Eh?

Wail, wail, knash, knash, ack! In case I was in any doubt that I was over the hill, my ride home yesterday destroyed any illusions I might have been harbouring. Do you know it's been 25, count 'em, 25 years since Michael Jackson released Thriller! Bloody hell, where did the time go! They've just released an anniversary edition. For goodness sake, they were playing Beat It at my high school graduation a year after this album was released. Okay, I sort of realise that the music I listened to as a teenager has been relegated to the "classics" station but when I think "classic" rock or whatever I think of the Beatles, the Eagles, California dreaming/surf or heavy metal as played by Zepplin, Who, Ozzy and Black Sabbath etc. They were around playing arenas before I was born, well, the Beatles and the Stones anyway.

You know how awful it is to realise while grooving to Lovestoned that Justin Timberlake is almost young enough to be your son...well if you was really, really active in your youth and I'm not telling. I'm not ready to trade in my motorbike for a rocking chair. Of course, I should have known that the downward slide was well underway when I started to dread going to all night concerts and crowded bars.

Breathe, breathe, it's going to be alright, even if you do remember when Michael Jackson was a black man and big hair was the order of the day. There are good things about getting older though, that pesky self doubt has been replaced by the certainty of knowing you are always right. No matter what. Because I said so. Hah, do you know how long I've been waiting to be able to say that with conviction. Now I can and no one looks at me and falls over laughing, my laugh lines ( I don't have wrinkles) entitle me to belong to that club. I also don't feel in the least bit guilty about not wearing high, high heels all the time or not being a size four. What the heck, I'm older, I'm entitled to some middle aged spread dammit! I can also listen to opera and the classics, sit around read my book and drink red wine instead of frantically planning the next lime and the next lime without being at all concerned that people might think I was dead if I wasn't out one night of the week.

Haha, see, this is liberating. Think I 'm going to haul my (toned) butt down to the CD shop and get me another copy of Thriller, it'll be nice to hear Vincent Price rapping after all this time. And for all you young punks out there sneering, let me remind you, as you sample away, many of the huge so-called hits over the last ten years have borrowed extensively the music of my generation. Why don't you come up with some stuff of your own eh.

Oops

Who sen' mih out dere. Yes, I ventured out into Port of Spain again. In four inch heels no less. As cute as they are, dusty purple, round toed with gathers, ankle strap and a teeny bow, four inch heels are four inch heels and are not made for stalking around uneven pavements. Especially not pavements with people domiciled on them. Damage to my shoes aside, I find it intensely disturbing that a man could die in a drain by the side of a busy street and no one notice for ages as happened earlier this week.

I am surprised? Nope. it's just another symptom of our decaying society. As the wealthiest Caribbean country we have one of the worst track records when it comes to health and social issues. I've come to the conclusion that Trinis love being martyrs otherwise we'd be a lot less accepting. As we stumble along the road to 2020, lined as it were with the Waterfront Development, Government Campus and other visible monuments to our success as a first world nation, I wonder whether anyone is paying attention to the fact that our "civilisation" is falling down around our ears.

I think I need to cut down on my trips round the capital city, they're disturbing my zen and ruining my shoe heels. Maybe if I hide in my ivory tower I too can avoid the unpleasantness at least until it's time to sit in the traffic to go home. Sorry, didn't mean to be a downer but you know, the destruction of my shoes heels must stop, oh yeah and if we could fix the other stuff, that would be nice too....

Shoes!

It's a love thing...

Let me start by saying, I do not have an Imelda Marcos complex, I own only 43 pairs of shoes. I am nowhere in the class of my friend Mark who stopped counting after he got to 150 something. One of the girl's in my department who, at last count, I think mentioned 300. She must have a shoe room.

I think my weird relationship with shoes stems from a childhood cruelty of having to wear Clark's Mary Janes when I really wanted to be running around in flip flops or barefoot. After all, I spent most of my time up trees, in the duck pond and other like activities. Girly shoes and clothes certainly did not fit the lifestyle. My mother, a woman surrounded by a whacking seven brothers must have had all these frustrated longings to dress up her little girl who really just wanted to be one of the boys. I suspect however my mother might have preferred this situation to have continued when I became a teenager to escape my constant whining for pretty shoes and clothes to go to parties in. Let's just say the primary school caterpillar turned into the high school social butterfly, not however the type that John Waters made movies about. I was Ally Sheedy to Lisa's Molly RIngwald.


