Excuse me you jumped the line

Hello there *waves and smiles* This is my first attempt of many to become a frequent poster. Be proud of me lol. Ok so here's a bit of insight into the clockwork of my mind. You can say Amen if you feel me or shake your head in disgust. But I speak from an honest place. Aight enough preamble, let me introduce myself; I am the 4th child for my father, his baby girl and the first of two children for my mother. Spoiler alert I consider myself a princess! Take your judgements and side eyes elsewhere please I am getting to the point. Being on the junior side of one set of siblings and being on the elder side of the other, I have come to learn my place in the order of life. Everyone takes their turn in the order they were born. I am currently blabbering to my few followers because someone has stepped outta line and caused havoc. Kind of like that person on the assembly line that adds their sprocket before their predecessor adds their bolt. *stop the presses*

The following things go out of sync when a younger sibling gets married first: 

1) You cant elope if they did!

 You be dam sure that all the pressure will be on you to ensure that your mother gets to wear her champagne pink mother of the bride dress. Now you might be like but it's your wedding blah blah blah, the person that does something first is the guinea pig and allowed to test the waters. The one after usually gets stopped dead in their tracks.... My mother flat out told me one day that the child's wedding is the parent's wedding. If she doesnt get it the first time, the second time ahhhh ....prepare for future fight *check*

2) People start treating you like you are emotionally fragile

All of a sudden everyone, especially those old aunties, begin inquiring about your love life with extra concern. "How's your friend?"they ask and hold their breath hoping I say he's fine and not, 'oh we dont talk anymore'. Why is this old lady rubbing my back when she asks me about my life, as though I'm depressed?

 Im living rent free with momma, those ppl at the altar gotta go find some rent money every month, I'm cool chica, go join oldpeoplemeet.com or something.

3) The people who were overlooked on the first wedding's guest list will surely be snuck onto yours...

4) Any deviant behaviour is measured against their success.

If one kids pulls all A's and the others dont, they hear about it. If everyone is pulling C's it doesnt look so bad. First borns set the trend and are not measured. We just aren't!



5) It's not new aka not a big deal.
Dammit all first children understand how special it is to be first! Everything is new with you. Us first children have obscene amounts of baby pictures because everything we do is novel and cute. The other kids....meh...first time eating with a spoon is sooo over-rated the 2nd and 3rd time. First big graduation, everybody is invited to celebrate that a child has passed the point of being a juvenile deliquent. The next child, ok well it's great that you made it, here's some cake. Please stop reading this if you are not a first child. You just wont get it lol.

This is in no way a post out of jealousy, if that's what you are thinking, you 2nd and 3rders are so clueless. I am content with my current lot in life. It's a simple existence that makes me smile daily. I'm still in my prime and not ready to leave the nest. *That's what I tell myself to sleep at night, rocks back n forth in corner* ... I'm just messing with you. But seriously  I wish all my siblings the best in everything they do and total success in every step they take. But I'm just saying, we have rules and order for a reason.... *thinks of ways to grab attention in the meanwhile....enrolls in NASA Space Program.*

Happy New Year

Happy New Year! Thanks to everyone who reads often and to those who encourage me by gently reminding me that I have been absent from the blogsphere for too long. I really appreciate the encouragement that keeps me going when I feel like no one is reading :) I wont make another resolution to post more, I will however promise to try. In terms of the blog I will be perfecting my blogging voice so get ready for a bit of a change. It's a good change I promise! I already have 3 posts lined up for this month... yay me!

So I stopped making resolutions a while ago. For a change I made an inspiration board. This doesnt outline my goals but gives me general reminders of the things I want to get done. It was a really great experience. It focuses your mind on the year to come, I will definitely be making this an annual activity.

This year I am planning to focus more on myself. You must be thinking that I've decided to be selfish, but I promise you that I'm far from that. My theme for the year is Dancing on the Moon (surprisingly this has never been my theme for a year). My theme encourages me to have no fears and no worries. I wasted alot of time last year consumed in my thoughts and worries. I am working on my adult, independent self, hence learning to be my own person without apologies.

