Laying It Down

Like the Queen of England proclaimed in a sad weak voice way back in 1992, 2012 has proven to be my annus horribilis!  I pray that 2013 turns out to be my year of joy! While this is the time to look at that 2012 List of Resolutions, ticking off what has been achieved, looking aghast at what you did not even remember you had put on that list, I am choosing today to forget the pain of this year and not make a 2013 List of Resolutions but instead to make my 2012 List of Gratitude: my'God in Action List' which I shall review in quiet celebration as the clocks tick off the old year. Thank-you for this life: not fully understood but being lived. Thank-you for a mind and body that was sound most of the year. Thank-you for keeping me ‘treading water’ with my nose just out of the water; never drowning. Thank-you for my little creole dog Feo, who kept me connected to the world having to take care of his daily needs and who always demanded a display of affectation. Thank-you to...

image of Canalons a  la Barcelonesa Having a typical Boxing Day breakfast - Christmas Day leftovers!  Love it! 

Merry Christmas to you and yours as we celebrate the birth of Jesus!

Star & Ribbon Jigsaw Puzzle

I think for all of us especially those of us who actively celebrate the birth of Christ, Christmas becomes a time of warm feelings,  giving of one’s self in particular through gifts, and of reflection through tradition.  The house must look beautiful, and the foods have to be all present.  Where there are children, big and small, there is an especial joy of passing on family values.   One can see throughout the Christmas season the simple exchanges of love as a knowing smile is shared between strangers as they pass, each laden with packages; the smile saying “Christmas!  Phew, lots of work, I understand, we love it “. For me, the reflective side of Christmas always dominates.  It is a time of even more thinking than is usual for me and a time of forced hibernation.  My mind hibernates for the last quarter of the year.  I have  concluded that occurs, because I was born during this season (December 30th )  and I imagine that within the...

There they were as I opened the gate, the click of the latch seemed to alert the two sentinels or maybe they were more like two grand-meres or grandfathers waiting for their errant grand-daughter.

Wrote this a while ago and forgot to publish but the Lord works to perform His wonders and this turns out to be a most appropriate time!  Please enjoy

It is the time of year to give thanks to fallen heroes of war.  I thank-you for my freedom.

This song has been playing in my brain for two  (2) days!  I am not in love, have no one to love but the song just keeps on coming back!

This blog is about my life and how I see the world on a daily basis.  It is not meant to be philosophical or even intellectual in its writings.  It is simply a place for me to leave my writings; to have conversation with  those who may wish to read it, so not all of which I write may be pleasing.  Often the writings are not pleasing to me but I have given myself permission to write them.  As I consistently observe there is always something beautiful, even in the bitterest of situations and if nothing else, I hope my writings convey that thought.    I wrote the article below near mid-October on a day when the world was closing in on me.  It is unedited. You may be pleased to know that I have found a job!  It is a six (6) months position in my area of current study.  I'M EXCITED!  Still treading water but EXCITED! _____________________________________________________

I am always in wonder at the fact that while you are going through troubles, life is tooling along, neither looking left nor right!

https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTgKA4bytzs30bQOCJZE5hBizGt92AthuB41wVykhXiLWXb6rt7pA "Surround yourself with only people who  are going to lift you higher."  http://us.cdn4.123rf.com/168nwm/jkraft5/jkraft51203/jkraft5120300009/12471146-closeup-of-a-hummingbird-in-flight.jpg ~ Oprah Winfrey  h ttps://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ2Xh3m5d6Dng4gGGw2AsYPpJWFtfzwASgHn3YPThKkbL92O-P2

Yesterday, I was told my someone whom I respect and care for a lot, with all good intentions that I had too many things up in the air, that I was in fact wasting my time being in Trinidad and Tobago, that studying at my age would not make a significant dent in my career because I was too old to find work!  What a downer!  

Sometime recently, at the Sunday morning Mass, the priest spoke on the shepherd and the role of the shepherd's crook.

If  it is October then for some it’s Halloween, for others it’s Double Ten and for most of the world it’s Breast Cancer Month .  

O’ I have not been able to write for days!  That is not entirely true since I’m being kept busy with semester papers and projects.  Who sen' meh to go back to school?

I have had a lot of aunties in my life.  In this lovely land of my birth and in my generation children were taught to call all older women, with whom the family/relatives were close 'auntie'.

I have no children, only 1 nephew and now I hear a grand-nephew, both of whom I do not know. 

The rain, tap, tap. Tapping on the earth  brought back memories of your lips touch, touch, kisses on my back   in the coolness of morning air as I inhaled deeply of the rain, tap, tap.  Tapping on the earth  While we lay snuggled in the sheets. Those were the good ole days Of maybes and yes Fond remembrances.

Hurried off to the supermarket this morning and found it packed like a sardine can!  The man standing behind me in the line commented on the length of the lines wending their way forward at every cashier, as time wasted.  While I agreed that the lines were indeed long, I also commented that it was a good way to have a chat and make quick friends.  And so it began. 

