Pearls of Fate

(Deep southern accent of an older white woman around age 60) Uh huh...see there? They tell me you reap what you sow….uh huh…. I guess what I’m really trying to say is what goes around, comes around. What you start, God will finish. Oh, I’m sorry, let me introduce myself. I’m the beautiful antique pearl necklace that has been worn around the necks of many generations of damaged women. Now, I’m not just any old pair of stringed pearls, why I’m uniquely decorated with quartz crystal and other interesting amulets on a strong sterling silver chain. Some large round pearls. Some small and even tiny pearls. Some (spoken with deep southern drawl) whiiite and some gray; but all English cultured pearls, nevertheless. There’s a beautiful silk gray ribbon that twines its way through every chain and indeed, I’m something to behold. It’s hard for me to walk into a room amidst the neck of a beautiful damsel and not be noticed. Which is why I’ve always told those silly women NOT TO WEAR ME. It seems that whenever I’m worn, the ultimate tragedy takes place. If only Ruth had left me on Clarissa’s neck to begin with, maybe I’d have been buried in the ground with Clarissa, never to bear witness to any of the unfortunate tales I’m about to bestow upon you today.

It was 1862 in South Carolina, not long before the slaves were emancipated. Clarissa Belle Winchester had reached the ripe old age of 49 and thought it necessary to try and give her husband a baby to replace the two children that she’d lost to that dreadful scarlet fever. Clarissa always despised the house slaves, since her husband Jerry Clyde Winchester used to have his share of sexual pleasure with so many of them. It angered her to know that he found delight in the colored slave, and without her own children to nurture, she felt worthless. This is when she decided to go back and try to force her body to perform like it did when she was a young bride. So, on that breezy fall day in October, something felt so odd about this delivery until even Ruth could sense that it would not be a good night for a new life to enter. Having birthed every baby on the plantation, Ruth was no stranger to mid-wifery. But the amount of blood that Clarissa was losing was a bit much and her pain was so severe that she reached up and slapped Ruth several times, just for being there. There was something in that slap that caused young Ruth to snap. Now back then, the slaves didn’t have no say. If your white slave owner slapped you and spit in your face, you were supposed to act like she’d just kissed you on the cheek and render unto her the services that were due with a smile. On this day, Ruth was supposed to deliver a baby that would cause Mr. Winchester to appreciate his wife once more. But this baby wasn’t scheduled to walk this earth. It just wasn’t meant to be. Still born he was. Never breathed the breath of life. And Clarissa took it all out on Ruth; somehow, she had to make it her fault. As Ruth cleaned the blood, Clarissa kept spitting at her. Spit on her brow. Spit in her hair. Spit on her arm. Well, I can just imagine in between that spit, placenta, and birthing shit, Ruth’s right mind just got up and split. Yea….that’s what I said…..uh huh…see there?

“Ruth? Brang me my special charm pearl necklace from over there off the boudoir. My granny passed them down to me before she died. Hurry up and fasten my pretty pearl necklace around my neck. Don’t want my husband to see me looking like this. Hurry up, you dumb bitty!!!” I remember like it was yesterday, the first time a stranger’s hand touched me. Ruth’s slaved palms against my fine self just didn’t match. But she did as her Ma’am said and fastened me around Clarissa’s neck. Clarissa thanked her with another hawk of spit to her left eye. Ruth didn’t dare wipe it off, but stood there and waited for permission to move. That’s when it all happened. As if fate played its part, Master Winchester walked in the room and learned of the fate of this half-born child. Born…but dead. In his frustration, he grabbed Ruth by the arm and snatched her out of Clarissa’s presence. Clarissa clutched on to me for comfort and I was there, ever so faithful to give life to such an ugly and dead situation. She held up a mirror to admire my beauty around her neck as she could hear the ramblings of her husband taking out his frustration sexually on Ruth. She screamed in rebellion, “Mas’sah No? Please Mas’sah?” But his bestial grunts gave way to the relief that was at hand.

When Ruth returned to her presence, Clarissa was writhing with bitterness and anguish. She clawed into Ruth’s face and demanded that she bring her some soup. This is where it all went wrong. Ruth brought soup all right. Soup made with some poisonous mushrooms and a few drops of blood from the scratch on her cheek. This tasty brew was sure to take Clarissa to an early grave. The bitter Ma’am found her last breath at the bottom of that bowl. And as soon as her Ma’am left this earth with her last panting gasp, Ruth snatched me from around her neck and put me in her apron pocket. Only to send me on a journey that I’d rather have just taken to the grave with Clarissa.

Ruth had tried and tried to make a baby with her husband and was under the belief that the good Lord had fixed her so that she’d never have chil’un. She’d grievingly delivered baby after baby whether it was for a slave or a Ma’am but never her own. All the herbs in the world couldn’t fix it so she could have a baby until 9 months after Master Winchester had his way with her on that strange October eve. So, come to find out, her husband Sam was the problem, and not Ruth. I suspect Sam had the babies knocked out of him after getting beat so many times for mouthing off to Master Winchester. Either way, when Ruth’s baby came out mulatto and passing for white, Master Winchester sent her off to live with his relatives up North in Maryland. He wanted his daughter to live a normal life as a beautiful white woman. So at the ripe old age of 15, Ruth clasped me around Cindy Lou’s neck and told her to guard me with her life.

Cindy Lou had a hard life because Winchester didn’t live long enough to keep up with her. Once she arrived in Maryland and his kin folks realized that she was a Ni’gra…they sent her to go be a domestic in New York. She worked hard and entered college to become a nurse. She was doing fine until she pulled me out and clasped me around her neck and headed out to take her midterms…that’s when she was snatched off the street and raped. I don’t know what kind of omen seems to follow when these gals wear me, but I wish for once they would just place me in a drawer and tuck me away. That rape baby that Cindy Lou had went on to be a famous singer in the Cotton Club in 1924. Rachel Ann, never knew her mother because she was raised in an orphanage. But Cindy Lou, made sure to leave me in that basket with her when she abandoned her on the doorsteps of that Catholic Church.

It was a cold night in October when Rachel Ann went searching through her jewelry box for something special to wear. She knew that this was the night that her Italian Mafia Boyfriend, Louie just might propose. So, as hidden as I’d like to be, she dug around until she came across me and adorned her neck with a fate that would end her life by midnight. The happiest ending for me was to lay around Rachel Ann’s neck and be buried in silence. I sat still and quiet as they

closed the casket. I was ever so relieved that my fate had come to an end. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust”…then it happened, a crowbar cracked the casket open at the request of Louie. He removed my clasp from around her neck……uh huh….see there? He just couldn’t leave well enough alone.