I heard a great, budding motivational speaker give a graduation speech last year and he charged the grads to always try harder and do better. This is what I plan to do this year as well and I encourage all of you my lovely readers to take this advice to heart and of course just enjoy the life you are given with gratitude

As customary here are my quotations for the year: one spiritual and one inspirational
"Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you are not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?' Matt 26-27

"You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing which you think cannot do." Eleanor Roosevelt

The Queen of Hearts

Dearest readers, please dont cuss me. I know I promised to have more posts this year but my writing has been all over the place this year and I've been trying to mentally gather myself...so that's my excuse :) Ok now to the post.

I can be considered a soft hearted person. I get all warm and fuzzy when I see babies and puppies, show me a baby hugging a puppy and I will melt faster than a chocolate ice cream bar on a hot summer day. I am a lover and have been known to cry at a heartfelt commercial. With that being said I know that this trait while noble can also be a hinderance in the working world. So it would be a surprise to most that the work me and the social me are two different people. I am working on my hard-ass-ness (yes I made up a term) lol and I am quite good at giving the unpopular answer.

 I once worked under the helm of a woman I greatly respect as a person and as a professional. Before working at her establishment I used to see her and duly noted her stern nature and don't mess with me attitude. Normally I would avoid working for such persons but I needed a job and I heard that an international student would have an easier chance of getting a job there. Thankfully a supervisor interviewed me so I was able to keep my perspiration in check and got the job. During my first year under her reign I didn't interact with her much other than hello, goodbye and thanks for my pay. Once she gave me a tax stub and poor little island girl me had no idea what to do with it. Let's just say that I didnt do my taxes that year.
By my second year there I guess I had passed her year long test and because I came back I guess she realised that I would be around for a long time. Or maybe she just finally warmed up to my irresistable likeableness (yep most people, usually love me!) Whatever the reason was she began to open up to me  and I came to love her. As a woman in an expected man's position I began to understand the whats and the whys to her actions. She told me a story once that I will never forget.
She was once the manager of a bar and one day a beer delivery guy came to do his drop off. He asked for the manager and she said that's me. The young buck laughed and said 'but seriously can I talk to the manager?'  Feeling highly offended she told him to apologize or she would have all of his company's products off the shelf and report him to the president of the company. He flippantly told her, 'you cant do that.' She plainly responded in her matter of fact tone 'Dont tell me I cant, no one tells me I can't.' You best believe that after a few calls that whole delivery was free with the compliments of the company president.
Working with her taught me about being respected vs being loved. The people that were closest to her respected and loved her. The people that didnt thought she was a bitch, and that was fine with her. At 2am when she needs to tell a rowdy patron to get the hell outta her place she can do it and be obeyed immediately. She could walk into a room and know that her presence alone stops wrong doers from their activities.

The Queen of Hearts in the Tim Burton's adaption of Alice in Wonderland asked her Henchman 'Is it better to be feared or loved?"
I feel like it is better to have both, to be loved by those who dare to get close to you and feared by those who look for an easy target. I strive to adopt her attitude in the work world. As I evaluate my life she will always have a mark as a person who left a lasting impression on me as a young 20 something year old trying to find herself in the world. And most importantly I wont allow anyone to tell me I cant!

I cant make you love me.......

During the last week I happened across some songs that got me thinking, so I composed a post, *2 posts in one week, is it Christmas?* :)
I think the best person to introduce this post would be the great Bonnie Raitt. In her simple yet powerful words, "I can't make you love me, if you dont. I cant make your heart feel something it won't" 



We all want to be loved and desired. No matter how we mask our feelings and pretend to be hard and over it all, we all at our core want to be loved. But love is the one thing we all want but we cant make it happen on our own. We as humans can do so much to change our fate. If we want a better life we push harder at work for a promotion. If we want to advance in education we bust our asses in school to get a scholarship.  Heck if we wanna get out of the hood we make the necessary sacrifices to move on up to the east side. But when we want someone to love us we cant make it happen.
I would now like to draw your attention to this Rebecca Ferguson song which is beyond beautiful.



In essence she is yearning for this person to notice her, because she notices him and wants him to be with her. But he doesn't seem to acknowledge her existence, which causes her to sing,
"I'll put a spell on you when you are asleep. And when you wake I'll be the first thing you see and you'll realise that you love me."
It made me sad when I heard it because such a seemingly simple thought is indeed so much more complicated.  She didnt ask for a million dollars or to be the world's biggest star, all she wants is for one single individual on this earth populated with billions to love her.  We all know that love potions and spells are hoaxes. In the Caribbean we talk about 'tying' someone, but that doesn't work either. We cant force someone, supernaturally or otherwise, to love us. We can dress up and put on a beautiful face and maybe captivate someone for a few hours, a few days or weeks. And in some cases we can give up a piece of ourselves in hopes of enchanting the lustful. This part brings me to this song, an oldie originally sung by The Shirelles but remade by Norah Jones. No offense to The Shirelles but if yall felt this song it wouldn't have been sung so happily!



