Life of a Troubled Prince
by Ramon Herring
“Until the lion writes his own story, the tale of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.” The Soy Autor writing process was developed in collaboration with young people at-risk of, victims of or perpetrators of violence in El Salvador. In 2017, this innovative program expanded into Chicago to create tangible high quality opportunities that nourish the minds, expand the voices and share the personal truths of young people who have long been underserved and underestimated.Through the process of drafting, revising, illustrating and publishing memoirs, the Author’s Circle members develop reflection, critical thinking, camaraderie, conflict resolution and positive self-projection. This North Lawndale Author’s Circle has been based at the Firehouse Community Arts Center, as part of Chicago CRED program.
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Life of a Troubled Prince Ramon Herring
My story starts o like no other I have heard from another’s life. It was a rainy month like no other, the month a young prince dessned for pain was born. The month of March. As I got older, I learned to loathe this me. I learned to prepare emooonally because I had been the one of all my siblings who didn’t get to see and know my Father. I was also the one that was house-bound and ed to my mom since she had been sick. She was in and out of the hospital since I could remember. I was soon to be 13 years old, in the sadness of 2005.
My elementary school was Maria Saucedo. I was the one in the house feeding my Mom “meals on wheels� 3 mes a day, helping her in and out the tub, helping her to the washroom, helping her get dressed, helping her at the grocery store.
March was my birthday month and used to be ďŹ lled with happiness for me, but around age of 7 I had built a wall around myself. I didn’t want to show the hurt, so I masked it with constant games of marbles, tag, it, home base, king of the hill and boys chase girls.
The year 2005 was dierent. The sun was bullied by the clouds as they cried heavy tears, as if an angel had fallen from the heavens in disgrace. They screamed and fussed with strong voices hiing our red brick row houses and through the trees in the boulevard across from my house.
I had been housebound for days due to the ferocious, feral weather outside unless I had school. I wasn’t going to let this ruin this month for me.
I had other plans, and 5 older siblings. My three older sisters and brother made this me fly by playing the Nintendo Gamecube version of Super Smash Brothers Melee with me. I only let them play with a girl character like Peach. My brother always had his favorite character, Link so I never got to use him. I always won with Samus. They all acted like they had a big secret, which they did, but I didn’t know. While I was at school this parrcular day, my mom had been rushed off to Mount Sinai or “Mount Dienai” as many called it.
For whatever reason there was always a dark thought at the back of my mind due to my mom having serious health issues. They gave me an early birthday as they dragged on even though they weren’t supposed to. They did so to keep my spirits up.
I eventually started to think to myself, “they have a hidden agenda. They know and feel something I don’t.”
I knew something was off on that parrcular day. I can’t tell you what it parrcularly was. I ssll couldn’t put my finger on it.
This day in itself felt as if cold fleshless hands and arms were engulfing me in a lifeless shroud of dampness like the grave.
The secret they were hiding I eventually figured out. As a child, the glitz and glam of early giis and me spent with my siblings over the past few days were blinders to me. I didn’t nooce unnl the radiance dissipated to a menacing sickness that was a plague on a genocidal level, eaang my consciousness alive.
I felt this way aaer I found out my Grandmother and Godmother had taken me to the hospital to see my mom a few days before my birthday. I hated the sight of her hooked up to the tracheal tube, IV, the bathroom bags and all the monitors.
It hurt me even more to see her unable to speak. My Godmother handed her the thick yellow notepad and she started wriing away. Her hand glided across the pages like a yacht across the oceans. She ďŹ nished up and handed me the notepad. I read it and broke down. It was as if she knew this was her last testament or request of me personally. She saw all of her kids that day.
As we were on the ride home all that was racing through my mind was a prayer. “Please let me take my Queen, please let her make it back home!! I’ll be good, I swear. I can’t and won’t survive or live on my own.” That cold rainy night was like a reoccurring aaack on my physique.
The next day was March 18th my birthday. It was lit. It was the second me in my life I had smoked weed. The first me was when I was about 11 with my homie Shauntrel, also the first I got drunk, thanks to my brother’s friends.
Liile did I know that this month would become a nightmare to me.
My Godmother and Uncle came over on March 23rd . They came in and asked where my second oldest sister was. I replied “upstairs” as I went back to washing the dishes up. They yelled upstairs, “Tammy, come down. We gooa talk to you and Moanie.” This was the nickname they had given me.
She hopped out the shower, got dressed and posted at the top of the stairs. “What is it? I’m geeng ready to go out. Say what you gooa say.” So my Godmother asked me to come have a seat next to her and I did. That’s when the Reaper came, plunged his fist in my chest and ripped my heart out.
Freezing me in his cold grip in me as he muuered the words, “Your mother just passed away.” I shook away from my Godmother’s grip and gave a loud shout. I replied “Stop Lying!!!” I had the pit in my stomach that confirmed the truth. She wasn’t lying. Upon hearing this, my sister came falling down our cement stairs. My Uncle caught her mid-fall down the 13 steps.
They woke my sister up and all of us, her kids and family, met at the hospital to view her body. They didn’t want me to go in at ďŹ rst. I don’t know if that was due to me being so young at the me or if was something else. AAer a while I started seeing red and tore up the hospital area right outside the curtain where they had laid her body on the bed for the family to view her.
They allowed me to see her but I only got a short glimpse. I was denied the request to hold her hand one last me. I couldn’t see her again unnl the funeral when they dolled her up like an old mey singer. That’s why the year 2005 is my year of sadness.
I’ve grown, matured and had me to diversify myself over the years through travel and encounters with people of all races. I have had the opportunity to see into the lives of others and how they have dealt with things such as the death of a parent. Everyone deals with grief dierently. Me personally, I ďŹ rst dealt with my grief by blaming my siblings and the doctors for the fault they had with her surgery.
There are many factors I blamed for her death, but now at the prime age of 25, soon to be 26, I have come to the realizaaon that in all honesty no one is to blame. God called her home. His plan, in my personal opinion, was to make me the level headed, strong willed, well educated (school and self-taught), good hearted and humble young African American man that I have become due to all that she insslled in me before she departed the world prematurely.
She lee me when I was the tender age of 13.
I am from everywhere and nowhere. From Jordan/Pelle’s and Business Suits in Bustle I am from the comfortable abode With the warm, mellow smell of a bakery. I am from the wind that blows Through high rises and low row houses. I am from family reunions and “Thick or thin, I have your back, we’re family.” From Herring and Summers. I am from the grudge-holding and God-fearing. From treat others like you want to be treated and Be humble, turn the other cheek. I’m from a Missionary Baptist. I’m from North Carolina’s southern hospitality and Chicago gritty paved streets. From soul food and seafood. From family feuds and out of the blue cookouts. I am from everywhere and nowhere.