April 4, 2011 · 3:25 pm

Macy V

Macy V
By: Mia L. Hazlett
4/4/11

How did you survive seeing your father killed? This was more of a follow-up question to, after you’ve seen your brothers killed and sister raped, following your own rape? It didn’t seem logical to even ask these series of questions. But in just two letters my grandmother explained her entire life to me, and our dysfunctional relationship. In just those two letters, twenty-two years were forgiven.

I wasn’t in the mood to read another letter. My mundane routine work day did little to distract the images I carried of the very descriptive lynching of my great grandfather. They haunted my dreams, morning coffee, bus ride, and my two business meetings. Even though my curiosity screamed for the small envelope marked with a number three, I had to take a break. I needed to digest my ancestry.

Combined, the stories as a whole were tragic. But, my mother’s story was most spirit breaking. She existed in silent grace, but the flood gates were finally lifted the other night when she let me inside of her reality. My consoling was not offered to my mother, but to a woman who had suffered the generational abuse from a mother who was defined by a lifetime of tragedy. Unfortunately, my grandmother was actually raising her daughter the best she knew how. She offered her the love that my great grandmother offered her, very little.

And as my mother revealed her upbringing to me, I realized the hero within her. For although she didn’t know it, she had broken the generational curse. Although my grandmother and mother had no one to run to in the midst and anger of their mothers’ tirades, I did. After spending a day with Ms. Macy, I was able to run into the loving comforting arms of my mother. I was showered with kisses and hugs. There was not a day that passed that my mother didn’t compliment my beauty. I never comprehended my grandmother’s hatred, but I relished in my mother’s love.

I sat in the darkness of my living room and called my mother. I wanted to know how she was able to a offer a love she had never experienced. My mother answered and filled my ears with motherhood wisdom. She preached the importance of what I had always grown up with, “it takes a village to raise a child.” Although love was absent from her mother, it was abundant in the next door neighbor that took care of her after school. It was spoken to her through words of encouragement from a third grade teacher. It was “you can be whatever you want to be when you grow up,” from the man at the sixth grade assembly. Most of all it was a grandmother that told her on her deathbed, “Don’tcha be like me. When you have yourself a baby, you make dat baby your heart.” So maybe it was the woman that began it that truly ended the curse. Because there was not a day that went by that I didn’t feel I was my mother’s heart.

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Filed under family, love, Macy, motherhood

March 31, 2011 · 8:01 pm

BFF VI

BFF VI
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/31/11

I wasn’t sure if I showed my utter devastation, but that’s exactly how I felt. I was absolutely devastated by what Kay just told me. But this was so far from being about me. My feelings didn’t matter. My thoughts didn’t matter. Nothing about me mattered right now. I just had to focus on my friend who was weeping in my arms as we stood in the restaurant’s bathroom.

This is exactly the release I needed. The journey was just beginning, but crying in Becky’s arms made this journey possible. Although the stakes are my life on this one, this moment brought me back to junior high. Jason Fegal, my seventh grade “date” to my first dance. He didn’t know he was there with me. We arrived separately and I had never formally asked him or anything. But someone had heard he liked me and they told Becky.

That’s all we needed. We knew the dance was coming up in a week. Our mothers got involved and we were allowed to buy new dresses. Not full make-up, but we were permitted to wear nail polish and lip gloss. You would have thought we were going to the prom the way our mothers carried on that night with all of the pictures. They dropped us off and as soon as we walked into that dance, we were on Jason patrol. He didn’t show up for another hour.

I remember standing around a corner against a wall with Becky, trying to figure out what she was going to say him. Obviously I couldn’t speak with him. Junior high rules: your best friend is in charge of getting the boys you like to like you. I can’t recall what we came up with for her to say, but I can remember them speaking clear as day and the feeling of wanting to die when she pointed at me. He and I caught eyes and I maturely ran into the hallway. Had I stayed, I would have witnessed Becky pushing him to the ground.

We went to the bathroom and she told me he already had a girlfriend that went to another school. I broke into tears and cried my little heart out in her comforting hug. She called him every name she could think of and I couldn’t understand why she was so upset. I later learned about the push and he didn’t have a girlfriend, but had called me ugly.