After listening to Norah's try I realised how tragic the song was. "Is this a lasting treasure or just a moment's pleasure?"  Simply put after the darkness fades on a night of fulfilled wants will you need me when we wake up?
If you were to think deeper she really asks the wrong question. It wasnt love that got them to that moment, lust -possibly, longing- maybe, curiosity- likely, desperation- probably. Over the past few months I have learned that love is not an emotion, being in love is a conscious action. I love you means I am going to try and make a conscious effort to treat you as you deserve. So you dont fall out of love you simply stop trying. I think that realisation helped to answer alot of unresolved conflicts in my mind in regards to love. And I think this definition goes for any kind of love. I dont think we automatically love our children when they are born. I think we decide to love them no matter what may come. The opposite result is probably why so many wayward parents exist.
But back to the point of this post, no matter how much you try you can never make someone love you. And that my friends is one of the saddest realisations of life.

The 6th step

So something significant happened to me the other day. Unfortunately I wont tell you in detail *listens to the crowd go ahh*
However I will talk about the lesson learnt. I kept finding myself in this weird uncomfortable situation. My friends kept telling me I was being put in this situation to learn to be comfortable. Ok fine, I got comfortable but I kept getting pushed into corners I didnt wanna be in. And I started to feel weak from exerting so much 'comfortable energy'. And then in one of these moments/situations I felt a gentle push telling me to go, step forward, and then I realised that I had been missing the message the whole time.  I wasn't being taught how to be comfortable in situations with people I don't favour, I was being given an opportunity to unload my burden. But I was so caught up with grinning and bearing that I didn't get it.  Sometimes the answers to your silent wishes are granted and you mistake the answer for something else. I honestly thought that I was being punished. I wanted to scream, I was growing tired of dealing with it all, until in a moment of quiet I felt the push. A gentle whisper that I have the strength to do what I have always wanted to do.

Lesson: Sometimes you have to free yourself to fly.

The 6th step.....Closure :)

Humans of....

During my daily social networking I spotted a link to a page called Humans of New York. Between a mix of boredom and nosiness I checked out the page. Subsequently the next few hours of my life were well spent looking through photos of New Yorkers. The owner of the page basically walks the streets of New York taking photos of those he comes across; the ordinary, the intriguing and the quirky. I loved the fact that he would often ask someone the simple question, what's your story? The answers are usually so interesting. I envy the person who can find an excuse to dig into the stories of the persons we may pass daily on the street. I often stare at people while they are not aware and wonder what their story is, so I got to live vicariously through this photographer.
After maxing out the New York scene I decided to check out India next. I was indeed touched by the characters I was introduced to. From the little boy in the market giving out compliments to every passer by just because he wanted to make someone's day, to the man that carries around beer bottle caps as penance for his alcoholism, it was more than time well spent.

Now to the point of this post, I came across a photo and caption that passed the outer regions of my heart and went straight to the core.

"This boy was at a crossing, begging like a thousand others around him. I gave him all the money I had on me, which was only 10 rupees (20 cents). I said it was all I had, meaning all that I had on me at the time, but he took it the other way. "If that is all you have, then keep it." The boy placed the coins back into my palms. I explained what I actually meant, and gave the rupees back. His compassion was deeply affecting."

To think that a less fortunate child begging on the streets, could be so compassionate to a 1st world looking stranger with a large expensive camera is absolutely moving. 

Every time I am being miserable, ungrateful, stingy or worrisome over money or any other luxury of life, may I remember this pure soul.

The Laughing Heart

I heard this poem on the Levi's ad and I love it! 

The Laughing Heart 

your life is your life
don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.
be on the watch.
there are ways out.
there is a light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you chances.
know them.
take them.
you can’t beat death but
you can beat death in life, sometimes.
and the more often you learn to do it,
the more light there will be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have it.
you are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in you.

@Charles Bukowski