Adrienne's Journal

Adrienne’s Journal

Patricia Daniels

AuthorHouse™

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© 2012 Patricia Daniels. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse   06/18/2012

ISBN: 978-1-4772-2521-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4772-2522-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012911089

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Contents

CHAPTER ONE:      A Spiritual Journey

CHAPTER TWO:      She’s Leaving Home

CHAPTER THREE:      First Love

CHAPTER FOUR:      New York, New York

CHAPTER FIVE:      Interpretations of Women

CHAPTER SIX:      Adrienne Meets Teresa

CHAPTER SEVEN:      The Next Step

CHAPTER EIGHT:      Life is Love

CHAPTER NINE:      Inner Visions

CHAPTER TEN:      Mare Moves On

CHAPTER ELEVEN:      Metamorphosis (The First and Second Visions)

CHAPTER TWELVE:      Like A Rolling Stone

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:      The Interview

CHAPTER FOURTEEN:      Between Worlds (Third Vision)

CHAPTER FIFTEEN:      Submission

CHAPTER SIXTEEN:      Adrienne Meets Mare

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN:      Eddie

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:      Angels

CHAPTER NINETEEN:      Virgil: The Fifth Vision (Message from the Angels)

CHAPTER TWENTY:      Betrayal

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE:      Fresh White Sheets

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO:      Healing

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE:      Convictions and Conversations

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR:      The Sixth Vision

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE:      The Seventh Vision

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX:      The Conclusion

—CHAPTER ONE— 

A Spiritual Journey

The fruit must have a stem 

 before it grows. 

—Jabo proverb, Liberia

Some journey to live, others journey to die. My journey is to discover the kind of woman I would be, if I lived in a world void of misconceptions about womanhood. Perhaps, my journey is to help create a world void of such misconceptions.

My name is Adrienne Small, and my story begins on the island of St. Vincent. This land is my birthplace and the birthplace of my ancestors. Grenada lies to the south, Barbados to the east.

Colorful vegetation and tree-covered hills adorn my island and tiny Caribbean paradise. Few outsiders know that is actually the crest of the enormous La Soufriere volcano. Most of the volcano is submerged. It has been dormant since April of 1979.

There is something poetic about living on a volcano. Perhaps, it is the uncertainty I sense as my bare feet prance above the earth’s hidden passions, or the irony of knowing its exotic flowers conceal a force so capable of destruction and death. It is as life itself and how often something beautiful conceals something hideous.

Wearing her long colorful dress and Haitian headdress, Mambo Racine Sans Bout strolls along a dusty road to take her teachings and spiritual powers to the people of St. Vincent who believe in her. She is a young woman of only 35 years, and a native of Haiti who has lived here for the past 10 years. She is also a practitioner of Obeah.

Over the years, she and I have had many casual conversations. She talks quite often about the weather and what each season brings to the island. I have sensed she is drawn to me but that she also has a certain fear of me.

My island is only 18 miles long and 11 miles wide, with a population of nearly 105,000 people. Most are poor. Yet, in spite of our poverty, my people invoke a reputation for friendliness and hospitality that spans the globe. There are, however, many dimensions to the lives of those who inhabit this place—and not all are friendly.

Along with Christianity, my people practice Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, or Voodoo. Voodoo is the secret religion. However, whichever faith they practice publicly, they fear and respect Voodoo.

I recall my mother taking me to a store near the marketplace when I was a child. The store was essentially a renovated shanty filled with the musty smell of an old damp structure, and the burnt scent of a wood-burning fireplace.

While browsing for goods inside the little shop, a man entered. He had the look of death in his eyes—a spiritless stare seen in those about to die. His skin was as lifeless as that of a corpse. The shopkeeper, a kindly middle-aged man, whispered to my mother.

That man was once a Catholic priest, he said. Look at him now. He is a zombie, like a dead man who walks. He is a victim of Voodoo.