Now we stood in that same embrace in a little restaurant bathroom. Becky was calling the doctors and biopsy results everything she could think of. And just like that night at the dance, “Don’t worry Kay, we are going to knock this cancer on its ass.”

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Filed under BFF, cancer, friendship, illness, love, sickness, sisterhood

March 31, 2011 · 4:31 am

Conundrum (Part VIII)

Conundrum (Part VIII)
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/30/11

There was a time in my life that I believed in fairy tales. When I met my husband, I was sure there was a happily ever after ending for us. There was an image of us in our rocking chairs on the front porch of the home we had spent a lifetime building together. We’d watch our grandchildren run about the front yard as we sipped on our lemonade and I rocked my youngest grand baby in my arms. I believed in “till death do us part.”

And even as I sat in the very cold corporate mediation conference room, I still couldn’t accept that this was how it was all going to end. I waited alone at the long highly polished dark mahogany table. Every part of my marriage contradicted the fairy tale I carried around in my mind. Because my entire marriage consisted of the very moment I was experiencing right now, being alone. Even in his presence, I was alone. And now we had arrived at the end and I waited alone.

My loneliness was interrupted by the mediator. Formalities and small talk were exchanged as we waited the arrival of the boy. Time ticked on and the small talk dwindled. And finally after twenty minutes, the little boy entered. He appeared polished from head to toe. His light gait carried an arrogance as he seated himself at the head of the table. So much for our rocking chairs on the front porch.

I remained seated after the short ten minutes of complete devastation took place. Nothing. He wanted nothing. He signed everywhere the mediator told him to sign and left. He left with no wife, no kids, no happily ever after, just an agreement for child support. He initialed and signed it all away.

I’m not sure what hit the floor first, my tears or the pictures of our…my…new daughter that he had never met. I don’t know what compelled me to think he would want to see her, but as the mediator placed the pictures back in my hands, I dried my tears. She would be better off not knowing him anyways. Because the man at conception, was not the boy that just left this room.

I wasn’t devastated because my marriage was over. I wasn’t hurt that he didn’t want me anymore. I was hurt because today my children were stripped of their fairy tale. Their happily ever after had been reduced to a 50/50 statistic.

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Filed under children, Conundrum, daughters, divorce, family, marriage, motherhood

March 23, 2011 · 2:55 pm

BFF V

BFF V
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/23/11

Lunch with my BFF. Yay! It had been almost a week since I’d seen Kay. I think she is pregnant. She had slipped up in a few conversations over the past couple of months with mention of doctors’ appointments. A few years ago she had a miscarriage, so I respected if she wanted to keep this one little secret under wraps until she felt comfortable telling me. They took about a year off after that, but I knew they’d been trying ever since. I prayed for them all the time. But like she said last night on the phone, she had some news for me. Yay! Finally.

Lunch with Becky. I’d been rehearsing every moment, since I invited her out to the restaurant around the corner from her job. Knowing her, she probably thinks I’m pregnant. I knew I’d slipped up about some of the doctors’ appointments. But I knew her, she was not going to say anything because of my miscarriage. Through all of my rehearsals, I’d found there was no happy positive way to tell your lifelong friend you have cancer. I mean, I hadn’t even accepted it yet, but I needed my BFF to help me. If I didn’t tell her now, I wouldn’t make it through this week.

Look at my girl. She looked so beautiful, a little tired maybe, but beautiful nonetheless. And she was not showing one bit. I always knew she would be one of those skinny pregnant woman. I hated her so much. I’d probably gain all the sympathy weight why she’d lose weight. This was what being best friends was all about, I thought as I sat down at the table and sipped on my ginger ale with no ice and lime wedge that she had ordered me. She knew my drink, while my husband always messed it up.

