I heard her play, I felt connected with my ancestors. Women with large families and even larger pride in their heritage. Women who were raised to be trustworthy with much and who took shak shaks from off the earth's floor and made much of them. I imagined them celebrating a village or family milestone with the kind of dancing that made the ground shake beneath them. Hips swung into other hips; mouths open wide in jubilee. I can smell the sweat thickening the air among them as they danced harder, sang louder, shook their shaks shaks harder. I can't hear their song, but I can see their tambourines moving back and forth in their hands. 

So when I held my first tambourine, I felt scared, thrilled, and much too young. 

I was maybe 6 at the time, and hesitant to touch its sensitive little cymbals. So I handed it back to my old friends in church and watched them try their best to make a beat, not quite getting it right, but trying with confidence. 

Now, I am older. I can't remember when I quite got it right, but I remember years of trying. Of having access to tambourines only during Sunday school, and struggling to play with the beat of the pianist playing in the corner. It was years of shaking and beating it against my hand incorrectly before I stopped making a fool of myself.

Now, I am older, and I haven't seen or touched a tambourine in years. I am a woman now, but I don't think about my age, or the life I've been able to build. I think about the small but mighty markers of my womanhood. Of them, I remember the lessons I learned from that little instrument. I learned to worship God with all the instruments and tools I had at my disposal. I learned to avoid being loud when I knew I was coming from a place of deep immaturity. I taught other women how to play and find their own style. And I embraced an unchanging sense of respect for things that ground me to my earthly identity, even the loud, sometimes uncomfortable and hard-to-manage elements of who I am in this world. 

The Oil Down Place By L. L. Ramdhanny

This place wasn't a vibe. It wasn't an aesthetic. I wanted to take photos of it but not for social media—for myself. But I knew a photo couldn't capture the honest heat of the day, nor the broken sidewalk that forced us to walk in the road and grass. A photo also couldn't capture the time I was spending with daddy, and that was the best part.

I was returning to America the next day and wasn't expecting to spend the afternoon with him—that time was such a gift. As the oldest girl in the family, him and I always had a special bond. We could read each other well. We were a team. We could roast each other without the threat of hurt feelings. And, most of all, we love each other unsparingly. I could think of no better way to spend my last few hours in Grenada.

We sat in the small restaurant while the smell of the food torpedoed around us under two heavy fans overhead. The bench I sat on had a torn leather cover revealing the cushion underneath. The walls were painted in a cool shade of teal with accents of yellow. There was a chalkboard on the wall with the menu for the day written in large white letters. There were four tables, each topped with a colourful floral table cloth, then again with a plastic sheet. 

What I loved about this place as I sat there, was that nothing matched and every colour, smell, and sound seemed to be yelling, not singing in a chorus. The floors, and tables, and benches, and even the waitress were all so different in feel and tone. But when I paused to take it all in, all I could feel was a sense of calm and peace. It was a simple lesson for me, one I was happy to experience again—sometimes the messiest places offer the most to your soul.

Sitting across from daddy, and beside my husband in that hot restaurant with the sound of cars speeding by and people talking outside, I felt the most peace I had in a long time. It felt like the restaurant was giving me the exact thing I'd needed and that generosity compelled gratitude.

So I ordered my oil down and coconut water and tried to take in as much as I could.

This moment in time will always have a foothold in my soul. I know this for a fact, even though it happened two days ago. That's because that restaurant and that day gave so much to me. It saw some of the little cracks at the bottom of my soul and filled it quickly. And that's honestly what home feels like. Grenada gives so much back when I feel like pieces of me are stolen when I am elsewhere. The island feels restorative and kind, like a nurse with plenty of time, one. who spares no cost to care for everyone in their charge. I can't go far without this place sending me a breeze, or a smile, or a howdy, or the awing sight of mountains just when I need it. I can't deny that God uses Grenada to heal in a way no other thing has. 

Which is why so many stay and fill that place with joyful words of thankfulness and praise to God.

The oil down was perfect. Daddy gave it a 4.5/5 but that was honestly the highest grade that food was going to get anyway. I gave it a 5/5 and Phil looked content enough to fall asleep right where he sat. We talked about daddy's upbringing, his sisters, and some of his life as I took mental snapshots of his smile at various parts of his stories.

I promised myself to return next time with a mission to record his full life's tale to enjoy, selfishly.

After lunch, we started our journey out to the car when I noticed a pot of succulents thriving on the stoop. I bent over to touch a big one when the waitress walked out to see what we were so interested in. And just like that, she disappeared inside the restaurant, returned with a small bag, and plucked out a dozen small shoots for me to have. Almost no words were exchanged between us while she did this. And in her abundant kindness, I met God yet again that day. In her generosity, her hospitality, her care for us, I remembered the deep love Jesus has for me, that He would spare nothing to show His affection and give good gifts to me. 

That trip to Grenville for oil down with daddy would be my last for the year, I knew that going in. But I'm excited to feel those memories blossom with the plants, for the heat of that place to wash over me from time to time, and for the taste of tumeric and pig tail to return to my tongue on good days and bad.