Living a Bittersweet Life

I grew up in a time and space where singers like Gregory Isaacs and Bob Marley rules the airwaves.
I can never hear one of their songs without going back to my childhood, growing up poor in an economically depressed community (so called by the sociologists), each parent looking at their child and praying for a way out for them.

So this one morning, when I heard Jamaican superstar, Gregory Isaac’s “I don’t wanna be lonely tonight” blasting from the speakers of a passing car, I was thrown back to that time in my life.

My upbringing was poor but I had a vivid imagination and I loved books. They were my solace and kept me from many lonely nights and days. Those days were bittersweet. The bitterness was from the feeling of lack that everyone seemed to embody. For many families, there was never enough to go around. If you had school shoes, perhaps you did not have a school bag. If there was meat in your food, there was nothing to drink. The sweetness came from the pure simplicity of life.

My mother and stepfather ensured that my brother and I never went hungry. We had a garden and raised sheep or chickens or rabbits. There was food. There were clothes, at least a couple of dresses and pants and there was shelter. What else was there to want, really?

This was growing up in the ’70s and ‘80s on a small Caribbean Island.

Sometimes we get the opportunity to go full circle. We grow up and get the chance to look at the lives we are living and we realize it still has remained bittersweet.
The bitter coming from the low-grade feeling of unhappiness that pervades even though we have all the material possession we want, the sweet from a deep-seated knowledge that we don’t have to be lonely tonight or any other night.

We have ourselves, our inner being, our angels, guides, and ancestors. We have Source Energy. We have life, and hope and our dreams.

What else is there to want, really?