I had to do my best to keep my tears away as I waved her over to the table. Just by looking at her I could tell she is expecting happy baby news. She didn’t even know I was about to drastically change both of our lives. The thing about being best friends was you feel the joys and pains of each other. You also try and spare each other pain. In this case, I was setting my pride aside and clinging to the only person in this world that would be able to share in my pain. In our lifetime together we had promised we would always use “we” instead of “I” if something happened to one of us. Because we both agreed, if it happened to one of us, it happened to both of us.

I took both of her hands in mine and she postured herself for the baby news. Her smile slowly fell as I finally let my tears flow. “Becky, we have cancer.”

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Filed under BFF, cancer, Christian, friends, friendship

March 16, 2011 · 5:57 am

Monster IV

Monster IV
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/16/11

I couldn’t say anything. Through the dim light and the small slit in my right eye, I saw a lean silhouette approaching me. I wasn’t sure if I turned my head towards her voice, but she was now whispering in my ear, “They’re going to kill us. I think I’ve been here for two or three days, I’m not sure. They got me on Sunday. Do you know what day it is?” I knew I had been brought down here with the dawning of a new day. If it was still the same day right now, then it was Friday. I went to bed Thursday night and they took me Thursday night. Today was Friday.

I don’t know if I told her it was Friday or was just thinking it, but our conversation or my thoughts were interrupted by steps outside of my small dungeon. The clang of the lock set Silhouette into an uncontrollable tremble. Her relentless grasp tortured my arm with a pain, but my mind transferred to that pain, rather than the aching of my ribs. I returned her tremble as the step with the light knock I heard at my house came into earshot, step, knock, step, knock… and then the maniacal laugh. She was right, they were going to kill us.

Silhouette screamed as they tore her from my side. I’m not sure if I reached out to hold her or if she had just not released her grip from my arm. I believed the latter, because she tore my sleeve and I now saw it dangling from her weak fist. She was thrown against the wall opposite me and all I could do was watch as Maniacal slammed his cane across her face. When I tried to turn away from her second blow, I was placed in a choke hold and made to watch as they beat her to death. She was right, they were going to kill us.

Maniacal crawled towards my face as it was thrown back to the ground. His low whisper terrorized more than his laugh, “You thought you could escape me? You thought I was going to never find you? I found you four years ago. How do you like that? I’ve been watching every little thing you do for the past four years. I could of taken you at 6:00 am in the parking lot at the park where you jog every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday morning. I helped you when you dropped your keys trying to get in your car after you bought your coffee and newspaper like you do every morning on the way to work. You let me come into your house and repair your air conditioner. I’ve been everywhere you go for the past four years. You can’t hide from me. I found you. I’ve got you. And just between you and me, you’re going to die here.” She was right, they were going to kill us.

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Filed under death, fear, fiction, horror, Monster, violence

March 14, 2011 · 7:10 pm

Conundrum (Part VII)

Conundrum (Part VII)
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/14/11

The silence enveloped the room as I breastfed my daughter and gently rocked us back and forth in the large maple glider my parents had given me. Her ladybug light casted a soft glow in the corner of the room. I watched her suckle and with each blink caught the flashback of this exact moment with each of her sisters. With my oldest, I had this moment on my bed propped up against my pillows in my small studio apartment. I did the same with my second daughter, but it was in our house with her father next to me. I now sat in the makeshift nursery in my friend’s home alone with nothing but dreams and hopes.

The only recent contact I had with my husband was the divorce papers I was served the other day. I couldn’t get my head around the fact that I actually felt sad. We were coming up on a year of being apart and I couldn’t tell you the last time we even talked or he contacted the kids. So why was this hurting? Why when I had embraced and accepted that I was doing this alone, did I feel like I was losing him all over again? I consistently prayed that God hadn’t forgotten me. Sometimes I believed I was just having a pity party, and the rest of the time I tried to hold onto the faith that He had me in the palm of His hand.

I signed the papers and sent them in the return envelope. It was against my faith, but I had to let go. Would God forgive me for giving up? I had continually asked myself this question since I mailed my vows away. But unfortunately my time in prayer had to be spent praying for my strength to support this family and thank my friend for her patience with my situation. I didn’t know if God was going to answer my prayers. I guess part of faith was hope, and I hoped God heard my prayers.

