Patsy is a Jamaican woman who finally obtains a 6-month visa
to go to the U.S. Her main motivation is
to reunite with her long-time friend and lover, Cicely, in New York. There’s one catch, however. Patsy has to leave her 6-year-old daughter,
Tru, behind, with Tru’s father, who has a wife and family of his own. Tru’s story is the heartbreaking one
here. Nothing but disappointment awaits
her mother in the U.S., but it is nothing compared to Tru’s loss. Patsy has never embraced motherhood, but now
Tru keeps wondering when her mother will come back for her, as promised. Patsy, of course, has no intention of ever
returning to Jamaica, despite the drudgery and financial desperation she faces
in the U.S., taking menial jobs and barely scraping by. The upside is that Tru’s life with her
policeman father is in many ways better than the one she shared with her
mother. Patsy grapples with guilt over
her abandonment of Tru, but she never takes the steps necessary to assuage that
guilt. I get that Patsy aspires to life
on her own terms, but her plans for resuming her relationship with Cicely are
completely unrealistic, since she knows that Cicely is married, even if only
for residency purposes. For me, this
story is unbearably sad, and not just for Tru and Patsy. Cicely is trapped in a marriage to a
successful but abusive husband, and her son is just as cowed as his mother. She seems to have written to Patsy, begging
her to come to New York, in an effort to bring some joy to her life. It is unclear whether she has been
fantasizing about a life for Patsy and herself, when she knows she doesn’t have
the courage or the means to leave her husband, or if she has just been telling
Patsy what she knows Patsy wants to hear.
Either way, her letters are the catalyst to an unfortunate series of
events in which Tru is the one who suffers the most. The central questions are these: How long is Patsy going to carry a torch for
Cicely, and is she going to make an effort to mend her relationship with her own
daughter?
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