Met a man on the roadside cryin
without a friend there’s no denyin’
you’re incomplete, there will be no findin’,
lookin’ for what you knew…
-”Friends”, Led Zeppelin

Miss B, I said this evening, I might be at the football field tomorrow afternoon so if you come home between services, that’s where I’ll be.

Sister Betty was heating up her dandelion tea, which smells not a bit unlike chicory coffee, and tastes ten times worse. Ohh, she said absent mindedly, who invited you?

Steaka- cup half way to her mouth, Miss Betty gave me a sharp glance. Is Steaka invite you? Don’t be getting all mixed-up with that now, Miss T. I’m not your mother, I can’t tell you what to do, but don’t get all mixed- up with Steaka.

This is frustrating, and exasperating.

If I could trade an X for a Y chromosome, I would. Many, many things are easier in Peace Corps for guys, and making friends seems to be one of them.

I have amazing Peace Corps friends. (Yes, I love you all.) But its exhausting and expensive to travel every weekend just to kill a bottle of wine and listen to classic rock and share a twin bed with someone you’re not having sex with. What I want are HCN (host country national) friends, but they, like the Holy Grail, seem impossible to find. (I’m not even going to touch the subject of dating right now.)

To be sure I have “friends” in Claremont, people who are glad to see me everyday when I walk by them, who love it when I stop and chat for a few minutes before waddling down the hill to work. But these people are either older women (like Miss Carmen, the market lady who gives me a huge hug every week and invites me to church), taxi drivers, or they are the scraggly legions of children who run after me shrieking “MissTaylorMissTaylorMissTaylor!”

I don’t really have any “FRIENDS” though, people my age to go dancing with, or to the beach, or to sit around and just fucking hang out. Is it so much to ask? Apparently so.

First off, who to to be friends WITH? Let’s look at the facts.
Here we have me, a white girl from a farin, who not only finished high school, but has a university diploma in weird things like Environmental Studies and Anthropology. On top of that, why the hell am I volunteering in Claremont, where nothing ever happens ever?
I don’t wear bright colors, I don’t wear anything short, tight, or low cut. I don’t carry a handbag, I don’t wear fake Gucci, and people are too polite to say that my Chaco’s are the ugliest things they’ve ever seen.
Then we have the rest of the 20 something girls in my community. If they are around, it means they have maybe graduated from high school, perhaps a class at Moneague College. Most likely they have a kid (or two), though not necessarily a husband. Some have jobs in town, or they work in Ocho Rios or Montego Bay. In short, they don’t really have time for me.

At home, this wouldn’t be an issue. I’m not much of a girl’s girl anyway, and most of friends in the states are guys. Here, this is loaded.
Peace Corps will tell you (in the chipperest tones possible) that its absolutely possible for a guy and a girl to be platonic friends in Jamaica. “You just need to be very clear on the boundaries.” Well…DUH.

This is where Steaka comes in as Exhibit A in the Great Friendship Dilemma.

Steaka (He told me once that his legal name is Tiegle, which is just as incomprehensible as his yard name) is the captain of the local football (soccer for you American philistines) club. The crew spends most of their time in a ramshackle patchwork zinc shack at the end of my lane. Their logo is spray-painted all over the place. Its the usual motley assortment of ne’r do-wells. Some drive robot (unlicensed, or white-plate as opposed to red) taxis. Most do, erhm, as far I can see, nothing. That’s not quite fair, actually. They smoke copious amounts of ganja and usually have a drink in hand. That’s not really fair either, honestly. Along the road outside their fence, and even across the lane and further on, the boys have made planters out of tires and put in trees flowering shrubs. Everything is consistently spruced up with fresh paint. Steaka was unmistakably proud of it when I complimented him when they had a work day, and rightly so: it’s tidier then many people’s home yards.

I pass the shack every day, and was at first overwhelmed with “Waguaaaaan, baby loves, and sexy-body gyaals, and mi love yuhs, and yuh can tek mi back a farins. A veritable Greatest Hits of Jamaican pickup lines. Steaka had a more original approach, and instead of blatantly hitting on me, would express his admiration for my sunglasses. For weeks, he tried to convince me that I should leave him my Wayfarers when I go back a farin, where, apparently, polarized Ray Bans grow on trees.

Eventually, a rapport was built up, and I began noticing that the boys on the corner were quite a bit more tolerable, almost pleasant. I’ll stop and chat with Steaka downtown, he’ll come to my rescue if an overzealous taxi man or doctor (the guys in charge of recruiting fares for the buses) is giving me a hard time. Once in a while, he’ll profess his sincere, undying love and hasten to assure me, that, thank you, he dosn’t need me to get a green card, but he as well as everyone else, knows I have a boyfriend in Portland (THANK YOU,RAZ). The line remains where I have drawn it and so far, he hasn’t so much as tried to sneak a toe over. I appreciate that.

I look at it like this: I don’t need him (or whoever) to be my BESTEST FRIEND EVER OMIGOD, but for chrissakes, I just want to sit down and have a goddamned Red Stripe (wheat free!!) and watch the Reggae Boyz (Jamaicas football team) and make lewd jokes. Again, is that so much to ask?

Let me be clear: I love Miss B. She is a great host mom, a good friend, and I utterly respect her judgement. But she’s also coming from a particular point of view. In her eyes, a “nice boy” is someone with a job, who goes to church. If a guy here has a job and goes to church, chances are pretty good he’s married with kids. And that whole church thing, anyways.
Nice boys don’t hang out and play football, and who knows (well, EVERYONE knows, and they might kiss teeth all they want, but the truth is, their husbands STILL DO IT) what else they get up to. And I’ve heard from other people that he’s decent as far young Jamaican guys go. Again, I just want to be able to pop into the roadside pub (glorified shack with a shelf of Red Stripe, one of Heineken, and one of Dragon Stout and the usual assortment of overproof rum), have a drink, high five it out (I can do the super-special hand shake), and go on my merry way. Just like most of my male PCV friends. Nothing further said about it.

And of course, I have to be careful, since again, me being “Taylor Severns, herself” here isn’t just “Taylor Severns, herself”, I’m “Taylor Severns” and also “the Peace Corps”, and “The UNITED STATES OF AMERICA” and “All White People, In Particular White Girls Of A Certain Age.” Plus I work with kids, which means I really have to watch it. Which I do. ALL THE TIME. Trust me. I’m not about to start running around with dancehall artists and “big men”, as have a few girls of PCJ popular myth. (Something about if you can’t be a good example?)

IT SUCKS. It really does, this double standard of respectability.

Especially since Sundays are the loneliest days of the week for me. Sister Betty is gone at church literall ALL DAY, so if I don’t call my family, or if its raining and no one passes by and calls out to me, I can spend 3, 4, sometimes 8 hours without saying a word to anyone. Just me and my laundry, and my 7th book of the week.

Monday I will regretfully tell Steaka I had the WORST HEADACHE yesterday, you just WOULDNT BELIEVE IT. And feel like a total asshole and also like I’m 5 years old and mommy won’t let me play with the other kids. Because while Miss B can’t really tell me what to do, she can and will kiss teeth, and quite likely not speak to me for a few hours. And I’d like to at least feel like I have a friend at home.