So in the dim glow of the makeshift nursery in my friend’s house, I said a single line to a prayer I had always rehearsed in its entirety, “Thy will be done.” I kissed my daughter and placed her in her tiny bassinet. “Thy will be done.”

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Filed under blessings, children, Christian, Conundrum, daughters, faith, family, fiction, friends, friendship, God, motherhood, parents, patience, praise, Uncategorized

March 2, 2011 · 3:47 pm

BFF IV

BFF IV
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/2/11

My best friend, Rebecca. I loved that woman. She was the only person that could complete my sentences, go to the store a month after me and buy the same exact dress and not know I already have it, and most of all she knew my heart and protected it better than I did at times. I couldn’t think of the past 28 years being any different. She was the love of my life, the only person outside my family, that had known me almost my whole life and still wanted to be my friend.

The history that Becky and I shared was something that my husband couldn’t seem to get passed. Well maybe not just my husband, but Becky’s husband too. I will say at the very least Becky’s husband reached out and became my friend. So while he hated the fact that I knew everything about his life, he also understood that I wasn’t going anywhere and my advice didn’t always work in my friend’s favor.

I guess the problem I had was that my husband really didn’t do any outreach to Becky. He felt the same way her husband felt about our relationship, but I’m not sure that he could get passed his jealousy to reach out to my friend. One of the pacts Becky and I made in our childhood was that boys stink. As we got approached our teens, there was a boy that liked both of us. He got us to stop calling each other for a whole three days. From that point on, we promised no boy was more important than our friendship. Those three days will be held as the longest we’ve gone without speaking to each other.

The other promise we swore to each other was to never keep a secret. I think we both tried and failed at achieving any sort of promise to ourselves or others. Most people who told us not to tell anyone, would always receive my honesty that I would most likely tell Becky. Some shared, some didn’t, but at least they knew not even their deepest darkest secret would make me break my promise to my BFF.

Now I sat in my bedroom wondering how I had gone a week and at least six phone conversations without sharing the news of what my doctor told me three days ago. This was one time in their lives that my husband and Becky had reversed roles in my life. My husband has been there for me the past month as I’ve gone through all these tests. And now I think he was understanding why he didn’t want to be my best friend. It was a huge responsibility. He continued to ask me if I told Becky yet. I told him I wanted to wait for the results. And now, three days ago-the results, and I still hadn’t told her. How could I tell her I have cancer?

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Filed under BFF, blessings, cancer, family, friends, friendship, God, husband, sisterhood, wife

March 2, 2011 · 4:26 am

BFF III

BFF III
By: Mia L. Hazlett
3/1/11

My best friend was my soul mate. Odd? Not really. I laughed when people made that claim about their spouses. It just wasn’t true. Ask any person if they tell their spouse everything…and I mean everything. I myself was married. But unlike my best friend, my husband wasn’t there when I was in elementary school. He didn’t experience my first kiss when I played spin-the-bottle at Jerry Cartright’s party when I was twelve. He didn’t try to get my first crush to talk to me by hanging out at his locker after third period everyday for a week, when I was fourteen. And he’s never told me that I look fat. He doesn’t even know what colors make me look fat, nevermind tell me the truth when I try wear them. And he sure the hell wasn’t there to assist me in writing the worst love email of my life. My soul mate, Kay, she’s been there through it all and because of her, yellow and baby blue are sworn out of my wardrobe.

I actually thought my husband’s jealousy over our relationship proved my case even more. Because my soul mate could not care less how he felt about her. He couldn’t understand why he couldn’t be my best friend. There was no comprehension in the difference in my relationship with Kay and with him. I couldn’t marry her. I couldn’t start a family with her. The whole live together thing had never happened. And I prefer to sleep with men, not women. She can’t be him and he can’t be her.

But now since my life partner and BFF learned they both loved me, things were backfiring on me. They liked each other. Meaning, they had each other’s cell and work numbers. And get this, my BFF took his side sometimes. For the first time in our lifetime of friendship she was telling me I was wrong. As jealous as my stupid husband got, he didn’t realize that my BFF had been the glue in our relationship at times. She was a wonderful mediator and had the peace of my soul in her best interest. So in my six years of marriage and my lifetime friendship, I was able to comfortably co-exist with my two favorite people. My life was happy and it was all mine.