My mother looked down at me. Without responding to the shopkeeper, she quickly pulled me out of the store as though she herself were a child pulling along a huge rag doll. I asked whether she knew the man, the dead-looking man, but she refused to discuss the incident and instructed me not to mention it again. Naturally, I respected my mother’s wish. However, there was something in the way that the man looked at me that I shall never forget. It was neither good, nor evil—simply eerie.

I later learned that Voodoo originated with the Fon people, relatives of the Ewe, of West Africa. The word Vodou means spirit. It is called vodou in Haiti, candomblé in Brazil and obeah in Jamaica. However it is called, it is Vodou, and 60 million people practice it around the world.

Some dismiss Voodoo as pagan and primitive. When illness or bad luck seems to haunt them, they offer prayers. They ignore the possibility that illness and bad luck have a less than divine source—a root, you might say.

The association that Voodoo maintains with Christianity, and particularly with Catholicism, allows its followers to appear to believe one religion while practicing another, or while practicing both. It is much like the way women talk about the men in a room with none of the men being aware that they are the topic of discussion.

Belief in a spiritual existence connected to our physical world is strong in the Caribbean. Colonization never destroyed this spirit. Our profound belief in spirituality, of all types, touches each child born here. It touches anyone who journeys to St. Vincent—whether they come to begin a new life or hide from an old one.

While strolling through the market place, I observe drug dealers selling their illicit wares. They are players in St. Vincent’s politics of corruption and drugs. Like corruption anywhere else in the world, greed extends privileges to the rich that are never extended to the poor. To make matters worse, the continuous influx of drugs creates a false economic base—a delusion that makes the wealthy pompous and arrogant while their illicit commodity erodes the moral fiber of the poor and uneducated.

I feel powerless to affect the many changes needed in our small country. However, my thoughts of social and political change quickly fade, as I sit against the thick trunk of my favorite tree to write in my journal. Once I begin to write, the ugliness of politics seems distant. I escape into my diary, where I am inspired by my fantasies of romance and independence, as well as my communications with what I can only describe as an angelic spirit.

On this day, the day my story begins, my tall and powerful tree protects me—not only from the heat of the island’s sun, but also from the fervor of its political passions. Beneath this tree, my mind opens as the tree’s umbrella of leaves creates a shadow around me. Like a woman might withdraw into her lover, I withdraw into its shade.

For the latter 12 of my 24 years, my tree has provided a place for me to record my secrets. Days have passed when I have done nothing more than sit here, hour after hour, listening to the sea gulls. As I listened, I reflected on my place in this world, and recorded my thoughts in my journal.

As a child, the searching songs of terns cried out answers to the questions in my heart, but my heart was too young, and I too innocent, to decipher its language. Fortunately, the same innocence that made me so naive also left me untainted by the corruption surrounding me.

Growing up, I had frequent reason to wonder whether living on a small island would add to, or subtract from, the sense of place so important to everyone. I conclude that it makes no difference. Whether I am an island woman or a metropolitan woman, my place is wherever I place my desires; and my journal is the record of these desires. To understand my story, one must understand that my journal is as much the history of my life as it is the literary equivalent of its essence.

Occasionally, when the weather is not suited to sitting outside, I write in the beautiful house at the top of this hill. It is my parent’s house: large and white with blue shutters. It is a house filled with the harmony of family and the peace of pleasant childhood memories.

Stretched across the delicate texture of my floral comforter, my secrets flow within the serenity of my bedroom sanctuary. Here, I discover the inner peace of self-knowing, as my mind connects with my heart, and my heart connects with my soul.

Whatever the weather, I write—gently inscribing my experiences onto sheets of cotton fibers and wood pulp. These experiences encourage me to seek out women who define themselves as more than a skin color and more than students of a particular ideology.

When I began the first of my seven journals, I was a shy island girl of only 12 years. Like most girls, I was infatuated with musicians, movie stars, and the dream of someday being a wife and a mother. Such were the hopes, emotions and thoughts that I recorded in my journal. Later, as I matured and gained confidence in myself, I started to include the past-life images and spiritual beings that I occasionally glimpsed while asleep.

