HE HAS ALREADY chosen one of the songs he wants sung at his funeral.
The singers are to be Paula Hinds if it’s a female, and Adrian Clarke or Tony Grazette if it is a male. They are to render The Golden Years, which Anthony Mighty Gabby Carter recorded with Andre Daniel several years ago and never released.
If you get the impression that the maestro is on his death bed, he is not. But he will admit that he felt like it a few weeks ago.
Wednesday, December 14, started off like any normal day and was preceded by a few days of not eating, which is not unusual for the 68-year-old either. He was a guest of honour at a function at a St James restaurant hosted by a Barbadian group, which is based in Boston, Massachusetts, where he received two awards.
He said he ate half of a sandwich and drank some juice before heading off to a meeting with chief executive officer of the National Cultural Foundation, Cranston Browne. It was during that meeting that he said he started to feel cold.
The coldness and general feeling of being unwell continued after he got home, and he decided to seek medical attention at the Sparman Clinic, Belleville. He was initially placed on drips for dehydration and the team at the clinic told him he would be there for about a day.
“I start to get fever so high. I start to get hot, cold. Then the temperature went up. I made more than 30 bathroom trips in less than eight hours. I was going and going uncontrollably. Every few minutes I gotta go,” he vividly recalled.
His episode with salmonella poisoning will be forever etched on his brain, not only because he had a similar experience while on tour in Toronto a few years ago, but it was the day before he was scheduled to attend his friend Clarence Thompson’s funeral. His absence that Thursday was quite noticeable.
“Everybody assumed that I would’ve had to be overseas. But I was fighting for my life . . . . I didn’t want to like broadcast it yet that I was ill, because I felt that the focus should’ve been on Clarence and the respect that he deserves for his great contribution to the music industry in Barbados.
‘Tried not to say’
‘So I tried not to say, because I know the guys would’ve probably left the funeral and come there,” he said from his Clapham, St Michael home
Gabby would be detained at the clinic for four days and he said Dr Alfred Sparman and his team were always vigilant and attended to his every need.
“Sparman and his staff, they were fantastic. I can’t praise them enough. It was hardly two hours passed in that four days I was there that I didn’t see a doctor . . . . I felt like I was in good hands. I don’t even know how you repay a man like that,” Gabby told the WEEKEND NATION.
He said he felt weak for a few days after being released on December 17, but he is back to his old self now. He is on the mend now, but even though he said he was close to death, he insists he was never afraid.
“I never scared of death. I always know like it was inevitable, so I does deal with the reality.
“’Cause once my mother (Rosalie) had died, that was it for me. All the other times it was like this body died . . . but, see, when my mother died I realised that this death thing for every and anybody. And you must not be scared of it, because it’s inevitable. Why are you scared of the inevitable? I guess you’re human and that will happen, but I get to deal with the reality in that sense,” Gabby said.
That second bout with salmonella brought some sober reflection for the entertainment icon and he has taken some lessons from it.
“What it taught me is that life shouldn’t be taken for granted. That you must treasure every moment. Treasure your friends and family. And treasure every opportunity you have especially as artistes to have visited other peoples in other countries and share with them. And remember the times and cities, backstage moments and stuff like that,” he said.