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Filed under BFF, blessings, friendship, husband, marriage, sisterhood, wife

January 23, 2011 · 1:58 am

Macy IV

Macy IV
By: Mia L. Hazlett
1/22/11

It was a lot easier to hate someone because they were a jerk. A jerk was just that, a jerk. And that’s how I had always thought of my grandmother. But this letter made it much more difficult to hate her. I was beginning to understand the deep seeded abuse she cast upon me. Still, how could I erase a lifetime of hate with a letter, well I guess letters? I turned to the only person that could offer some sort of explanation, Macy’s daughter, my mother.

So much pain resurfaced in the two hour conversation we shared – pain for both of us. I realized my grandmother had reached from beyond the grave, and her hatred was revived as she forced me to open old wounds for my mother. When my mother cried, a chord struck in my heart as we relived a past that we thought was buried. As I leaned back on my couch, I regretted calling my mother. It never crossed my mind that my mother was a victim of Macy’s serial abuse too. Macy was a woman so wronged that she carried her wrath for two generations.

My grandmother prayed that my mother would take the routes of my aunts…marry light. But not my mother, Daddy was somehow darker than her. So I guess my baby picture delivered the third strike. My mother was dark, she married dark, and now she had an extra dark baby. She shared with me our first meeting. It wasn’t that warm fuzzy pacing the waiting room thing or waiting by the phone, but I was hidden from her for almost two years. A family birthday brought us together and my hell on earth began.

To those she loved, she was known as Mama. My mother called her mother. I called her Ms. Macy. She called me the black sheep amongst her pure lambs. You see Ms. Macy was the daycare for our family. My mother dropped me off at six in the morning everyday, except Sunday. Six days of relentless verbal torture from that woman…every single week. There was no reprieve. Just a self-hatred that formed from as far back as I can remember.

I sat on my couch for over an hour after my mother left. The letters begged for my attention as I tried to avoid them. I reached for the envelope with the tiny number two in the left corner. Tears streamed as I read each word. I cried myself to sleep that night.

That day at the lake chainjd my life Macy. Therr wuzn’t nuttin’ that happnd to them boyz Macy. Thats just how it wuz back then. Therr wuzn’t nuttin’ that wood happn to white peple dat killd cullurd folk. The thing wuz, white peple didn’t think or care that cullurdz luvd therr babeez. Becuz it wuzn’t only my life dat chainjd, but Mama wuzn’t rite aftr dat eether.

See my daddy dun got killd to. My oldr bruthr Tobias wuz namd aftr my daddy. Daddy shur wuz angree. You mite now think he dun run to therr houz and hurt them, but he didn’t do that. One them boyz walkd passd my daddy in town and daddy dun gave him a bad stare. Thats all it took back den. You dun lookd at a white man rong and you wuz cullurd, then they wood hurt you reel bad Macy. They wood hurt you reel bad.

I dun wish I hadn’t run after them people in the woodz Macy. I dun wish I hadn’t. But I did. Me and my couzin followd thoze therr men and I saw what they did to my daddy. Don’t know if you dun hurd about linchins Macy, but thats what they did to my daddy. They dun linched him.

My daddy wuz a big man. It dun took four of dem skinny white menz to hold onto my daddy. He dun faught dem men through the field, but when they got him to that therr tree in the clearing, therr wuz about twenty othr menz therr. Me and my couzin stayed up in the trees in the woodz, but we could see it all. As I looked past my daddy at the tree, thats when I new what they wuz gonna do to him. Therr wuz already a man hangin’ there. He was just hangin’ therr with no life.

I didn’t do nuttin’ Macy. I didn’t do nuttin’ but cry in that tree. They dun stripped my daddy’s clothes off and tied hiz handz round the trunk ov that therr tree. Sum men had whips and sum had sticks. They dun beat my daddy bad. They beat him till he stopped hollarin’. I thought he wuz ded, but when they untied him, he didn’t fall. My daddy stood aftr hiz beatin’.

