< Situations and Revelations of Passing Notice in Guyana >
Locket # 32:
My wife and I were coasting through retirement. As safe as anyone can coast
in Georgetown. Actually she still working, but we are on a good track, heading
to the golden bridge, three score and ten. So I thought.
At age sixty-five, I would say your habits and expectations are set. My wife and
I know each other very well.
Last month she took a trip to New Jersey, USA. Staying with our oldest
daughter. I didn’t go with her. America is a rich country. Why should I leave
our poor country to spend precious pension dollars on vacation in New Jersey?
I would have gone with her to Antigua. Our second daughter lives there. She
wrote saying the place getting raggedy with immigrants.
Since her return, my wife is a different person. Our conversation has changed.
Now she asks, “So what you have planned for today?”
I rarely have things planned for the day. Coasting through retirement, you
develop routines. All of a sudden she is this “what we doing today” planner.
She continues, “Nothing as usual? Okay, that’s alright, if you’re comfortable
with that.”
That part, “if you’re comfortable with that.” Where did she find those words?
Then she steps out the house. Even when it rains.
She came back with rain boots and a raincoat. Puts them on and steps out.
Doesn’t say where the hell she’s going. Just, “I’m out.” You hear that? Who
talks like that in this country?
I can’t put up with rain and water running in our streets. Can barely tolerate
umbrellas. I have enough to occupy my mind until the next rain-free day. Like
reading a book. Conferring with like minds. I comfortable with that.
Besides, stepping out on these Georgetown roads can be perilous business.
I was raised by a stern father, with a firm hand; in a time of bicycle traffic
and one or two bicycle thieves. Age has slowed and shortened my gait. Now I
have to be careful crossing the road. Vehicles galore, and vehicle man
slaughter. There are days I wish we had a train service.
I changed the louvre windows from our house and installed window bars. Late
some nights my wife says she hears visitors outside. Rascals after the fruits
in our backyard. Mangoes and guavas hanging low on the trees.
Nothing wakes me once I put my head down. But she hears these intruders.
She hears them and does nothing. Lets them take what they want as long as
they remember to latch the front gate on the way out.
Who lets people break and enter their property just like that?
But you see, she came back from New Jersey, a new constitution written
in her head. I ask myself every blessed day, where was this person hiding all
this time?
Take her clothes. I have never seen my wife completely naked. I don’t know
why that would surprise anybody. I am not the type to grab her buttocks,
playful like, in the bathroom.
A little chubby from childbearing, she wears nice dresses, pulled over her
head, zipped up. Modest and appropriate for the occasion.
But she came back from New Jersey in skirt and blouse. Same person, but two
sections of clothing, divided at the waist. To me it was a worrying sight.
Something had changed.
In and round the house in a blue denim skirt, and blue denim shorts. Her
“casual wear”. That is how she dressing now. She changed her glasses frame,
and puts on her "sneakers" when she stepping out. Clearly something is
developing.
“In life you have flavours and variations. I like variations,” she says. Really?
Since when?
Since New Jersey. I blame my daughter in New Jersey. I can imagine their trip
to the malls, the mother-daughter conversations. It explains her new bedroom
expectations, wanting a new intimacy now. Something closer than what was
required after we got married.
For instance, this thing about “hugging”.
In the old days, 10 o’clock, lights off; was important to get your eight hours
rest.
Now this goodly lady wants hugging. Accuses me of not understanding the
importance of hugging. Tells me I probably didn’t receive hugs as a boy. Men
like me, with fathers like my father, didn’t get hugged enough in the old days,
she says.
How many times did you hug your daughters? My jaw dropped, then just close
up.
Who keeps count of huggings? I never heard our daughters complain once about
hugging. They slept in safety every night. What does hugging have to do with
anything in this country?
Suddenly she is this fountain of wisdom on hugging. Making out like there was
some kind of deprivation in our family, and she kept count and the hugging
receipts all these years.
I will say this: our daughters can play musical instruments, thanks to me
insisting on music theory lessons. Salaries were low; we had to find ways to
move ahead in this country. I knew the things that mattered, that pushed you
beyond Satisfactory.
My wife and I are nine learning years apart. Gaps sometimes make a difference,
I know, but we have been equals all these years. Now I am beginning to sense,
call it a little tilting of the balance.
All these comments, this moving around in denim skirt, the shirt with the top
button not buttoned. Clearly something has developed.
Trying one morning, not too long ago, to get me interested in the “blue pill.”
Shouting through the half-closed bathroom door, “When last did we, you know,
do something?” (At least she didn’t bring back the “F” word.) Trying to sound
like she not complaining. I didn’t flinch a muscle.
At this stage in my life, I have no intention of going to the drugstore, like a
schoolboy long ago wanting prophylactics, and enquiring about “the blue pill”,
which I hear is very expensive.
On this earth nature has put me on a healthy, regulated course. I wouldn’t
be where I am today without my regular morning bowel movement. And now to
be forced into an indulgence requiring the cost and colour of certain pills! (I
will swear, though, by Cod Liver Oil tablets from the old days.)
Let me say this: there was serenity in the old days. There was room for self-
improvement and forward thinking back then. Everything required maintenance.
As time moved on, we threw away the shackles, but we couldn’t find ways to
maintain serenity. We can’t maintain anything these days; buildings, bridges,
nothing.
“For the rest of your life your face will stay like that. Serious as a church. You
don’t have a face for having fun.” You hear that? High court in session. I don’t
have a face for having fun.
I came into the world with this face. It was my father’s face. It stood for rules,
no excuses.
I wore this face on fields of athletics. Athletic competition bred character,
encouraged focus, honest endeavour. There were rules you followed, track
markers and qualification times and disqualifications; and everybody could see
who won fair and square.
But thanks to people elected to high office, with small cupboards for minds,
athletics have declined in this country. Gone to pasture, and so many false
positives.
I better stop here, cause the more I think about this, the more I get worked
up. You won’t catch me dropping dead from blood clot or pressure, no sir.
So Mrs. Home from New Jersey can carry on with the stepping out. In sneakers
and blue denim skirt. Could be unhappy? Beyond the usual worries about this
country, I can assure you my wife has no reason to be unhappy.
Besides, I rest my case already. I’m not going to let one round trip ticket to New
Jersey ‒ was not even New York. New Jersey! ‒ turn me into a grumpy old man
who don’t understand “fun”.
I will advance through these last years, steady as she goes. I see a long home-
stretch avenue in front of me. Morning bowel movement, nature in thoughtful
flow, no pill purchase necessary ‒ I comfortable with that.
Brentford Rose
Georgetown, Guyana
FARJOURNEY CARIBBEAN 