My dreams and visions were always important to me. I was never certain why. The dreams or visions, whichever you prefer to call them, invaded my mind with images of events I had never seen; they took me to places I have never been, and occurred more frequently as I moved towards becoming an adult woman.

Whatever the reason, the images of spirits presented a reality I shared with no one except my mother—Veronica Small. My mother became my confidant. She believed me, listened to me, and allowed me to share my experiences with her without ever being judgmental.

One very special spirit—one who affects me directly—I know as Carolyn. She is entwined with my soul. Through her, I began to understand the nature of an evolving spirituality—a spirituality that is neither paternal, nor maternal, but which seems androgynous. At present, the philosophy is incomplete. However, my belief is that someday each of us will find increasingly creative ways to satisfy spiritual hunger. I also believe that during the 21st century powerful changes will occur and become apparent. I believe this because the hunger has already begun. Inevitably, nurturing will follow.

Through the spirit Carolyn, as well as through several incredible visions, I learn that whatever we choose to believe, it is best that it be firmly rooted in love—a philosophy of loving, sharing, nurturing and giving. It must be void of racism, sexism and all the other isms that divide us.

In this story, I—Adrienne Veronica Small, discover a way to reach into the past through the spiritual being I know as Carolyn. Carolyn guides me into the past to contact a young woman and place a seed in her subconscious mind. The seed eventually saves her life and creates, for all of us, an alternative future.

Our journey is possible because Carolyn’s soul merges and emerges through me, and because she is free from the constraints of physical law.

I have calculated that Carolyn almost certainly died in 1977, the year of my birth. At that time, a non-physical union between her soul and mine began. To put it another way, a union between her history and my life began the instant of my birth.

I know that Carolyn’s soul communicates with mine, and that the bond between us cannot be broken unless she wills it. Our souls are connected. In a sense, Carolyn lives through me, perhaps to accomplish some task she had hoped to accomplish had she lived.

—CHAPTER TWO— 

She’s Leaving Home

Nothing in his life became him 

 like the leaving it. 

—William Shakespeare

The postman always came three days a week; and, for several weeks, I had sat on the porch waiting for his arrival on each scheduled delivery days. He knew I was waiting for a letter from an American university, and saw the disappointment on my face each time it had not been in the stack of mail he delivered to our house. My deepest fear was that my application to teach had been rejected, and the university had not taken the time to notify me of their decision.

Today, it is late in May, I watch the postman hurrying along the road. It is raining and I cannot hear him, although he appears to be shouting. The rains in St. Vincent can be very loud.

Seeing that I cannot hear him, he raises his arm. A letter is in his hand, and he waves it furiously.

It’s getting wet. Don’t let it get wet! I yell as I run down the hill to meet him at the mailbox. The smile on his face tells me everything I need to know. He seems nearly as excited as I do.

Adrienne, I think this is it, he says, nearly out of breath. I think this is your ticket to America."

Already, I am completely drenched. I snatch the letter out of his hand, totally abandoning any measure of good manners, and start running back towards my house. However, before I go very far, I turn around, run back to him, and kiss him on the cheek."

He gives me a huge grin, then says, I will bring you another letter from America, tomorrow, and another one the day after that.

I smile at him, turn and start running again towards the house. My mother is standing on the porch waiting for me. Her joy is evident in the light surrounding her body. It is as though she has already read the letter.

Girl, you are going to catch your death of cold, she says. Get on into this house and get out of that wet dress. There is plenty time for you to read that letter.

Mama, I can’t die! I’m going to America. I reply.

We both sit at the kitchen table. She hands me a butter knife and I use it to open my letter. In the letter, the university informs me that my application has been accepted and that a gentleman named Professor Peter Godwin will meet me in New York. He has volunteered to be my guide. The letter says I am to meet him at John F. Kennedy (JFK) International Airport. Arrangements have been made for my stay in The Big Apple—New York City.

