GoodHeart | BossMom celebrates roots with new home for Cambridge family
Ziggy Marley, corporate sponsors help make ninth charity house a reality
Published:Saturday | December 14, 2024 | 12:05 AMAinsworth Morris/Staff Reporter
This festive season, Michelle ‘BossMom’ Gordon saw the community of Cambridge, St James—where her father, Frederick Jackson Jr., is from—listed as a potential recipient of a house for Christmas from her charity. She immediately knew it was the family to choose.
After meeting the mother, Ikeisha Waite, and her sons, Kevon and Juliane, Gordon was even more determined. She appealed to Ziggy Marley, Ashley Furniture HomeStore, Unicomer Group, Ford, KFC, and others for funding and donations. With their support, her ninth charity house, built by a team from Food For The Poor Jamaica, was completed and handed over on December 6.
“It was really just serendipitous that this particular mother came from Cambridge. When I saw the list ... Cambridge, St James, is somewhere that would have been near to my heart. I remember going there as a little girl, parking at the top of the road, and we had to go down in a valley and cross the train track and there was a little river. It was a lot [of] joy for me, my sister and cousins when we used to go there,” Gordon, who grew up in Kingston, told GoodHeart.
“We were town kids, so going to the country was always fun. It was a nice outing for us, because a car couldn’t access where my grandfather lived in an old wooden house, so we would walk up to the house. I remember the yard at that house had every tree possible– ackee, banana, mango, lime [and] apple trees. They believed in growing a lot of their own food, and in the home that we built, the mother had a lot of trees and a lot of things she can take from her own property to eat.”
Gordon shared that she had always been fascinated by the goats her grandfather raised in the community. The thought of returning to Cambridge stayed with her, inspiring her to fulfil the wish of providing a house for Waite and her sons this Christmas.
“Going back to Cambridge after so many years was a beautiful experience for me and knowing that this lady had that need, was a no brainer for me. Going there was very nostalgic. My grandmother was a teacher and my grandfather was a carpenter and a musician. He was a violinist. He used to make his own violins, so it just brought back a lot of memories. The Jacksons’ side of the family was very academic, so going there we would always sit and read with grandpa or we would have to play the piano.”
Since 2022, Gordon has built houses in recognition of Mother’s Day and Father’s Day.
As a mother, Gordon has always been particular about choosing mothers in entrepreneurship as herself, especially single mothers, to be the housing recipients.
“I believe that when a mother feels safe and when she’s in a space that she’s mentally stable, happy, comfortable, she knows where her bread is coming from and she can provide for her children, it makes her a better mother. It’s hard to parent well, when you’re worrying about so many other components, so, for me, putting a mother in a space where it’s her own. She’s not begging anyone. She doesn’t have to abide by stringent rules that people put on her, and a lot of women who are in abusive relationships, and they just have accept what is given out to them, it makes it very hard for them,” Gordon said.
“This particular mother is an incredible mother. She’s living her life for her children. She’s sacrificing a lot for them. She went through a lot. She has been through several abusive relationships but she made up her mind that she is going to put her children first, so it really was a pleasure to help her to step out on her own,” she said.
Gordon, who calls herself “the queen of begging”, mentioned to her hairdresser that the Christmas house recipient loves hairdressing. This led to Waite receiving a styling chair and a toolkit for hairstyling.
That is a Christmas gift Gordon said that tugged at her heart the most, because they gave her the ability to earn, not just giving her a house to sleep in at nights.
“When we handed over, one of residents shouted, ‘Yes! Mi a come fi mi hairstyle tomorrow!’ and Cecile Levee who was one of volunteers, she turned to the crowd and said, ‘Anyone who sits in this chair must pay for their service!’ and everybody applauded. And, that’s it. It’s not the fact that she can do hair. People must pay her for the service. She’s there to make some money to take care of her family,” the BossMom added.