Dr Calene Roseman and Dr Jessica Adams Skinner have shared a friendship that spanned over four decades, having grown up together in Laventille, then leaving T&T for America – Roseman, with the sole purpose of seeing Janet Jackson.
Now, with the sudden death of Skinner in August, Roseman is determined to take the legacy of her best friend to the community in which they spent their childhood and teenage years.
“Jessica was from Thomasine Street, and we have always talked about the negativity of when you tell people you’re from Laventille, and we even started making a joke out of it. But she always maintained that it (Laventille) created us. It really made us into who we are and she would say, ‘Laventille is in our bones; in our DNA.’”
While she hasn’t yet worked out all the details of the legacy project, she knows it will involve coaching, mentoring, and education – all areas in which she is well qualified and has had years of experience.
“Maybe there’s a young lady or man someplace there thinking they want to go into nursing, but may think it’s too hard…or the fear and the barrier of, ‘I don’t know if I can afford it, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to do chemistry, anatomy;’ things we put in our way before we even allow ourself a chance,” Roseman told Guardian Media.
As a teenager, Roseman was obsessed with Janet Jackson, after seeing the star in the Jet magazines she used to read.
“I wanted to look like her, smile like her, I wanted to meet her.”
She got a job, saved as much as she could and left Trinidad on a visitor’s visa when she was 20 years old. Today, 39 years later, she has a PhD in Nursing Science and Leadership from the University of California (UC), Davis, she is a nurse director, a professional mentor, and an advisor to PhD and DNP fellows, and National Black Nurses Association leadership fellow. And, she has seen Janet Jackson live in concert in New York.
“I’m telling you, your mind is a powerful thing,” she said with a smile.
Roseman recalled growing up in Eastern Quarry in the days when “everybody raised you.” For her and her seven siblings, the poverty was real, “to the point where some nights we drank sugar water and went to bed.”
Her mother was a Merikin descendant, so she spent some time in Fifth Company Moruga. But Laventille was home. A place where, poverty aside, she felt safe.
“Most of the older women in the community kept you proper; It didn’t have to be my mother, it could be your mother, the next door neighbour. Also, the young men in the community looked out for you. If you were outside after six, they would be like, ‘what are you doing outside?’”
She fondly recalled how fun their Saturdays used to be. They would wake up, go to the market, came home to cook and clean.
“And then we played bingo in the evening, or pan cup, or tennis in the road. That how safe this community made you and how this community built you.”
But the stigma loomed even then, and Roseman harboured insecurities about the community.
“I went to St. Catherine’s Girls’ School and I remember how embarrassed I was to tell people I was from Laventille. Because, you know, the other students were coming from the west and Cascade and St Ann’s and all of these places.”
As an adult, looking at it from a different lens, she is able to see beauty in a place where she spent so many bittersweet years.
“I recently posted something on LinkedIn about my eight by 11 diploma that came in the mail, and the struggles that I went through to get it. And it took me right back to Laventille; how hard it was. But I feel like if I wasn’t brought up in Laventille, I don’t know if I would be here today. I don’t know if I would have gone back for my PhD.”
In retrospect, she appreciates how far she has come from her early days in the US, working as a domestic worker.
“I used to clean people’s houses and look after their children. It was one of the hardest things I ever did, but I felt I couldn’t leave because I felt all the sweat and blood and hard work I put in would be in vain.”
Eventually, she was able to get a sponsor and a green card, and began plotting her academic journey.
“And somewhere between before I got my green card, Janet Jackson was going to be at Madison Square Garden, and I remember telling the people that I worked for, ‘I need the whole week off to get ready for Janet Jackson,” she chuckled.
“I got the best seats and I saw Janet Jackson in Madison Square Garden.”
Initially, her plan was to study law, but she made a decision to pursue nursing following the illness and death of a close friend.
“I went to nursing school in New Jersey, Charles E. Gregory School of Nursing, and I always knew I wanted to do oncology. I was an adult oncology nurse for about 13 years.”
She eventually got the opportunity to become a travel nurse in California in 2003. And despite the many challenges she faced as a black woman, she was determined to move up professionally.
“I didn’t really see anybody like me in leadership. There were no black nurses, women in leadership. And this is when I realised that your voice could be really powerful. You just have to be willing to get up and speak.”
Several disappointments later, she landed a management position at UC Davis.
“And so I’m a director now at UC Davis – ” a position that she had to put everything into, as one of the only two black nursing directors there.
“And I realised my responsibility in that role and I ended up with hypertension,” and a PhD that was inspired by that medical challenge.
Roseman teared up as she remembered how proud her friend was of her accomplishment, especially considering where they had come from.
“She would have been 64 on November 22, and she was always the life of the party. I want to do this to remind people that not just because you’re from Laventille it means that you’re not going to go anywhere. Look at Jessica and me.”