I will finally be able to teach creative and expository writing at the State University of New York, in Manhattan. My dream has come true.

My mother is as happy as any mother can be to learn her daughter will soon be living far away from her protective eyes. Tears mix with our different joys.

For me, teaching had always been the art of taking the fertile soil of a young mind and into that mind planting the seeds needed to create a beautiful garden. A teacher is like a gardener.

Yet, in spite of my eagerness, I too have mixed feelings about leaving my native country. I do so only because of my personal need to challenge myself.

The following afternoon, and as anyone who knows me might suspect, I am sitting at the base of my tree and writing in my journal. I am proud that I will be the first in my family to work as a teacher, and to leave St. Vincent for a reason other than uniting with a spouse, or seeking a potential husband. Of all my accomplishments, I am most proud to be leaving St. Vincent to further a career.

My independence distinguishes me from women whose fate is to emigrate from poor countries and impoverished circumstances to be with men who have promised them a future. Most often, as is certainly true in my country, a husband journeys to America, finds work, and a place to live, then—several months later—sends for his wife.

If I do meet someone in America, and a relationship blossoms, I will marry him. However, I will only marry him, if I can find a place for him in my life where he can compliment my dreams. Some say this makes me a selfish woman. I agree. Too often, women are not selfish enough.

St. Vincentian culture works to keep women socially and economically dependent on men. I hope such cultural mechanisms do not exist in America. My mother’s only concern is that I marry a Catholic, preferably someone from the Caribbean. However, I have promised her nothing. I am my own woman. My only concern is that my spouse—whoever he is to be—does not distract me from my goals.

Most of my girl friends are happy for me. Yet, I think that some that are a little jealous. Each of us have heard or read that American women are quite liberated and radical. However, we do not believe everything we read. Still, we wonder how it might feel to have such enormous control over one’s life. Privately, I wonder what a woman does with such power.

Looking down towards the base of the hill, I watch my friend Eddie as he makes his way up to me. He ascends, briskly. Periodically, he breaks into a short sprint.

Eddie, my sweet Eddie. Never have I known a kinder or gentler man. He and I are the same age and share the same love for the English language. I share nearly everything with Eddie. Everything except my body and the contents of my journal.

He is coming from the marketplace where St. Vincentian women buy their vegetables, fruits, meats and fish. There, they also buy coffee beans and sugar, mangoes and coconuts—all the things we women acquire to attend to the needs of our families.

In the marketplace, ladies browse, selecting the spices and seasonings used to highlight the flavors of our tasty Caribbean meals. Their fancy headdresses hold firm against the ocean breezes—headdresses as bold and brilliant as the flowers that dress the countryside. Women’s songs and laughter create a symphony of sounds that are as much a part of the island as the island is a part of the sea.

Some of the women are African, and like the women of St. Vincent, and from the northern parts of South America, they wear brightly colored cotton dresses. More often than not, a lady’s dress matches the umbrella she holds. Suitably attired, she shops and strolls with her parasol open to protect her from both the sun and the rain.

Like everything in the Caribbean, the marketplace thrives with a dazzling array of colors and sounds. These days the market is also a meeting place for the drug dealers. They come here to sell small packets of marijuana, hashish, cocaine, heroin and crack. These petty drug merchants transact in the streets and taverns of St. Vincent. Their high-level counterparts arrange convenient ports of entry for these drugs. They make their transactions over cellular telephones, while sitting comfortably at the swimming pools of posh hotels.

On the streets they deal in ounces and grams. At the hotels they deal in pounds and thousands of kilos. The police somehow only manage to apprehend criminals who can barely post bail. They dare not approach the courtly mansions of the upper class.

Eddie has nearly reached the top of the hill. I can almost feel his fatigue.

Tall, skinny Eddie, with his handsome features and dreadlocks, has been my best friend since we were children. Somehow, his heart had not aged.

