People I guess.

Sometime I wonder where the time went... I mean its like I came home from a party and barely made it up the stairs before the sun was in my bedroom, fell asleep and woke up years later. I went through a phase where I was fairly popular and there wasn't a pan knocking and I wasn't there, now... now I get "Bombaat Chella! Is when you fly in?" Through all that time I've made some new friends, lost some good ones, replaced some fake ones and I am now left with a small group of people that I know will see me through anything life can throw at me.

Its funny how some people you expect to be there forever somehow fade into oblivion when the sky gets dark and even funnier the ones you didn't expect to play any major role come and scrape you off the floor.

Alot of people grow up in a community and don't know their neighbours, my case is the complete opposite. We ALL ran up and down in the other ones house, ate dinner at the house who's menu sounded the best, all the mothers were willing to dress anyone's chipped knee and we never got in trouble alone. We were all a big family. Somewhere along the line the foundation of the friendships started to rot away and even though we'd all still go out together, everyone grew up and out and it never became apparent to me until I was involved in the nastiest break up I will ever be in. It was ugly and messy; he and I were so close for so long that I didn't know what life would have been like without him, I mean I couldn't picture not being able to call him to tell him how horrible a day I was having, the whole concept eluded me. I thought that if we ever did call it quits for good we could still be friends, silly, I know. I guess since he was one of "the brothers" they all decided to trun there back to the situation and didn't even realise I was not-so slowly slipping into a depression that ultimately contributed to me not even wanting to leave my room let alone my house. With everything though, my phone would bring and it would be my parrie from school and he was always up to chillin', we watched tv for hours and ate pizza and he never asked why I didn't go out anymore, but he was there. Brendan, you're a star! I don't even think he knew how depressed I was, or maybe he did and didn't bother to try to address it.
When I finally decided I spent too much time sad one of "the brothers" went rogue and decided to ask me what exactly happened why I changed so much. He asked and I told him and loved and respected him more for even asking even if it took him long, Deno you will always have a special place in my heart and my respect for you will always be a little more than the rest, simply because you cared.

" New broom sweep clean but ol' broom know di corna."

Ava and I met at a birthday weekend celebration in 1st form and even though we didn't even go to the same high school its like we were always together. Literally if I bucked my toe Ava would know because I would call her and tell her and she'd know where I was and what I was doing when I bucked my toe, if it was bleeding, everything. She trully is my sister I tell her everything and even though we aren't in the geographically close anymore all those miles still can't prevent me from telling her about that guy I met or how tired I am of adding numbers at work. My sister for live.

" There are sistrens and then there are sistrens"

P-K, and Sash if for nothing else they have provided ears to listen one for a little longer but both without judgement or ridicule.


I'm stronger for them and more rounded for the people I chose to keep around. I'm calmer and more focused, but most of all they taught me that people will always show you what role their willing to play in your life and find the lesson they were there to teach you.

Reporting the news... LOL

Ok so I have some good news, some bad news and some duh news.

The good news is two of my grandmother's tests came back with no signs of cancer in her abdomen or bones so its isolated. PRAISE THE LORD!

More good news I'm going to the beach today, just me and mommy. I hope she doesn't try to get too presonal, yes she is my mother and all but there are some things I rather not discuss with her. If I was comfortable enough to tell her everything why would I need friends?

Some bad news, I don't know how they did it but somehow my cousin in Atlanta fell in a step class and broke her foot in two places, and then my uncle ups her by falling off a chair breaking his nose and chin and chipping a tooth... all in the space of a week or so. I think someone took us to a "modda ooman." Salt eeh?

And the duh news, I love love love my ex-boyfriend, the more I "date" the more I come to the realisation of how much of a CATASTROPHIC mistake I made breaking up with him. I won't tell him because I think the relationship we have right is what he wants, really great friends. We tell eachother everything ( I probably shouldn't tell him about all these losers I've been seeing since we broke up... oops!) I miss him and I really wish the situation was different, maybe if he was here or I was there. I love him all the same, and cannot wait to see him when he comes down in August.

My Cherry Tree and Joycie

I have a cherry tree in my backyard, and we planted the tree out there so long ago I cant ever remember looking through my window and not seeing it. It was a gift from my godfather Uncle Jerry and I dont even know if he expected me to still have the tree. Well some time last year I realised that a parasite was growing in the tree, in the world of parasites I suppose this one was pretty bold it bloomed flowers and the leaves were noticeably different from those of the cherry tree. so one day after the whole tree looked to have been taken up with the parasite my father decided to go "clean the tree up". The one day project took 2 weekends and only left me with one branch on my precious chery tree. Now that I think about it I have to laugh... aah bwoy.
A couple weeks ago it began raining for days on and off but consistantly the tree would get some rain water. Then I realised that all these new branches started to push out from practically nowhere, and the one branch that was left originally left is so laden with cherries that it almost looks like the tree is toppling over.

I recently learned my grandmother has breast cancer, and a part of me is scared shitless to say the least. It was just last year January that I buried my grandfather and even though we weren't so close I took comfort in knowing I could reach him when I wanted to. My relationship with my grandmother is the opposite I see her atleast 3 times a week now that I'm working with my aunt, and before that you can bet we were eating dinner at her house for Christmas, Easter, Mother's Day, Her Birthday, Father's Day, and alot of the time we'd gather for no other reason than because we can.

