ALL SKINFOLK AIN’T KINFOLK

Ten years ago, I purchased a beautiful antique golden pocket watch with engraved initials. “E.R.A. “ Also, I was able to score an old Tiffany & Co. Return to Tiffany Tag Necklace and Bracelet in Silver and a pair of ladies Sperry Navy sneakers in size nine and half. I was so happy with this haul, especially since I only paid $50 altogether. Little did I know that my little weekly thrift store and antiquing outing for my online vintage store called Poor Little Rich Girl would end up allowing me to become a time traveler. I thought I had scored big by just discovering a pocket watch that had my initials on it. I have always been a huge history buff. My name is Evelyn Rosalyn Amiss. I have been traveling for so long through different time periods. I almost forgot what era I am really from until I heard two Englishmen in 1830 at a pub called "Illusions" say the phrase "Unfortunately, Samuel couldn't save him! By the time he finally arrived back, he was too deep in thug life!" Instantly, I thought about the first time I heard the 2Pac song "Thug Life" playing on my dear departed mother's Mercedes-Benz car radio while driving home from high school with her. I was sixteen years old and living in Queens, New York with my maternal family. It was Friday, September 28, 1994, my grandmother's birthday. We were excitedly discussing our plans for her big party that night. This is really a bittersweet memory for me. That was the last birthday I ever shared with them. They were all killed in a drunk driver fatal car accident a month later. My mother, grandmother, grandfather, aunt and cousin were traveling back from a sushi restaurant when the accident occurred three blocks from our home. I hate sushi, so I didn't go with them. I was able to treat myself to a Philly cheesesteak sub, instead while hanging outside with my friends. To this day, I hate the sight of sushi. I was already a big fan of 2Pac. The song started playing on repeat in my head as I listened to the two Englishmen tell their tale of another doomed from the beginning interracial love affair. Kill, kill, kill Kill, kill, kill [Verse 1] Raised by thugs schooled by killers I learned mathematics from big-time dealers So how the f**k these love to see a nigga fallin' Pop the Glock, suckas plottin' on a playa 'cause he's ballin' Up early in the mornin' four deep Creepin' in my Jeep, nigga real thugs don't sleep You'll never kill a real g, feel me Suddenly, I missed the 21st century. I realized I was finally ready to go home and face the music. I have avoided handling my business long enough. These two Englishmen don't know how much their tale of family drama unfolding in Bombay, India, speaks to my past open wounds. The British East India Company arrived in India in the early 1600s, struggling and nearly begging for the right to trade and do business. Within 150 years, the thriving firm of British merchants, backed by its own powerful private army, was essentially ruling India. In the 1800s, English power expanded in India, as it would until the mutinies of 1857-58. After those very violent spasms, things would change, yet Britain was still in control. And India was very much an outpost for the mighty British Empire. They speak of their uncle, Duke Charles Manning, being sent to the Seven Islands of Bombay, India by order of the royal crown to assist with reshaping the city with large-scale civil engineering projects aimed at merging all seven islands into a single amalgamated mass in 1782. He took his whole family due to the fact it was believed to be a long-standing post. I traveled to all the Seven Islands of Bombay during the Portuguese Rule from 1534-1661. I had a lot of mischievous fun. It seems his eldest son Samuel quickly fell in love with a native woman named Aalia and impregnated her. He fought to marry her to legitimatize his son but was unfortunately unable to do so in that "Anglo-Indian" society. He was forced back to England to manage their affairs at home with the promise that he could eventually return once his younger brother Matthew completed his schooling. Then, other issues kept popping up that held him in England courtesy of his dear father. So, he was forced to be content with only writing to his beloved and sending money for many years due to the fear of being disinherited. After forty-eight years and the death of his father making him the head of his family, he was able to return. Unfortunately, in his absence, his son started running in a bad crowd. The absence of a strong parental figure can lead many boys to look for father figures in the streets of many large cities around the world, as well as in any decade I have discovered. Furthermore, in 1830 India, gangsters suppressed by British Rule in the early 19th century, were called thugs and/or Hindi swindlers or thieves, meaning "he covers or conceals" in Sanskrit. By the time he arrived, his son had stolen and assaulted too many individuals and was hanged. Now, Samuel and his beloved Aalia have their grandchildren, Aavya and Henry, to look after since their mother died in childbirth. Speaking of my past open wounds, let's start with parentage. My mother, Darlene Adina Amiss, was a light-skinned African-American woman and my father, Victor Diego Rodriguez, was a Mexican man. I was raised to believe in it till I was sixteen and had lost my maternal family that my mother had once lived in Los Angeles, California. That is where she met and fell in love with my father, who was an illegal immigrant in this country. They were together for a total of five years before he was forcibly sent back to Mexico and killed, sneaking back across the border to be with us. I was five years old at the time. I don't really remember him. The rest of his family was in Mexico. So, with no family support from his side, she returned to New York. I still remember all the events of that terrible evening just like it was yesterday. Some of the corner boys who I went to school with came running to inform me that my people were hurt badly in a car accident up the block. I raced up the block to discover my family dead on the scene. Police were everywhere, and I lost it. I was hospitalized for a panic attack. Then they sent me to a group home until they could locate any family for me. They were able to find my paternal grandmother, Maria Rodriguez, living in Brownsville, Texas two weeks later. Brownsville is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the seat of Cameron County, located on the western Gulf Coast in South Texas adjacent to the border with Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Mexico. I was able to return to my maternal family rental apartment long enough to pack up a seven-piece luggage set. Before taking my first plane ride, I remember going to Texas. You will never know how hard it was to pack up my whole life in two hours in only a very worn-beat-up seven-piece luggage set. During that period in the group home, I discovered that my birth certificate had me listed as a White Hispanic. I never knew this information; my mother raised me to write down African-American. I do remember her telling me that she was asleep when my father completed all the hospital paperwork concerning me. They had already agreed upon a name for me. So, I assumed it was my father's handiwork at the time.