As an adolescent, I wondered how such a loving and handsome man could choose to be a lover of other men. To me it seemed a waste of manhood. I could easily have fallen in love with him. Yet, even then I knew that a physical love between us had never been Fate’s intention. Eddie’s love for men was as strong as my own.

Could Eddie have made a conscious decision to be gay? As a teenager, I confess that I thought his decision had been intentional. However, as I grew to know him, I began to understand it had never been a matter of choice. Eddie had no more decided to love men than I. He was born to be the way he is, just as I was born to be the way I am. It had not been a conscious decision, and could not be morally wrong—no more than being born blind, left-handed, or deaf could be morally right or wrong.

In an earlier journal, I recorded that Eddie was physiologically male and psychologically female. What sense, therefore, did it make to label him gay, abnormal or deviant? In fact, through my reading and research I discovered older cultures that were fully accepting of people like Eddie. They called them twin-spirited.

In many ways, Eddie’s feminine nature kept our friendship pure and made it wonderfully easy for me to talk to him. He was a man with a feminine spirit. Moreover, because of his spirit, we connected as easily as if he had been born a woman.

I am not saying that Eddie is effeminate. He does not behave nor use gestures one could call feminine. I say he has a feminine spirit. There is a difference. Unfortunately, most people neither understand, nor have a desire to understand the difference.

Eddie is a beautiful human being. That’s what matters most. It’s all that matters to me.

Eddie reaches the hilltop, and runs up to me. Without asking permission, he forces my legs apart. Then, he sits between my knees, rests his arms on my thighs, and places the back of his head between my breasts.

I look to make certain that my dress has fallen between my legs. Eddie, are you a fool? I yell, surprised by his behavior. How do you come to sit between me so?

I don’t know, he answers, innocently. I think if there is no problem with you resting against your favorite tree, then there is no problem with me resting against my favorite friend.

Innocently, Eddie confirms that he is a unique human being. I know how much I will miss him when I leave for New York. Such childlike sweetness is rare, especially among adults. It is even more rare among adult males.

Not far away, little girls jump double-Dutch and sing an old Calypso song:

Mama, look, a Boo Boo, they shout;

Dear Mama tells them, "Shut up your mouth;

That is your daddy!"

Oh, no! My daddy can’t be ugly so!

Shut your mouth, go away.

Mama, look, a Boo Boo Day.

Shut your mouth, go away.

Mama, look a Boo Boo Day.

Melody Lord, © Duchess Music Corporation, BMI 4/19/59

I watch the little girls masterfully jump between two swinging ropes. They combine gymnastic with rope-jumping skills so precise that it well deserves to be an Olympic event.

The ropes move swiftly, alternating in opposite directions. One girl alternates her steps, raising each foot from the ground just long enough to allow the rope to slip under, as two other girls maintain its rhythm and speed. Their timing and alacrity are impressive.

As they play, they sing and recite rhymes passed down through generations. Their rhymes speak of a world seen only through the eyes of children.

Who will look after you when I am gone? I ask Eddie, saddened by the prospect of my departure.

I will look after myself, he answers. Besides, I am older now. I do not run the streets nearly as much as when I was younger.

I absentmindedly twist one of his dreadlocks between my fingertips, then say, The island is no place for people like you, Eddie. People here despise gays. They don’t know how to deal with them. Yet, you still run around like a little slut.

I know what I am, Adrienne, he replies, but what can I do? If I could, I would go to America with you. I would live in Greenwich Village and write poetry like Nikki Giovanni, or stories like Rita Mae Brown.

Yes, and I would find a big tree like this one, and lean against it while writing in my journal, I add, wistfully.

Eddie rubs my legs up and down between my knees and ankles, then says, It snows in New York, you know. You couldn’t write outside—not all year long. Not in the city of pigeon poop.

We laugh. Then, I respond to his comment, saying, Yes, but when it gets cold, I can go to Macy’s, and buy a mink coat. Then, I can sit against my tree just the same.

