BOY, LOOK, if you mind the things dat ya hear and see happenings all up in the States, in the Caribbean, Trinidad and Jamaica, especially and right here in Barbados, if ya doan mind ya ’self, they would send ya crazy.
They would more than make ya want tuh take off all ya clothes and walk through town naked as ya born or throw ya’self in front of a speeding vehicle, drink the green garden wine or some other deadly substance or even jump off o’ some kinda building and end it all.
Wunna think it easy, nuh? Evahtime ya open the newspapers or sit down tuh watch lil TV, it is tragedy, predictions of tragedy, some kinda disasters from bad weather, fighting, cussing, murders, students getting hold fuh drugs at airports, people killing li’l innocent children. Lord have mercy! It looks like the whole world like it gine mad as France. People living fast and reckless like there is no tomorrow.
Only the other day I was reading ’bout the big birthday luncheon the family of Mr Sisnett, who was then the second oldest man in the world. The man was 115 years old.
Listen, talk wha’ ya like but dem is real flipping years fuh anybody tuh be pon this earth, hear? But he died last week and quick so a lady who was 110 years old, she died too and right behind her was another centenarian, 100 years old.
Wunna think the way how people getting on nowadays anybody could live tuh see dat kinda age in this time? No soul! Wunna think dat wunna could live tuh see the day when the Governor General come tuh honour you with his presence on dat very special day when you reach 100 years?
I doan think so.
First of all, people ain’t eating the kinda foods dat dem old-time people used tuh eat. The females, especially, eating nuff fast foods, corn curls, chips and all kinds o’ snacks; duh ain’t got nutten in duh bodies tuh hold dem up when the real hard times come.
The next thing is duh eyesight. You look at some o’ dem centenarians? Some o’ dem look really healthy and strong and the other day I was reading ’bout one who the family said could see tuh thread a needle.
Wha’? I tell ya, some o’ these people dat stirring nowadays ain’t gine be able tuh see fuh too long, far less thread a needle. Ya know why? Well, duh got tummuch glue in duh eyes from dem long eyelashes dat all o’ duh sticking on pon duh eyes all the time. Then there’s the memory. I am sure dat some o’ dem centenarians does burn off the Governor General ear ’bout the good old days, where they went tuh school, the kinda food dem used tuh eat and things like dat. Then they would talk ’bout the kinda work they used tuh do and the amount o’ money they used tuh get.
Dem memory still intact and functioning; dem ain’t got nor had nuh lot o’ glue from the weaves the women putting in evah single week: nuh wonder a lot o’ dem cahn remember nutten nowadays; it is the glue dat seeping in tuh duh brain from the many times duh shave off all duh hair and use glue tuh stick on some synthetic ones, rope or wool. If ya gine purposely clog up ya pores, it bong tuh give ya some kinda memory loss.
Doan talk ’bout hearing at all, some o’ dem centenarians does be sharp as a tack. I cahn remember seeing nuhbody hollering in dem earholes when duh trying tuh carry on a conversation wid dem.
Half o’ this generation gine be deaf or half-deaf. Dat is why duh cahn talk quiet nor soft: it is because evahwhere ya turn ya does see all kinds o’ people wid a cord coming from duh ears or driving a car wid some o’ the biggest speakers blasting down the place and, look, people does be in dem same cars gine ’long cool, cool, cool like nobody’s business.
Duh ain’t gine be able tuh walk too long from the wearing o’ the tallest and hardest high-fashion shoes or the cheap flat cardboard slippers, come rain or sun.
• Mavis Beckles was born and raised in The Orleans. She has an opinion on everything.
