How one comes to live on Nowhere Island.
When I look at my face, I see the plight of the indigenous Carib tribe, who, along with the Arawak, struggled to survive five centuries of European conquest and ravage. When I look at my face, I see Africans violently plucked from their home, brought to toil on the stolen land in heat the white man couldn’t bear. When I look at my face, I see my maternal grandfather and his brothers — teenagers, sailing from China to the Caribbean islands to escape communism, with no money and little knowledge of English…
Crocheting. After 21 years, it is back in my life, every stitch unhooking my mind from things that weigh me down in a day. Hook in right hand, yarn in left I am on automatic, chain linking, waffle stitching, blanket stitching and cross stitching, every fragment of my life back together in the hopes of making something great…something comfortable that makes others smile. Hoping to make something of a story with this life of ours that will result in something beautiful.
I have so many things I want to make with this yarn and hook of mine. Things that I…
It’s been a rough stretch. COVID-19 restrictions, trying to generate business at work when no one has money to spend, and despite pandemic restrictions, that Crazy Christmas Aura is in the air and Adam does not handle this time of year well. He’s been cut off from the Special Olympics Program and a great deal of his activities due to COVID-19 and of course he physically takes out his frustrations on the walls of his apartment and then takes it out mentally and emotionally on us by constantly trying to push our buttons. In his mind, if he is upset…
If Not Now, When?
One of the things I’ve learned from living in this time of global pandemic is that life is unpredictable and short, and I need to stop procrastinating and start doing. Enough is enough. It is time to use my gifts, my experiences, and my knowledge to help others. It is time to stop making excuses about being busy, having too many responsibilities or not being in the right mood to write about what I know. It is time to call myself out for being afraid to write and to finally admit that every excuse I make…
“Bye Daddy,”
My husband, Tom, and I were over the moon. Those were the first sounds we’d heard from Adam in eleven months and the last time we would hear him string words together in four years. That morning started like any other since things changed. Adam was sitting beside me in his highchair enjoying his breakfast, fixated on traffic in the street below. Acknowledging the elephant in the room, Tom squeezed my hand, kissed us both on the top of our heads and went to the door, and as he had done every morning, said in his cheeriest voice…
I attended a funeral for my friend’s sister three weeks ago. In a time of covid-19, technology made it possible for me to be there while sitting on the other side of the continent. It was surreal; it was like watching a movie of their lives play out before me, except that their loss and sadness was real. Pandemic protocols determined that my friend and her family wait about two weeks before her sister could be cremated and two months and two days before they could celebrate her life and have the finality of a funeral. As I watched the…
This title might be looked upon rather strangely considering I have a publication on Medium called Playing God. That publication however is not about religion but about my journey raising my autistic son. This post is about my relationship with religion, more specifically with God and how freeing myself of all that I had been taught and believed and reevaluating the way I look at life, made me a better person.
I was born in Trinidad, where Christianity is the largest religion in the country, Roman Catholicism comprising 21.6% of the the population that consists of 1.39 million people. I…
The Importance of Hope When Your Family Is Affected by Autism.
Long before I had my children, I’d been described by my family as impatient, aggressive, demanding and I suppose overbearing and annoying when I set my mind on something I wanted to accomplish. I suppose it must have been exhausting for my parents and those around me, and I am sorry for having put them through whatever discomfort it might have caused them. Age has brought me the wisdom and experience that I tap into everyday before speaking, texting and sending an e mail…well, at least 98% of the…
Everyone agrees that life in 2020 is a big blur. Last week was long. Monday dragged into Tuesday and the rest of the days slid into each other like thick gooey gravy. There was much of the same when it came to news about the Covid-19 pandemic except that certain cities and regions were heading into lockdown again with the number of infected cases increasing rapidly. …
I was reading a post by Kate Bittman called Here’s the Dish to Cook When You *Really * Don’t Want to Cook, which was a wonderfully warm piece about a simple treat her dad used to make her called the Egg in the Hole. It was toast with a just-runny-enough egg embedded into it and it looked tasty and comforting. I liked the post and I commented to her that it was nice to see someone have such a fond childhood memory of a simple treat that satisfied not just the belly but the soul. I told her it reminded…
Isle Chile
Proudly Trinidadian, proudly Canadian.Financial Advisor.2 sons. Married to business partner husband. Autism advocate.Hockey Mom.Mom to Special Olympics Athlete.
