#BTColumn – Memory as survival

The views and opinions expressed by the author(s) do not represent the official position of Barbados TODAY.

by Esther Phillips

It seems right that what we humans know as time should be divided into past, present and future. Just imagine if all we had was a consciousness of this present time with its ever-multiplying dangers of COVID-19, economic hardships, crime, and the list goes on.

Our hearts could indeed fail us for fear. The future doesn’t look much brighter either, according to the various voices informing us, with absolute certainty, that things will not get any better, but only worse, much worse.

That leaves us with only one other component of time, which is the past. And why are we inclined to revisit there? One reason may be that we humans generally crave some degree of certainty or stability.

The past, unlike the present, is not in a state of flux; changing unpredictably and even dangerously. The past has already happened. And while our present perspectives on past events may change, the experiences or events themselves really cannot. We have already lived the experience. We were there. The events are fixed in a particular time frame.

Memory, then, is this amazing faculty we use in order to reach back into the past. Memory is not only the repository of our life experiences, but also contains the arsenal we need for our present and future survival; it is through our memory that we reach for resources that helped us out in difficult times. Memory is the touchstone by which we are able to test what should be avoided and discarded, and what is tried and proven to be worthwhile, or possibly enduring.

It is in the context of all the above that I find myself reflecting on part of the conversation between VOB broadcaster Larry Mayers, and two of his callers last Saturday morning. One of these callers told of a gully located in St. George that enabled residents to cross over to nearby districts in a fairly short time.

The gully is now overgrown and impassable. Drivers must travel some distance around in order to arrive in the said districts. This situation, I’m sure, could be repeated times over in Barbados.

This scenario, to my mind, is rich in symbolism: I see people in the past descending into the gully with its wild bush, and having to cut a path if they were going to get through to the other side.

This clearing could not be done by a single individual but by some for whom it was a self-designated task. A few others simply took along a sickle from time to time and cleared the path as they went about their business. No one claimed special rights to this path; it was travelled by all.

The path was narrow, making it easy to exchange greetings with a neighbour whom it was virtually impossible not to know. If someone lost their way in the gully, they would seek out this path. Having found it, they knew they would make their way through and out of the gully, then on to their destination.

I believe the allusions I’m attempting to draw from the above are too obvious for detailed analysis on my part.
Suffice it to say that I see the above as a microcosm of our present society where we have forgotten the old paths, the old landmarks of caring and sharing that brought communities together. We’re now taking the long way around, avoiding as much as we can the heartbeat of the community, so that we hardly recognise who and what we find when, or if, we do get there.

Another point of interest for me was the reference to a location known as Jacob’s Ladder. This name speaks, I believe, to the Christian faith practised by most Barbadians at the time, and the foundation on which many built their lives.

Interestingly enough, and if I’m not mistaken, individuals recalled Jacob’s Ladder being not far from the then Glendairy Prison. We who follow the Christian faith know that the Biblical Jacob is described from some of his actions as a deceiver and a swindler.

I leave it to the reader’s imagination to make whatever associations he or she may wish to make in light of location and proximity as mentioned above. But Jacob’s life does turn out to be evidence of God’s mercy and forgiveness; an example of the divine intersection between sin and grace.

Perhaps we too may consider the need to become a kinder society, not given to judging too harshly; avoiding the practice of “pulling down” one another as some of us do, whether via social media or by other means.

I note also that both the gully and the ladder” required the pedestrian to descend before ascending. This may be a lesson reminding us of the need for humility if we aspire to rise to true greatness.

On a somewhat lighter note, I believe we should be grateful to our Creator for the gift of humour. These days, if yuh dohn laugh yuh would certainly cry. Dread times fuh true !!! Listeners to the Saturday morning radio show can be sure there’ll be something to smile about.

Who can help but be amused at a name like Centipede Alley, an area so named apparently because of the contentious behaviour of its residents? One also hears stories of shop-keepers and other aspiring businessmen whose enterprises never thrived because they chose to deposit whatever profits they might have made on a particular kind of bank, the name of which I’m not at liberty to mention here.

These are just two examples among several that |inspire humour. Romanticising the past? Arguably, there are some individuals who do. But I doubt, in fairness to the majority of callers, that they have any desire to return to the past they are describing.

What I think callers are really celebrating are the positive values of a particular time that more of us believed in and more of us practised. Is this a case of selective memory? So what if it is? The psyche finds ways to protect itself, and does what it must in order to survive, especially in times of distress and chaos such as we’re now living. We need some kind of respite, some form of relaxation. And we need, oh how we need to laugh!

In any case, the stories we hear do not deny the realities of hard labour, scarcity, need and even a degree of ignorance that existed in times past. What is revealed, and supremely so, are examples of the creativity, resourcefulness, resilience and endurance of a people, not to mention their sense of humour that helped to take the edge off hardship.

May the walk through our folk archives on Saturday mornings continue! Let us hear, from our own authentic Bajan voices, the names of places some of us had never heard before, as well as the history behind those names, for example, Hangman’s Hill and Amen Alley.

Let us reflect on some of the cultural practices we have forgotten and maybe gain some wisdom from them.
Re-acquaint us with the colourful Bajan sayings, such as, “De grazing good, but ’e tie too short,” one of my favourites.

Let us forget, at least for a few hours, that the COVID dashboard hangs at our backs, and before the day is over, we’ll have to turn and face the numbers again, and so on… and so on… Esther Phillips is poet laureate of Barbados and Editor of BIM: Arts for the 21st Century.