Buying shoes started to represent independence for me or so I like to justify it. I could never have afforded the range or variety that I see my friends getting their kids now. In my day, you had school shoes, usually brown Mary Janes or later, white sneakers and going out/church shoes, some awful white things as I recall. In between there were the ever present flip flops or a pair of sandals. Quite damaging to my emerging girl psyche.


My first job didn't pay well but Ate Logo was my best friend, all kinds of real leather shoes. Who knew you could buy colours other than black/brown/white/navy blue! Oooh it was heaven. In my line of work you have to look a certain way and I do the needful but the part I really enjoy is the shoes. Some people are into fixing up their houses, some people collect cars or jewels. I like to look at my happy little collection with rainbow colours, different heel heights, styles - strappy, pumps, peep toes. Whoo hoo. This addiction to nice shoes if you will is not fattening like chocolate, depending on what I buy, not as expensive as fine art or jewellry and they make me feel good. What's not to love.

An then...

You know I've alluded elsewhere on this blog that my office is next to a POS prestige school. There are days however, I wonder if the administration of the school knows what goes in their cafeteria. Now despite what you might think, I don't really pay a whole lot of attention to what takes place outside my window unless it affects us over here. But I have to tell you, the on-going soap opera of the people next door! Wow!

I and my staff who meet in my office from time to time, have intimate knowledge of the people's business, conducted as it were at top volume. Most days we hear about the travails of man and wife as they sometimes put the Young and Restless to shame. I'll spare you the sorry details but we try not to listen but it's hard to miss. I've even had people on the phone comment on it so that should tell you.

Today, they're in full cry and I have to wonder again how deaf are the school jefes. And why would you ventilate your business like that to all and sundry? Do they enjoy the drama? I wonder what the parents who pride themselves on the "prestige" of this school would make of this...or the fact that the little darlings walk over the roof onto our wall and through the fire escape route to "break biche". But that's another story. On occasion we have thought that we might have to call the police or somebody to intervene in the warfare in progress though has sounded like someone may yet kill someone, I fervently hope it never gets to that.

You might think that I spend the day minding the business of next door but quite frankly, I would happily miss out on the almost heart attack prompted by the unexpected sight of a disembodied head suddenly appearing on the wall outside the lunchroom.

Driving my life away

As Carrie in Sex and the City, Sarah Jessica Parker used to sit on her bed and tap out her by-line on her trusty Mac every episode. Women all over the world wanted to be Carrie, never mind she looks somewhat like a horse in cooky clothes. She had great shoes, interesting boyfriends, and seemingly, a life. Her job was almost an afterthought. She wrote a book in between romancing Big, Mikhail Baryshnikov etc hanging out in cool bars with her cool friends dammit! Who knew you could do that?
Fortunately Carrie is a fictional character loosely based on the life of her creator Candace Bushnell and I content myself in knowing Ms Bushnell probably had to work at it a lot harder!

As much as I have spent half of my professional life churning out words, both as a writer and as a manager with hundreds of reports/memos etc I'm not half as lucky as Carrie. Sure, I own some great shoes but no where near the Manolos or Jimmy Choos and not a snowball's chance in hell of getting near them. But I don't let that bother me, after all, they're only shoes right. Right?

Nah, as I sit whiling away my life reading interminable reports, writing yet another useless communications plan that will be ignored or cleaning up the fall out from the ignored plan, I am warmed by the thought that my life has some meaning, some purpose to it. I'm not quite sure what right now but I'll get back to you on that. As I sit in traffic trying to get to the office every morning losing years off my life I know that my contribution to nation building will not go amiss, never mind that it takes me half an hour to travel three feet. Or else why would I do this? Unlike Carrie, mine is a higher calling, a mission if you will and I will not be deterred by the indifference, surly staff or bad customer service. I almost feel like Mel Gibson in Braveheart, FREEDOM from the tyranny of (insert name of organisation here), freedom for the workers......

Okay, you're forgiven for thinking that I lost my mind while watching the Oscars last night. You can attribute my above lapse to 1) the copious amounts of super spliff that my neighbours smoke under my bedroom windows, lack of sleep caused by said neighbours loud partying at 4:30 am three days in a row, the cumulative effect of carbon monoxide fumes from the traffic or the noise being made by the teenagers at the prestige school next to my office, so loud that they drown out anyone on the phone - did I really have a conversation if my lips were moving and no one could hear me?

So I think in the interest of maintaining some balance in my life, I will have to go visit Zappos.com. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do ay.

It's been how long?!

What a week this has been. My fellow management grunts and I have seriously considered a hit on a colleague who shall remain nameless. If something happens to him I had nothing to do with it, I take the well being of my karma seriously. On a much nicer note, having not spoken to any of my particular high school friends in something like twenty odd years I heard from two of them in the same day. It felt REALLY good. Neither live here anymore and were a little surprised to find out that I did. Okay I was the last person expected to stay here what can I say, times change. I came back and all that.