A big fat man came on my daddy and hit him in the neez with a big long stick. Daddy fell back with a big crash and cry. Two ov them other men dun put a rope round my daddys neck. I didn’t know where he went as they gatherd in close round him, but then daddy was in the air. They dun threw that rope up over that branch next to that no life man. He kickd and screemd Macy. My daddy kicked and screemed.

When that man let go of my daddy’s legs, he didn’t screem no more. His cheeks puffd and his eyes lookd up. I stoppd lookin’ ’cause I saw one man bringin’ ovr sum fire. I new they wuz gonna burn my daddy. Ain’t nuttin’ no child should have to do, but Macy, I prayd my daddy wuz ded. Macy, I dun prayd my daddy wuz ded. My prayers wuzn’t answerd Macy. I herd my daddy screem to death. All the way to his death, my daddy screemd.

My momma did her best with us other ones after that. But she just wasn’t the same. She dun lost her sons and husband. They dun took the bodies somewhere after that, my daddys, my brothers, and that no life man to. So she lost her men and couldn’t even bury them. Not like all the big stuff that happens nowdays for dedfolk, my daddy and brothers didn’t get no funral. I don’t think it was the no funral so much that botherd her. It was the fact she had to keep cleanin’ the house of the boy who dun killd her sons, raped her daughterz, and got her husband ded.



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Filed under death, fiction, husband, kidnapping, lynching, Macy, racism, wife

January 14, 2011 · 2:10 am

Taken IV

Taken (IV)
By: Mia L. Hazlett
1/13/11

It had been two months since my baby was taken. There were occasional phone calls from the detectives assigned to Jessie’s case. But over all, they were starting to dwindle. It used to be three to four times a week, but now it was only return phone calls. The hardest part to adjust to was the decrease in the search intensity. The first week I functioned completely on adrenaline. It felt like the detectives lived here. Our neighbors did everything to help. The house was never empty. Even the second week, we had relatives and friends in and out. But now there was just us.

My husband held most of the details to the investigation. There was very little that I knew, except that they had not found her. Unfortunately, these past two months, as heart-wrenching as they’d been, had been a reprieve from Mark, my husband, and his brutality. Last night was the first time since we lost her that he’d hit me or should I say beat me. It was with such viciousness that I thought I wouldn’t make it through. There had been times before that I thought that, but last night he unleashed two months of pent up fury.

I touched the mirror instead of my face. My fingers lightly traced my swollen right eye. How my left eye was spared, I’m not sure. The split down my lower lip seemed to cut it right in half. There was a bruise on my left cheek, which was probably the reason for the excruciating pain that shot through my face when I tried to open my mouth. Usually he spared my face, but I guess he knew I wasn’t leaving the house to go anywhere.

The last time I left the house was the morning we went to drop her off for school. It may be selfish, but I wasn’t ready to see other children playing in the neighborhood. I didn’t think I could take hearing the sound of “mommy” coming from a child’s mouth. I sat on the floor in her bedroom and cried myself to sleep most nights. Not to mention my dreams, they rentlessly taunt me.

Sometimes they were memories, sometimes she was running back into my arms completely untouched, but mostly they were nightmares. It was the nightmares that left me drained. There was one that I had consistently. I was at her school and following behind her in the crowded hallways. I could never seem to get close to her, but could hear her distinct little giggle. Out of nowhere, a man came and grabbed her. He was running so fast with her and my legs didn’t move. It was the sound of her screaming, “Mommy help me!”, that always woke me.

“Mommy help me.” Mommy couldn’t even help herself, I thought, as I examined the large bruise on my right side in the mirror. I knew my ribs were broken. A large inhale forced me to double over in pain and brought about a much more painful cough attack. I made my way back into bed. My four pillows offered me the only comfort I think I would find in the next couple of nights as I tried to heal my wounds. I could only pray that my darling Jessie was safe right now. As much as I missed my angel, I was grateful she was not here to listen to my cries for help.

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Filed under daughters, family, fiction, kidnapping, Taken