As I am cleaning up, poking through things, figuring out what to keep, changing my idea of what is precious and just dumping, I am finding a lot of my writings.  It seems that somewhere along the line I began trying my hand at haiku.  As you know traditionally haiku is written in  17 'on', (the Japanese word for its phonetic sounds) ( I call this meter) of  of 5 7 5  and has a seasonal reference i.e. it speaks to things of nature.

As I draw near to my gate, tongue near hanging out like a dog’s from the heat, a woman stops me to kindly ask if I would take part in a survey.  Leaning on the gate, I assent and proceed to give her my age.  She is astonished and told me that she was pulling out the questionnaire that relates to those in the 35-44 age group!   Okay, I tell her with a smile.  She made me feel pretty.

Apart from being very depressed due to my lack of unemployment for more than 3 years I am also quite bewildered and very lonely.  My bewilderment comes about because not having a job is anathema to everything I’ve been brought up to believe as truth!

This year I got a bit involved in assisting a neighbour prepare her kids for school.  You see I have an old high school friend of who gets together with her other friends and lends support to children whose parents cannot provide all that is needed to begin the school year.

Today I did the wildest thing!  I sat on the other side of the church!

I 'wrote' this poem as I was heading to work one dry season morning, chip, chip, chipping along in the traffic jam.   The backs of receipts work well when you're driving.   It was a period when Trinidad and Tobago was going through a lot of "gang killings" and the atmosphere was tense.  It seems that things have not changed so very much 7 years later. Keep in mind that I write "talking poetry" so they may not read as well.  Perhaps, I'll present this to you guys once again but then I shall tell you what I think. _____________________________________________________

You know this no job, no home, searching for a job, searching for a rental home is exhausting,

Yesterday I got all nostalgic for our Trinidad and Tobago Independence Day.  It was our Jubilee anniversary and the islands were bursting with pride.

Happy Birthday Trinidad and Tobago!  Yes, today the nation of Trinidad and Tobago, the land of my birth is 50 years old.

Sometimes, I am puzzled at those who feel that I should not be me.  Have any of you encountered those who don’t care for parts of your character, cannot shut their trap about it and want you to change?  So like Toni Braxton sang‘I Apologize’, today, I’m ready to do the same.  Apologize I mean, not sing!   :)  Perhaps there may be something on this list that speaks to YOU.

Found this on http://www.wired4life.net/  via FB.   So simple, so beautiful!  Great to use as a mantra when I try meditating.  What do you think?    Thanks for reading!  

O’ heart you’ve gone and I can barely breathe O’ heart I long to touch my face  to yours and breathe O’ heart To listen to your warm low voice Advising me of life and  Helping me to breathe again O’ heart Tell me of your love for me Let me see your eyes sparkle So that I may breathe again O’ heart My love for you will not end Not for you my friend Although I’ll breathe again Written: Summer 2005 Thanks for reading! 

I have to leave this house which I have called home for 26 years.  You see it was never my house but this neighbourhood made it my home.  Already I am missing the warmth and love and care of my neighbours:  the reason I have stayed in this lower-middle class neighborhood: this neighbourhood our politicians call a ‘hot spot’!    O’ yes, I aspired to own my own little piece of property and for that I have worked hard but it seems not smart, because I still do not have it. This four (4) blocks area has been a place where from the start people shared in my delight of being in love, shared in the pain of my many losses – husband, jobs, and betrayals by friends.  This is the place where others encouraged me to achieve and were proud when I did.  Are there other places, my mind asks, where I can rest assured that my dog will be fed, my yard kept trimmed and lights snapped on if I am not there to do these things?  Will anyone call on me with a warm pla...

So I found  this scattered piece on my phone which means, I was probably riding the bus or a maxi-taxi with no pen and paper.     ______________________________________________ I was speaking with an elderly woman about the fact that we should not let each other drive drunk, even when we do not know each other.  She responded with "why should I be my brother's keeper?"  She is not the first from whom I have heard a similar statement.  Have you not heard someone say "my child doing well in school so  I don't care what happening in Y school."  "As long as my family safe...". These are the same people who tell you that they are loyal nationals.  Yet is is okay to see man X leave the fete,lime,party take your pick, to drive drunk. You're irritated by the police road block that may just take 'drunk boy' off the road because "hey did they have to slow me down?"  It's okay for Y child not to learn concepts, morality and ethic...

Some of my email readers have never actually seen my page.   Try this.  At the end of your email message you will see a hyperlink to the page.  Please use and put your comments/reactions, etc., on the blog page. BIG THANKS!

