Where Are My Children?!

By L.A. Davis

Twenty seventeen was one of the worst hurricane seasons in history. Some blame the erratic changes in the weather patterns on climate change, global warming, or mother nature getting herself back into balance. But what if it was revenge for crimes committed against humanity centuries ago? In this tale of historical fiction. L.A. Davis creates a story of imagination that explains why hurricanes Irma, Jose, and Maria came to pay a destructive visit.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Absolute Author Publishing House
• Release date: Mar 1, 2020
• ISBN: 9781733718257

Book preview

WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN?!

L. A. DAVIS

ABSOLUTE AUTHOR PUBLISHING HOUSE

New Orleans, LA

WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN?!

Copyright © 2018 by L. A. Davis

Published 2018 by Absolute Author Publishing House

All rights for this publication is reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means to include electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or by any other means. Excerpts may be used in brief quotations in printed reviews without prior permission of the publisher or author. All pictures are the property of the author and are copyright protected.

Line Editor: Dr. Melissa Caudle

Copy Editor: Erin N. Wright

Cover Graphic: elite cover on Instagram

Illustrations: alisalaheldinkrar on Instagram

Section Graphics: Free Graphics

Author Photograph: Darnley D. Davis

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Davis, L. A.

ISBN: 978-1-7337182-5-7

Where Are My Children?!/ L. A. Davis

p.  cm.

Fiction  2. Hurricane

0 1 2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9

Printed in the United States of America

SPECIAL THANKS

Special thank you to Mrs. Mary Perry for your support.

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to every ancestor whose blood was soaked into the soil during the Transatlantic Slave Trade. To those who entered the belly of slave ships and were cast into the ocean from the shores of Africa, to the shores of the Americas and beyond. May you never be judged by the choices you had to make. May you never be judged by the choices you couldn’t make. May your souls forever rest in power as you rest in paradise.

I dedicate this book to those worldwide whose love and compassion rose above hate and bigotry to help those in need in the Caribbean and the United States during hurricane season 2017.

I dedicate this book to the people of the Caribbean for their resiliency after hurricanes Irma, Jose, and Maria.

I dedicate this book to the people of the United States Virgin Islands. You have shown the same resiliency as your ancestors before you. May we never let that die and may God continue to bless the emeralds of the sea.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

SPECIAL THANKS

DEDICATION

FOREWORD

CHAPTER 1

The Genesis of Hurricane Names

CHAPTER 2

Rise and Shine

CHAPTER 3

IRMA

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

Jose

CHAPTER 6

Maria

CHAPTER 7

Dust Clouds of Red

Conclusion

Honorable Mentions

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

FOREWORD

By Anita Davis

As a broadcaster, I was on the air for both Hurricanes Hugo (1989) and Marilyn (1995), in addition to various others, smaller, but disruptive storms. Having gone months without electrical power, running water, mobile,  landline telephones, and cable after those major storms, I have my island legs. When I met L. A. Davis in 2014, I did not know she was working towards a Doctorate of Education (EdD) in Organizational Leadership/Development. The path to her goal was arduous, occupying several years of her life. She considered letting go of her dream several times. Through serendipity, she elicited the key to what she needed to do to proceed, and successfully defended her dissertation in 2017.

This entire experience awakened within her an intense desire to help others in similar straits. She founded Pay it Forward USVI, Pay it Forward Caribbean, Virgin Islanders Business Directory to enable helping hands and networking among the inspired. She is a USVI Tourism Ambassador and wrote her first book, So, you want to be a doctoral learner huh? Are you nuts?!: A short story of my difficult journey as an online doctoral learner, and some tips to help you succeed - a marvelous yet sometimes heartbreaking chronicle. I purchased that book because I wanted to support a local author, but it lit a fire in me. I offered to review it, in hopes that others would find out what I did: that the only voice that matters is your own, and that we must keep ourselves open to all gifts, regardless of how they are packaged.

In September 2017, Dr. Davis’ beloved island home was overtaken by two horrifying hurricanes with just days between them. Irma demolished St. Thomas, Water Island, and St. John. While Irma dealt quite a blow, their sister island of St. Croix was not as severely affected. As local officials and residents launched into the recovery phase, we were warned of a new danger - Hurricane Maria. On September 19, 2017, Hurricane Maria seemed intent on finishing off whatever Irma had left, and we were utterly lost. US Virgin Islanders are citizens of the United States of America, but beyond the Caribbean Sea, we were invisible to the public before, during, and after the storms. The unincorporated U.S. territory of the Virgin Islands (originally purchased from Denmark in 1917), barely registers on television weather maps. Our proximity to the U.S. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, just forty miles west, rarely get us an honorable mention. The Office of the Governor struggled to mount assessment and search and rescue details and had already thrown out the lifeline to Federal officials in advance, and I cannot sugarcoat this as this was a humanitarian crisis.