You’re dreaming, he says.

I take a few seconds to savor a warm breeze that blows up from the ocean. Since I was a little girl, my dream has been to go shopping in Macy’s, I tell Eddie.

"That’s cool, but it would not be the same as shopping here, Eddie laments. There is no place like St. Vincent, Adrienne."

"I know, Eddie. There is no place like St. Vincent and no man as crazy, nor as lovable as you. I stare across the field and out across the ocean. Even from the hilltop, I can see its waves. I will miss St. Vincent and my family. I’ll miss you too, Miss Eddie."

America is a dangerous place, Adrienne. They shoot tourists, you know?

Cowards die many times before their death, I reply. Now tell me who said that first.

Billy Shakespeare, he answers, playfully.

I pull him to me. Oh, Eddie, I’ll miss you so much. We share so many wonderful memories

I’ll miss you too, Adrienne, he answers. Then, he pauses. A very solemn look appears and he says, But your destiny divides us.

"Our destinies divide us, I answer immediately. Our destinies, Eddie, not mine alone."

Damn Destiny! Eddie protests with the tone of a Shakespearean actor. If I could rule Destiny, it would be me slave. I would be your husband. We would have six children, and live in a big mansion on a hill overlooking St. Vincent.

Then, he says, while swirling around, I would be the king and you would be me queen, or vise versa. You know it would not make me much difference.

Again, we fill St. Vincent’s sky with laughter.

Six children! You would be the one to have six children, Eddie, not I!

Six children. No problem, he boasts. I could drop six babies in the morning, then go dancing that same night.

I just look at him, amazed by his naiveté. Our laughter leaps onto the current of the summer’s breeze. Our voices blend with the enchanted sound of the Calypso music playing in the distance. It is the soft metallic sound of muted steel drums echoing over the treetops. The sound fades into the evening sky but never leaves the heart of those who have heard it.

Angels color the sunsets here. They stroke the sky with brushes filled with the paints of rainbows, until the sky reflects their passions. This evening, their enchanted hues move leisurely towards the horizon.

My thoughts drift like clouds. Eddie senses I am far away.

What is the matter, Adrienne? What are you thinking about? he asks.

I answer, saying, I’m thinking about everything. I am thinking how science tells us that the universe came from nothing and will disappear into nothing. I’m trying to imagine this ‘nothingness.’ What does nothingness mean, Eddie? Does it mean that it is our destiny to become nothing? If that’s true, then how can my life or anyone’s life have any meaning? How can anything mean anything, if it will all become nothing?

I don’t know, Eddie answers.

Trying to be more precise, I say, They say the universe is like a baby born from a womb of nothingness. And as the baby matures, it begins to realize that some day she or he might return to the void from which she or he was born.

Eddie does not comment.

I add, At first, the child accepts the promise of an afterlife more wondrous than life itself. However, as the child matures, it begins to question this so-called afterlife. It wonders if heaven is merely a philosophical promise without an iota of truth. Then what, Eddie? Then what?

What are you asking me, Adrienne?

"I’m not asking, I’m saying that between being born from nothing, we either live with the fear of becoming nothing, or—on the basis of faith alone—we live with the hope that we can journey into some everlasting paradise. Yet, from generation to generation, we keep asking the same questions: ‘Who am I?’ ‘Why am I here? ‘What is my purpose?’ ‘What is the meaning of Life?"

Eddie does not answer. He does not even attempt an answer. He merely looks at me. Eventually, he turns away, repositioning himself between my legs.

Acquiring the mood to be an actor, I push Eddie away. Then, I stand to deliver my monologue, Who am I? The question begs for a definition. Doesn’t it?

I am human, I answer. I am man. I am woman. I am the powerless victim of Fate! I am the omnipotent warrior battling Time! I am the Amazon, the Queen of Ideologies and Dreams—mightier than Superman, more powerful than Thor!

