Jamaica:Peace of the Mountains



The second to last day I was in Jamaica, a bunch of 16 white people party animals crashed where I was lodging in Jamaica. I tried to discern who they were...not U.S. citizens (thankfully) but from what I could tell ex-Pats from various European countries (some obviously Germans/Dutch by their gutterality) and caucasian natives from the Jamaican lowlands. For about 5 hours, the mountain peace was disturbed by excessive drink, saccharin 80's Pop music blasting, and bawdy jokes. English was the lingua franca.

BTW, I am going to be on a Jamaica jag for a while. Great experiences crack us open with ideas and reflections.

I wondered why any group of people would travel over 3,000-4,000 feet up to party their brains out when any hovel would do, with dangerous ride to boot down the treacherous road to Kingston. It wasn't a case of sour grapes of me wanting to join the party. The older I get, the more I go for quality in relationships and conversation, not quantity. I am not looking to score...I am 53, so that game is over, unless I want to marry a chica with two kids in college. No thanks. I had my chances and I whiffed. God never promises grand slams.

So, I am content in my singleness. I have nothing left to prove to anyone which has released me from an enormous burden of trying to adhere to societal expectations of companionship of a romantic nature. I just wish I had the courage earlier to recognize that singleness was a legit way to live life. What do I love about being non-attached? Freedom from others' expectations. My accounting is only drawing from my existence. Period. I owe no man or woman.

After the party mercifully came to an end, with the resultant wreckage on all of the other non-boisterous guests' experience over, the air was purged of Babylon (a Rastafari term for the corrupt world system). I get that establishments have to have crowds swarm into its orbit to rake in some cash, but I could tell that the group's behavior was stressing out all of those associated with the establishment in an official sense. It struck me that the group was not at all aware that a greater number who came to the restaurant that day were adversely affected (obvious from the non-verbals) by their exuberances and excesses. No clue, no awareness, no care.

The morning after, as I sat at the cafe alone, reggae music was back on the playlist, and I enjoyed the solitude and coffee. I tried to reflect on how forbearance is often a difficult discipline. Patience is not in our nature. The bruising of the serenity the day and night before had dissipated. I guess I felt more sorry for the crowd than anything. Maybe sorry is a tad too dramatic. Perhaps a sense of meaninglessness. I let go of the irritation. A lot of our inconveniences from others are not intentional.

People, on the whole, look to pleasure to compensate them for their lack of peace. Peace comes from God.    

  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Shake the Dust: Anis Mojgani

Pslam 90:2 "Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God." I am not real certain where Anis Mojgani comes from belief-wise. Cats like him tend to be synchrestic spiritually rather than Christ-centered. Yet, this poem captures the spirit of Jesus. What this poem also needs is grace....we shake off sin and mortality and take on Christ and immortality. This is for the fat girls This is for the little brothers For the former prom queen And for the milk crate ball players This is for the school yard wimps And the childhood bullies that tormented them Shake the dust. This is for the benches and the people sitting upon them. This is for the bus drivers driving a million broken hymns And for the men who have to hold down 3 jobs, Simply to hold up their children. For the nighttime schoolers And for the midnight bike riders trying to fly Shake the dust. For the two year olds who cann...
Read more

Thomas Jefferson & Jesus

Image
I was reminded today, by a friend's post on Facebook, that it is Thomas Jefferson's birthday. So, I had a little party on my own of watching two documentaries on him through Netflix Instant. There is much I admire about Jefferson, there is much I dislike. He is polarizing figure. Besides the owning of slaves, the second most odious character flaw was his castration of the New Testament . See my slice of his slicing. Live by the razor, die by the razor. I did learn a cool new word call Amphiboligism which means ambiguity. The arrogance of Jefferson is astounding as if he had a more accurate vantage point of Jesus after 17 centuries than Jesus's own contemporaries and colleagues. In an empirical and scientific sense, he is at a considerable disadvantage in his postulations. When my wife and I visited Monticello on our Honeymoon, the most memorable moment there --besides my downing a can of Pringles all at once (in my own version of the "Pursuit of Happiness" w...
Read more