Like Rain on Parked Cars, Chapter 10 – Jonathan

Pregnant woman, Image courtesy of Adobe

“Then she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees; for she said, ‘Have I also here seen Him who sees me?‘” (Gen. 16: 13).

I had parked outside Aretha’s West Philadelphia apartment (her aunt’s actually).  The windshield wipers swept rhythmically back and forth, the streetlight casting its thin rays out into the wet street.  Cars passed by, raising a spray against the door, without regard to us.

Aretha sat beside me on the front seat.  Hands clasped in her lap, she squeezed out a few halting words at a time, tears in her voice.

“I don’ know what to do.”

“About what?  What’s happened, honey?”

“They’re all yellin’ at me.”

“Who’s yelling at you?  Why?”

“Ever’body has an opinion.  No one’ll listen to me.”

“Tell me what’s happened.  Maybe I can help.”

“Well, I’m expectin’ now.  My aunt wants me to get rid of the baby.”

I caught my breath.  A baby.

“Is that what you want?”

“I wanna keep it.  I thought…I thought about, you know, ending things.”

I struggled to remain calm.

“You mean suicide?  Oh, honey, you can’t do that!  Don’t even think that.”

“I can’ go on like this, bein’ pulled in all differen’ directions.”

“We’ll find a way.  Whatever it is you want to do, we’ll find a way.”

“I knew you’d un’erstan’.”

I did not, however, understand.

Oh, I understood why Aretha wanted the child – someone all her own to love her unconditionally.  But I had heard Aretha say a thousand times she did not want children.  I had heard her deplore the fact that so many young women she knew were becoming mothers at a tender age.

I had worried she might forego the great pleasure of motherhood entirely, in a misguided effort to further her career.

Aretha had never been “boy crazy.”  She had dated little.  Now, there was another life in the mix.  Aretha’s life was no longer entirely her own.

Birth Control and “Accidental” Pregnancies

Aretha did not conceive from any lack of knowledge as to contraception.  Methods of birth control – condoms, IUDs, the pill – had been part of her curriculum.  She met what appeared to her a quiet, serious-minded man, a clerk from Jamaica, and did not take precautions.

The pregnancy was, in Aretha’s mind, an “accident.”  I did not view it the same way.  Though the pregnancy stunned me, it seemed to me a choice Aretha made to follow in the footsteps of countless other young African American women in the inner city.

I had seen girls of fourteen flaunt their sexuality for lack of anything else to flaunt.  I had sat with young women, already mothers multiple times over by age twenty, who spoke of marriage as optional, and wanted to wait to find the “right” man.

These young women, so ill-equipped to be mothers, do not consider their situations incongruent.  Not having had fathers present on a regular basis in their own lives, they do not see men as essential to the raising of children.

As for young men, some were callous enough to pick partners as young as twelve and thirteen, since virgins could be relied upon not to be HIV positive.

Many had children by more than one woman, apparently viewing procreation as “proof” of their manhood – a guaranteed legacy, perhaps the only one within their grasp.

This was a tragedy passed from one generation to another.

Fantasies

Aretha and the baby’s father had plans.  She would continue her education.  He would watch the baby, while she was in school.  When I asked how he could manage to do that and still hold down a job, Aretha was stumped.  The thought had not occurred to them.

Aretha fantasized for awhile that the two would marry.  She envisioned a wedding in the islands, on a beach.  Like any young girl, she pictured a flowing white dress.

The reality was that neither had a way to pay for such a wedding trip.

To give him credit, the man was attentive and conscientious, at least at the outset.  But employed as a clerk, occupying an apartment that did not reliably have heat, he had little in the way of financial stability to offer Aretha.

Internalized Racism

Some of Aretha’s relatives opposed the match on other grounds.  Their view was that Jamaicans were notoriously violent, whether by nature or culture.

Such intraracial bias is a form of internalized racism [1].

I had heard about this bias before.  A Jamaican woman I once knew had, as a girl of twelve, been chased home by a crowd of her African American neighbors.  In fear for her life, she began frantically boiling water in every available pot, so as to have something to use as a weapon, in her defense.

Her mother by her side, Aretha called from the Labor Room nine months later.  I was deeply touched that she would think of me at such a time.  Thankfully, Jonathan was born healthy.

Equipped or not, Aretha was now faced with adult decisions and responsibilities.

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[1]  Wikipedia, “Internalized racism”, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internalized_racism.

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