Then, while pointing at Eddie, I continue. Or, I am the perverted gay child who has grown and become an adult to sin against God and the Church. I am the sinner, the wicked bitch, the adulteress, and the whore of forbidden lusts.

Damn! Eddie replies. I’m scared of you, girlfriend.

I ignore his silly humor and continue.

These Christians, these politician and philosophers, these self-proclaimed prophets and disciples—who gives any of them the right to define what I am or what I should be so long as I have the mind and the wit to define myself?

Who am I? I ask myself, aloud, I am Adrienne—more wonderful and beautiful than the most perfect flower, yet less significant than the least noticed blade of grass. I am Adrienne. I am woman. I am as much everything as I am nothing.

Looking out towards the sea, I say, I am not what society calls me. Biologists and physiologists do not classify me. Popes, rabbis or teachers do not define me. I define myself! It is my right to define who I am, and to say, ‘I am Adrienne—a new woman for a new age!’

You think too much, Adrienne, Eddie suggests, visibly unimpressed. Thoughts like yours only depress me. I’m just Eddie, he says solemnly. Life has no meaning, except for those who can enjoy Life. If the Universe disappeared tomorrow, there would be no one to weep for us. There would be no one to care.

Still, the questions are important to me. Although, it’s obvious, they are of little concern to Eddie. I realize it is pointless to pursue the discussion any further.

Adrienne, let’s not get into all of that metaphysical mumbo jumbo. Okay? he pleads. This is our last day together. Let’s just sit here and be close.

I resume my prior position with Eddie, then close my journal as easily as I close my eyes. Soon, we fall into a light meditation. Unthreatened, I feel Eddie’s warmth as he rests peacefully between my thighs. Together, we slip into a tranquil state of mind that allows us to savor our last day together on the peak of the submerged volcano known as St. Vincent. We bathe in the peace. We bathe in the beauty of the island.

Then suddenly, I shout Eddie’s name, abruptly; and I take him away from what I am certain is a lustful adventure within his mind. His head falls back against the tree as I raise myself from the floor of the island. Then, he too stands.

What’s wrong with you, Adrienne? he asks while rubbing the back of his head.

Come, follow me! I shout. I must show you the clothes my mother has made for me to wear when I go to teach in America!

Eddie slaps me on my derrière and shouts, "You’re it!" Then, he turns and runs in the opposite direction. I chase him and we play tag, until we are both nearly exhausted. We play as we had played when we were children in St. Vincent’s beautiful botanical gardens. Only our levels of innocence have changed.

In my mind, I hear Carlos Santana’s Jamaican rendition of the Spanish classical piece, En Aranjuez con tu Amor. Its reggae beat pulsates in my heart like hearts beat in the chests of excited children running among the flowers. In my mind, Eddie and I are children again. We hide behind huge Caribbean plants, then chase one another until we are exhausted of laughter. Then, to cool ourselves, we swim in one of the pools hidden in this forest of flowers. We bathe shamelessly on our Garden of Eden. We are the Adam and Eve of St. Vincent.

Like the small animals that watch us, so curious about our strange behavior, we drink from a stream and savor the cool beverage of the mountain. Suddenly the spirituality of life, youth and Nature marries and becomes one magical trinity, but then the thought disappears. My mind returns to the present. Then, Eddie and I run farther up the hill towards my parent’s house.

Sweet scents of island vegetation, the green-blue ocean, and flowers make our island a tiny bit of paradise. Paradise, after all, is meaningless unless it is physical.

My mother, Veronica, is sitting on the porch reading a book. She watches as we continue to play while running towards the house. You two are lost in childhood, she says as we stand before her.

Eddie leans forward and gives her a kiss on the cheek.

It’s not that we are lost in childhood, mother, he answers, it’s that we have never lost our childhood.

Always the one to play with words, mother replies. I know it’s too late now. But, why have neither you or Adrienne made time to go to church today?

Mother, I have too much to do today. You know I leave for New York tomorrow.

"And Eddie, what’s