Along with electricity, food, water, sanitation, medical care and shelter, the need for communication was dire. Many mobile network towers were affected, and the aerial telephone, cable and fiber optic systems were obliterated. Our underground fiber optics survived unscathed, as did any power lines buried underground. Nonetheless, the majority of the islands’ residents were in the dark literally and figuratively, with no way to communicate. Desperately, L. A. Davis took to social media to sift for information and share it as best as she could. Others were as frantic as she was for these treasures from home. She sought solace in memories of how she and her family survived previous tropical storms and hurricanes when she was a little girl. She recalled folk tales the adults in her life would tell to distract or thrill the children during such times.

As she kept vigil, the inspiration for her second book, "Where Are My Children?!" was born. For it was during the days and weeks after Irma and Maria as she tried to reach us, that she imagined a truth that might have been—a truth that connected her to home. If you are from the USVI you will find a certain familiarity within the pages of this book. If you are not, you will discover the power of a culture that has sustained a resilient people for centuries. And, everyone regardless of origin the book will revel in the ongoing story of the African Diaspora as seen through the eyes of the grieving forgotten.

PROLOGUE

September 2017 is a year that I and thousands in the Caribbean and millions around the world will never forget. One Category 4 and two Category 5 Hurricanes came within two weeks. They tried to wipe the entire Caribbean off the face of the earth. Hurricanes Irma, Jose, and Maria were vicious Cabo Verde tropical waves that bloomed into destruction. It was the first time I had ever seen hurricanes go up the Caribbean chain like a bowling ball trying to mow the islands down like pins as hard as they could.

The Hurricanes didn’t hit every island directly, but they touched most in some way. Jamaica was the only island that escaped the season of dread, but in their history, they too have had their loss. Irma boiled through the Caribbean with a vengeance; Jose couldn’t decide what to do, and Maria followed her sisters to make history.

Whatever islands hurricane Irma missed; Maria tried to finish. Those bitches were angry. Angry at who? Angry, for what?

In the Virgin Islands, we have Hurricane Supplication Day which falls on the fourth Monday of July each year. My grandmother always called it Pray Against Hurricane Day.

I remember paying attention to this weather pattern as soon as it popped up on the radar. There was something about her that left an unsettled feeling that would not leave my consciousness alone. There are many things in my life that I never thought I would live to see. The World Trade Center brought to its knees, an African American president, or two Category 5 hurricanes within weeks of each other, trying to scrub the very existence of my island home off the face of this planet. I could never have imagined the destruction Irma would bring.

I watched daily as the weather pattern crept closer and closer to the Caribbean and my island home. I spent time willing Irma back into the ocean by envisioning myself standing over her and blowing her back into the Atlantic Ocean. It was not to be. No amount of prayers was going to change her mind. She had unfinished business, a score to settle and nothing was going to stop her.

Days before Hurricane Irma hit, I posted a warning on my social media page not to play with this storm. Irma had not made landfall anywhere, but I knew something ominous was coming. I take nothing away from the people in the direct path of Irma. I can’t imagine the terror that resonated with the people dealing with these monsters. For those of us outside of those islands, it was agony. The emotional havoc those storms played on the people in the worldwide diaspora was almost unbearable. Hurricanes Irma, Jose, and Maria brought men to tears.

People were angry feeling that Puerto Rico got more news coverage than the USVI when Irma hit. I lost ten pounds and much sleep in one week. I felt guilty because I had my home, electricity, food, and no way to get any help home. I helped other groups on social media post messages of missing people to ease the mind of worried family members. I contacted our Congresswoman’s office in Washington D.C. to find out if there was anything else that I could do. The gentleman who answered the phone told me to continue doing what I was doing on social media. It gave me a sense of purpose and kept my mind occupied. I wanted to collect food and clothing to send home. That would have fallen on deaf ears. Hurricane Harvey had displaced thousands of people who came to our small city for refuge. The week before my family collected bags of clothing and food. I took them to the local collection center. No one cared about Hurricane Irma or the Virgin Islands.

December 2017, after hurricanes Irma, Jose, and Maria retired into infamy, I watch via social media as St. Thomians  as we are known on the island of St. Thomas, United States Virgin Island, assembled in a park that was created to commemorate the abolition of slavery in the USVI