DECRIPTIVE ESSAY BY: Kadiata Kaba
ABOUT THIS ESSAY
Introduction by Prof. Camille Goodison
Kadiata's essay was personal for me. Through succinct, concise language, Kadiata successfully captured a very specific moment in time when there was an influx of Caribbean immigrants into the city.
This essay about a single snapshot is itself a snapshot of a time in the 1990s when a young, black Caribbean woman had to navigate an unfamiliar world that was not always welcoming. She had little money, yet enough moxie carried over from the world she left behind to enjoy herself and partake in some of the joys that defined '90s NYC cultural life.
There in its dark wooden frame, behind a glass case, is a photo of my mom. The photo is from the 90’s, and since it was taken on a digital camera, the colors have that faded throwback tint that all old pictures seem to get after some years have gone by.
My mom was in her early twenties in the picture. She is standing in front of a brick building that I believe was her first Bronx apartment. Mom is wearing a close-fitting black dress under a coat with shoulder pads. She’s got a big smile, as if she’s laughing at something behind the camera.
Every time I see this photo of my mom, I’m compelled to stop for a second and stare because she looks so different from the woman I know now. The person who wakes me up each morning, takes me to school, asks me what I want for dinner.
Instead, I see a girl my age, who is maybe more like me.
She looks so inexperienced and eager. She wears her hair in a silk-press with bumped ends. She’s tightly holding a small, leather clutch.
It’s weird to realize that your parents had a whole life long before you were even born.
Once, while we were cleaning out her closet, I got the courage to ask Mom about the photo. She stopped digging through the clutter and just stared at the picture for a full minute. She looked at the picture as if she were as clueless as I.
“That was the day I got my first real paycheck,” she told me.
When she first arrived in America, she lived with her older sister, helping her at her hair salon. She spent that whole day walking around the city with a friend from back home, someone who had moved to America a few years earlier.
She was feeling good, like she’d finally made it. She bought that dress and the clutch as a treat for herself.
As I listened to her talk about that moment in her life, our life together felt more real and my mother came alive for me in a way she hadn’t before.
Isn’t it interesting how a single moment caught on camera like that can change how you see someone?
Among the other photos Mom had hidden away in that closet, this was by far my favorite. The others were filled with memories of me and my siblings. But it was this picture of Mom, before me and my siblings were in her life, that left an impression.
All those great moments we are having right now will eventually become a distant memory as our identities grow with us. Care for these moments as they are happening.
