Jamaican Anatomy

I remember having a good, long laugh about this particular image when one of my cousins shared it on Facebook awhile back.  It reminds me that my parents were right about me being Jamaican, even though I was born and raised in America.  When I became a dad, among the many parenting things I did (and still do) was baths.  And while I was washing the twins (moreso when they were smaller than now), I would find myself calling out their body parts in patois as I washed them.  “Come mek me wash your neck back”, and so on.

When I was growing up, I made no effort at all to speak patois–not even when we were in Jamaica visiting for weeks at a time.  I even teased my younger sister for her attempts.  But now the joke’s on me–in more ways than one.  The patois that sneaks out when I’m not even thinking about it isn’t the only way the heritage is more firmly embedded than I realized in my youth.