Coming Home at Last

Michael is the oldest of nine children of Vindel Elizabeth Collins, from Thatch Point, and Isaac Abraham Thomas, a carpenter born on the island of Montserrat. Isaac Thomas left Montserrat in 1914 for Cuba to work at a sugar plantation. He eventually made his way to Trujillo, Honduras, and at some point in the 1930s, arrived on Roatan.

In 1961, the judge in Coxen Hole wanted to deport Isaac, who still held only a British Passport.
His entire family presented themselves in support, and things settled down. Isaac died on Roatan, and was buried in a cemetery in Coxen Hole.

Michael’s first memory is from when he was 11 years old and used a machete to cut down bananas. He was taught six grades of English and math in a Coxen Hole private school by teacher Elfrida Brooks.

Michael remembers 1950s Thatch Point and Coconut Garden as filled with thousands of coconut trees. Coxen Hole still had coconut storage houses filled with coconuts waiting to be picked up by boats heading for La Ceiba or Tampa. Those small houses were built in the water to make easy access for the boats and keep rats away.

A life of adventure and the wide open world tempted Michael in his early years. When he was 18, he travelled to Tampa where he found work on boats moving cargo around the Caribbean, earning him $50 a month. He soon found a better-paying position as ship’s assistant cook for $100 a month. Eventually, he learned to be a cook, and his salary increased still. “That was the best job you could get,” says Michael.

He moved all over the US, but never acquired proper residency papers. He lived in Miami, Los Angeles, and the far off Glacier Bay, Alaska . Every year, he would visit Roatan and stay for a month or two.

Michael fathered 14 children, but remained an eternal bachelor. Seven of his children live on Roatan, with 36 of his grandchildren. A saying goes that a seaman has a girlfriend in every port – “or more than that, I tell you that,” said Michael.

After suffering a stroke in 2010, Michael finally came back to Roatan for good. He settled in a small wooden house at the Punta of Coxen Hole, once called Black Creek and full of mangroves.

Michael’s ankles are swollen, and he likes to sit on a blue plastic chair facing a tamarind tree. He can see and hear the airplanes landing just 100 feet away. He is tall and soft spoken, and his eyes have a tint of blue in them.

He can see airplanes landing just 100 feet away.

Now he plays dominoes with friends, and reminisces on the old good times. He also visits his aunt, who is 94 and lives just a few meters away. “The family learns to live with what they have and they also share it with each other,” says Michel.

Michael never received any pensions from his american employers, so life is sometimes a struggle. He attends the Methodist Church in Coxen Hole. “Regrets, I had a few. I don’t like to even talk about it,” says Michael.