Sunday, November 27, 2011

Vincentian Traditional Sunday Mornings

You know when you look on a map of the world and you only see nothing more than a dot representing the size and location of your island home, it can be quite disconcerting at first. Nonetheless, St Vincent and the Grenadines has been a comparatively tiny island that held much golden humanitarian values for its approximately 100 000 inhabitants over the years.

Sunday mornings were a special time of family, friends, food and faith that sowed some irreplaceable seeds of universal values within us while we wee young and growing up.

I can still recall that on a Sunday morning very much like this one, as children we would awake to the sound of our parents in their bedroom having their extended morning devotions. If you paid attention long enough you would really think it was an early version of the Sunday service which we would all later attend. Daddy would be quoting scriptures and giving his interpretations and mini exhortations pretty much as a pastor would do. My mother would be the song and worship leader. They would go back and forth between singing and reading of scriptures.

When the sun began to knock on our windows all of us children would be told to awake at that time. Sleeping in after sunrise was never allowed it seems. So beginning with my oldest brother, we would each have to kneel at our bedside and "say the Our Father Prayer" and a prayer dictated by either parent. Our parents would not leave the bedroom until they themselves had prayed; this was the time that we would hear our mother praying extensively for each of us in the family.

Sunday breakfast was also a uniquely anticipated time in the family as well. After Saturday grocery shopping in town mommy would have brought back some tasty bread and condiments which would be our Sunday treats. It was the norm that you ate meals on Sundays that you would not usually consume during the rest of the week. Back in those growing years the kitchen would have been a wooden structure separate from the "wood house" as we called it.

My mother and my sole sister would proceed to the kitchen and commence the making of chocolate tea, flavoured with cinnamon and ginger. I always had my chocolate volcano hot--never liked tea at any other temperature. My mother would then prepare the bread and fried fish or other protein servings which would accompany the bread.

During all this time, my brothers and I would be sweeping the yard or washing the dishes from Saturday evening dinner. Sometimes as well, we would have to be about the backyard and even the garden collecting wood or pieces of dried sticks to be used for roasting breadfruit, if that was on the menu for that day.

By mid morning all movements would be to get to church. At one time we attended church with our parents but that changed because their church was located so far from where we lived. So as children we would walk across to a nearby village to participate in Sunday School and later on morning worship service. It was an adventure getting to church, especially on wet mornings. You see, the path to the church was really a shortcut--a dirt track through shrubs and uncultivated lands. We also had to cross a river by jumping across stones. To slip from a stone because of its slippery surface was to have your "Sunday best" shoes, socks and pants foot drenched in the muddy water of the river.

But through it all we learned some lessons in those days that are still embedded in us as adults today. I, along with my siblings, would have been left with a heritage of prayer and motivation to keep working. Because living conditions may not be the ideal today does not mean that tomorrow will not be better. We all must keep on moving.

Another thing that stands out about our Sundays long ago is the neighbourly sharing of Sunday lunches. Food was always in abundance, and we always knew what the neighbours were eating, and vice versa.

Sundays were the quietest of days. All commercial and business activities ceased for that day. Public transportation was at a halt. Shops were closed. Loud music was silenced. Farmers stayed out of their mountain lands. t was the Lord's Day. It was family day. It is now that we are all grown up and gone physically apart, mommy is in heaven, and yet life goes on that I appreciate the significance of those old and seemingly insignificant Sundays back then. Family and good parenting are essential inputs into the life of a growing child.

It is my hope that my readers are able to appreciate their own Sundays and other occasions when their family is sowing good things in their lives that will help them to stand productively as future adults.

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Welcome to The Wrestling Place

Thank you for visiting The Wrestling Place (TWP). Some of my readers may have followed me on my previous blog "Ashford Daniel Writes" which was hosted by Wordpress. Unfortunately, since early September, I have been unable to have any new article published on Wordpress because of a technical issue within Wordpress. Wordpress has been unable to resolve the issue. As far as I am aware, no action has been credibly taken by them to solve the problem. I postponed leaving for as long as I could, but life must go on. Indeed, it is something I also "wrestled" with. You may still see many of my past articles on Wordpress at

                         www.risingdano.wordpress.com/

First of all, this blog is not a WWE partner activity. I have decided to call my newest blog The Wrestling Place (TWP) because I want it to be symbolic of the times and seasons in every life when a person has to do some personal wrestling or struggling with opposing circumstances. It is only after we have faced our challenges and have wrestled with them that we can grow and move to a happier place in our lives.

You can rest assured that there will always be some post of interest and innovative worth for you as a reader, no matter your back ground or walk in life. Let me invite you to become a subscribed member to TWP and spread the word. After all, readers are leaders and world changers.

STDCXQG7WTKU

Friday, November 25, 2011

When Men Hurt


Western societies continue to evolve on all levels. The shifting focus and inter dependency of gender roles on our social well being is taking a somewhat obviously subtle turn towards violence and retribution. In the twentieth century it was the women and children who were regarded as being the helpless ones in the context of situations involving domestic violence or relationship breakdown.
The empowerment of our independently driven women over the last decade has brought a fair deal of balance to the vulnerabilities of the sexes. In fact, our females have almost been enclosed by a legal regulatory frame work that acts as a force shield from the traditional domestic disputes and conflicts.


The socialization of both genders has seen our females in general not being invited to empathize with any emotional vulnerabilities of the opposite sex. The men also have been ruthlessly trained that a critical criteria which determines manhood is to not show any sense of emotional fear, intimacy or failure, especially as it relates to their relationships.
The unwelcomed reality is that after many decades of man being the sexually dominant figure and the economic centrepiece in the home, men are now having to face some hard changes. Their women are no longer willing to just be a frightened puppy when the treacherous situations of cheating and insensitivity pop up in their intimacies. Ladies are actually prepared now to move out and move on with their lives, largely due to the supportive frame work put in place over the years.
On the other hand, men are finding that, as their home lives deteriorate, they have no one or nowhere to really go to for some sort of solace or resurgence. They definitely cannot approach their brethren with whom they hang out and share their inner pain or pending family loss. The vibes from the Gaza culture and Hollywood instant retributive side leaves them with a seemingly easy and cost effective alternative of violence and swift murder.
Each time a man goes on the killing spree and slaughters his girl friend or woman there exists another man somewhere in the dark heartlands of despair, fear and frustration with his own family who is all the more encouraged to follow suit and rid the world of the persons he sees as representing his pain and loss. Such persons in effect have taken away his manhood. And a man without his manhood is no man.
The growing sense of domestic alienation of our men and young boys is sending a strong wake up call for balanced emotional support for the male gender. Many men now seem to have so very little to live for within a happy monogamous relationship. It is far easier for them to just see the need to satisfy their current sex drive and not necessarily to value "settling down" with one woman and their resulting offsprings.
The many teenage boys who have little choice but to become a man before they see puberty because of a missing father represents a flashing amber light in the social dynamics. Upcoming is a generation of tomorrow's men who have much disappointment, anger, hurt and confusion as to why their should-be role models never stuck around practically in their lives. They have to somehow deal with all the resulting pain before they can even think of having their own successful family.

Women and men have been hurt so much in relationships that a growing percentage of both sexes is starting to have little or no expectations of a future relationship that is built on stability, trust and commitment. The sweetness has been removed from many homes and so there are little incentives to anchor the heart there.