Happiness Breakaway

 

 

(First published Friday, February 21, 2003, under the column Brew)

 

breakaway: n A piece of music that is jumpy or up-tempo, mostly fast-moving Calypso. The dance that goes with it. Also when someone conservative goes wild. (see leggo)

From: Cote ci Cote la Trinidad & Tobago Dictionary, John Mendes

 

SHE DID NOT WEAR ALL BLACK at last, and she danced her ass off.

She jumped and waved ... and jumped and waved; raised her hand, raised her voice. She sang, shouted, screamed. And she danced her ass off. 

For the first time in what felt like forever, she was not living her father’s pain of illness; her heart’s pain at losing the newspaper she treasured; her body’s pain on the brink of a health crisis. None of these things touched her now. 

From the left of her a group fussed, “Buh wha’ happen to she? She enh know dat paper dead!” 

From the right of her others chafed, “Buh wha’ happen to she? She fadder die week before!” 

They would never comprehend that what we truly love lives forever ... if only inside us. Still, at that moment she wasn’t thinking such things even. She wasn’t thinking at all.

 

Bringing in a little better

 

She let go. She gave in. She released. All the assorted agonies surged out of her and away, if only for so short a time. It would all be a little better from that moment on. 

I am writing about myself: “breaking away,” as some would say, at last week’s Guardian calypso competition. 

Oh yes, I wailed; quite a different wailing from what I’ve been doing since my beloved father, my beloved WIRE and my beloved body took a turn for the worse in a hat-trick I could well have done without scoring. 

Interesting, it was, to hear a few of those who knew some of my suffering begrudge this momentary respite from heart-woe, lamenting my reprieve into gladness and good, clean abandon. 

Then a man came near and made up for all this by saying,

It’s good to see you happy.

 

We are prodded to bear it, to take it, to not worry, to not think too much, to “stand by your man,” to be satisfied, to settle, to shut up, or risk “she paid for it with her life” — as was insensibly worded in the Express cover story Saturday. 

Irony resides in that the people who will be wining their waists off come the torridness of Carnival Monday/Tuesday, are the self-same who would look askance at someone else (someone who will choose to stay shut in safe and quiet on those same days) for taking a wine by the time.

 

Letting out a lot of pain

 

It is merely part and parcel of people wanting joy for themselves, yet not desiring the same for their fellow human. 

Please, don’t be like that. 

We all need a break. Sometimes we need a breakaway. 

We need catharsis to drive our pain from us; to free us from grief, angst, guilt, rage; to push us back into the laughing places of Self, and keep us from falling afoul of an ulcer, cancer or lowered libido. 

The breakaway is God’s way of balancing the sacred with the irreverent aspects of our emotions — building forbearance, building bridges, building human endurance against hardships. 

Happiness, the true kind, is a breakaway of the heart and soul. Embrace it where you will. Embrace it for others.

 

Open up

 

Graphic image by L. Ric Vidale

For my free images of true Trinidad and Tobago esprit, touch the link: Jhaye-Q Trinbago Photography

Access my other blogs via: Jhaye-Q Shows