I've been clearing up the house (albeit slowly; not good at it all! LOL) and  in so doing I've found some of my writings going way, way back, long before I joined the writers' group and got tips on various types of writing and ways to do it better.  I plan to publish them on my blog from time to time, simply because I've lost so many due to my penchant to writing when 'the feeling moves me' which could be anywhere, anytime.  My favourite, which I've lost, was written while stuck in traffic but I have also written while talking on the phone, or in a boring meeting, in the prescribed notebook, on the back of somebody's business card, on the plain edge of the newspaper, and of course, I like the old napkin and tissue paper too. Not too sure how good they are  nevertheless they do express my feelings at the time.   Some are happy, some are angry, some are sexual and some are sexy.  In fact they are some of every emotion.  I've never shared any of thes...

Someone one keeps on asking me,  with irritation in here voice, words to the effect, " why do you bother?  Why do you feel you have to change the world?"  She asked me this months ago and I could not respond.  I know my conscious intent isn't to change the world.  I do know that whatever knowledge I have I want to impart .  I do know I want to make this country, Trinidad and Tobago better.  As a matter of fact any country in which I live, I want to give to the fullest.   Early one Sunday morning my response formed and I preferred not to answer my friend directly rather,  to ease my mind, I wrote my answer on Facebook.  Now, I re-print here. _________________________________________________ I talk with everybody. I talk with people on the bus - the older woman who tells me that she has only visited the U.S. once and it sure doesn't touch TnT, the young man whose eyes warm when he speaks of his daughter of 2 years. I discuss...

I was watching, not intently, the television show where wives swap households for 2 weeks and during that period try to impart some good to the new family.  In this episode, the children of one household were asked to give up one prized possession in exchange for spending time with their father.   They could not.  There was a great deal of "weeping and gnashing of teeth” with father at one time asking, “can you not give up 1 thing for me?”  Father, at this point revealed softly with large tears plopping from eyes to cheeks that he was hurt, pained and disappointed in his children’s reaction, in particular, the behaviour of the elder.  He felt he had failed in showing them that material things were less important than another human being.  Somewhere during this show, the elder of the 2 children realized that  she was not comfortable with her action and indeed gave up a prized possession for time with her father. I too have been devastated as I am fo...

What a busy couple of days it has been!  Not sure if the days have been truly full of activity or if my mind has been busy.   Yesterday I went to offer my presence to a very good friend and her relatives, as one of her brothers has died.   I hoped that my being there would show how equally pained I felt at his sudden passing and that my participation in whatever had to be done would at least for that period ease their burden.  I came away feeling lifted by my participation in the simple tasks, the many hugs received, by the laughter which lifted my spirits, amidst the sadness.  I gained as much as I hoped I have given.   My ‘weeping and gnashing of teeth” were eased for a period.  What a gift! I have another friend who always speaks of “planting seeds” and I thoroughly understand, what I call, her adage.   You’ve got to lay down the ground work, nurture your crop and receive your harvest.   That planting of seeds has been my greatest amb...

In conversation with someone recently, I was asked what would it take for me to put behind me former sorrows?  That question made me think since I did not realize that I was carrying them and carrying them so openly.  It came to me that I had not allowed myself to grieve over anything severe that had happened in my life.  I feel as if I was not allowed to grieve having to be mature and strong all the time.  I've also had no one with whom to grieve; no one to hold me while I wailed over my losses and so help me survive. Do any of us really grieve?  Do any of us, especially those of us reared in the  ideology  of the Western thought take the time to wail over our losses?  Do we take the time to remove the pain from our hearts and minds or do we just through another layer of toughness over our grief?  Perhaps that is why we have so many brokenness  in our lives?  In the Bible, Job wailed and his friends held him.  But these are...

Good day!  What a beautiful day the Lord has made!  We have experienced our miracle, that of being alive and kicking today! I posted part of these comments below in response to Philo Alexis Baptiste's statement and it will be my blog of the day.  I want us to be creative and find solutions to this continual problem, which may not be so specific to Trinidad and Tobago as it may seem. _______________________ I am yet to hear government has begun work on straightening rivers, strengthening their banks , enforcing the laws that restrict building development above a certain feet and in general putting into effect mitigation practices to abate this annual flooding.  When will Cabinet sit and organize this?  All well and good to assist in the short-term but what medium to long-term measures are being designed and implemented? Were the Corporations given monies to do remedial work BEFORE the rainy season?  If so, who screwed up at the Corporatio...

I truly am not a blogger because I so often forget to write.  I am a writer.  I write when the feeling comes over me and that really isn't enough for blogging.  Still have not learnt how to  do a lot of things to make the pages interesting :), so please forgive the errors and if you know how to do it, (whatever it may be for a blog page), teach me.  Anyway, I've got something to say and I am ready to blog it.  Read on! _____________________________________________________________ What a rain!  Yes, it was only ordinary rain according to the Met Office but to those of us who were awakened in the wee hours of Saturday August 11, 2012  by the downpour and the lightning and the thunder, it was a storm!  For those who have been flooded out,  or who lost loved ones, it was a storm!  The roadways covered in water became rivers themselves and thus were impassable.  We human beings saw the force of Mother Nature combined with our pe...