The last time I'd spoken to Shirley twenty years ago, she and hubby were getting ready to go off to the States. They now have three kids, two of whom have had near death experiences. Shirley was a sweet girl and she's grown up to be a lovely, strong woman. I'd stumbled across a contact for her on the Internet and we've been e-mailing since Wednesday. I was so happy she called today, it really took me back. And then this afternoon Mark called. I haven't spoken to him since 1984. No he was not a boy friend, he was one of the gang. Marks's stepmother used to breed Doberman Pinchers which contributed greatly to lifelong love affair with the breed. Oh yeah, now you know when I did O Levels. Well we certainly had some times then.....

Ah, it was the Big eighties, we all had big hair, oversized clothes - man we had no fashion sense at all! Madonna was going through her lace/net/rubber bracelet phase, ugh. I shudder when I see some of those pictures though I admit, I still get a kick out of my streaked hair. It was fun. Never mind the weed/coke pusher on the corner, the music was happening and we had some terribly good times in Dairy Queen and were thrown out of KFC on more than one occasion. In those days we could make a portion of fries and a large coke last a long time. And that was for four of us. We didn't have a lot of money but we sure as heck had a lot of style and we conquered our world best we could.

In the twenty some odd years since we've all gone our separate ways Shirley, Annie, Lisa and I -we've been married, divorced, had kids or not, had a lifetime of experiences that make us who we are. And yet, there is still something that makes me smile when I think of these girls who I spent so much time dressing up with, sharing my dreams, gabbing about boyfriends, breaking up with boyfriends, failing exams and moaning, passing exams and going to Dairy Queen. Let's not forget "breaking biche" to go the movies or hang out at various houses with parents at work. These girls and a few other people represented some of the best moments in my life and I'm thankful to them for putting up with me.

I have however, developed much better dress sense thankfully. I have also had some other very good friends who I've lost along the way, but that's okay, I had them. Best of all, though most days I wear the corporate suit and toned down hair and at a time when I'm questioning some of the crap in my current life,thanks to Shirley I am minded of that girl who's anthem was Matthew Wilder's "Break My Stride". I am reminded that in me there still beats the heart of a true bohemian, who in her dreams has cherry red hair to go with my bunch of dragon tattoos.

Blogging 365

You know when I started this blog, it was really to write about the more positive aspects of what was going on around me. I figured there was enough negative crap out there, why add some more. It's not turned out that way I'm afraid. There are many days when I face my keyboard and rant. One of the reasons I don't post so often is that it's very easy to get caught up in a cycle of ugh and not so much the other stuff. And I'm trying not to do that.

Today, I reluctantly ventured out into the streets of Port of Spain. Having teetered from the Library back to my office yesterday, wearing four inch stilettos, canary yellow if you must know, I was loath to experience the capital city up close and personal again. Let's face it, the sidewalks are bad and the addition of vagrant do and vagrants can be hard to take. But out I sallied, admittedly today's shoes were a tad more practical. Comparatively speaking that is, they're brown suede, peep-toe wedges. And gorgeous they are too.

Port of Spain used to be a nice looking city before it was overrun by ugly concrete monstrosities and the ever present stench of drain and vagrant. But clearly we like it like that or we'd make someone do something right. And as I made my way up the narrow, cracked sidewalk, constantly having to move out of the way of hordes of surly, ill mannered, "prestige school" going children hogging the entire pavement, I wasn't really surprised that we allow our capital city to look like a dump. If the so called cream of the crop were so rude and ill trained why are we amazed that no one holds anyone to account. But I don't blame the kids, after all, they're just emulating their lovely parents who have been known to park indiscriminately on both sides of the road. Who stop dead without warning in the middle of the street blocking all traffic, to fling open their car doors to either let off or pick up the little teenaged darlings. This behaviour is repeated around the corner at the primary school as well. Start them early I say!

These and other like rituals are enacted daily around our fair country. Women drivers who do not acknowledge when someone stops to let them out, or drive so badly they make you wince for them. Taxi drivers, clerks who steups at you, the list is endless. Buddhists believe (to simplify) the world is a mirror, what you put out comes back to you. The more negative you are, the more toxic your surroundings and I believe there is truth in this. Think about it. Isn't your day a whole lot nicer when someone does something nice for you or acknowledges when you do something for them? Of course. So when you have a bunch of rude, awful, unkind, discourteous folk what might you get. You think?