Our family is so close its often hard to tell how distant a cousin is because no matter how far a 4th cousin you are, you were at those gatherings and it all seems to revolve around my grandmother. It's easy to tell that she is the anchor in the McKenzie/Barnett family.

She doesnt know it but she is my inspiration ( I suppose one day soon I'll tell her, definately before they start radiation treatment). Her sheer determination to make something of herself led to her going off to teacher's college (which I will be doing in August), writing so many Math books that sometimes I felt scared to fail Math throughout prep school and into the first parts of high school simply because I could find the answers in one of the books she wrote. Among other things she managed to raise her 6 children who all did well, helped raise her grandchildren and now is helping with her great grandchildren she did with and air of youth i suppose, because it was not until my cousin gave her her first great grandhild was I free to call her grandma because pre-greatgrand children grandma made her sound old, " Look child call me Aunty Joyce".

She doesn't even seem phased the strength of this woman. She goes to the doctors' offices and take the tests then goes rigth back to her school.

Somehow I know my grandmother and my cherry tree have the same spirit (if you will allow yourself to believe cherry trees have spirits). They'll take what they need to take off her, cut away the bad parts and then the rain will fall and she'll flourish and be so full of life she'll seem to tilt.

Thoughts provoked.

Young and naive,
thoughts reversed:
I suppose I should be careful now...
Now that I no longer believe in the fairy tales.
I should take extra care with things as delicate as these.
These broken things;
and though I hope there is still beauty in broken things,
I still pray my own delicate pieces dont fall apart,
or even worse allow this new light to shine through the cracked spaces.
thoughts wayward...
There is some patience, wisdom maybe ( I am hoping to discover in myself)
that will prove to help me rise above the "eggshell" footsteps I've been taking.
thoughts, hopeful?
There is a strength I will need to,
to possibly look pass the imperfections,
my inperfections,
even through my thoughts of perfect.
There is a slow strength, a kind of vision perhaps, to approach without hesitation (life)
To recover from being young and naive...
thoughts eternal.

"Though I speak wtih the tongues of men and of angels, If i have not charity I am become a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.

And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge; and though I have all faith so that I can remove mountains and have not charity I am nothing.

And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned and have not charity it profiteth me nothing

Charity suffereth long and is kind, charity envieth not charity vaunteth not itself , is not puffed up

Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, not easily provoked thinketh no evil

Rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth

Bareth all things believeth all things, hopeth all things endureth all things

Charity never faileth; but whether there be prophecies they shall fail; whether there are tongues they shall cease; whether there is knowledge it shall vanish away

For we know in part and we prophecy in part

But then that which is perfect is come then that which is in part shall be done away

When I was a child I spake as a child. I understood as a child, I thought as a child, but when I became a man I put away childish things

For now we se through a glass darkly, but face to face; now I know in part but then shall I know even as I am known

And now abideth faith, hope and charity these three but the greatest of these is charity"

I Corinthians 13 .



My favourite bible verse, if I were to get married I would want it read. I had to recite it often as a child and at the time I didn't realise that these words would guide me through life, thus far anyway. Charity has many definitions and among them is love. Its funny because even as I type I realise that if all this is true I have never known love. Not the love it describes anyway, a love that is non judgemental and unselfish. Maybe this love is only of God.

God is such a sensitive topic for me, I see his hand in my life but often wonder that it could possibly be that he has been preparing me for... all these lessons, and failures, for what?

Back to love...
I have been in something that resembles love before, my thoughts seemed incomplete perhaps if somehow they didn't concern him. I promise never to love like that again. And now I find myself slipping slowly, and with much fighting and screaming, into something new. Where I have to acknowledge flaws especially my own... the way I viewed people and the situations I thought I'd never get into and my way of passing judgement without even a hint of what was really going on. Ignorance, I guess. But in my something new I find myself trying (actively) to break habits I formed over time that totally did not work for me, habits that were ultimately the reason the something that resembled love really wasn't love at all...
But I want that love they speak about, the one that endureth all things. I'll whisper a prayer.

To Whom It May Concern.

I'll write this once and hopefully at the end I would have gotten it all out so that I will not feel the urge to think of you and how you're doing, or how intriguing our conversations were and how much I loved your laugh. I absolutely hate you in every sence of the word. You were a waste of my time and my emotions and I really wish I never fell in love with you, your conversations or your laugh. I feel like you always knew where you were leading me but I was so caught up with you that I didn't care as long as you took me, and that you did, you took of me until I was left with nothing of myself.

I hate seeing you and not so much because I cared for you so much but more because its uncomfortable for me.I hate being asked how you are. The mere mention of your name turns my stomach and I can literally feel my blood draw from my face, you leave me tired and listless. To think how much I gave up for you, how much I gave up for us. I'd really like nothing more than to never EVER have to see you again.

Congratulations though because as hard as I fought you broke me and it really was mostly my doing becuase I was never able to let go when I should, and somehow silly me, I thought I was meant to be with you and even though everything pointed in the opposite direction I held on untill my fingers bled. I am bitter and hurt and its all your fault and there is nothing that makes me happier than knowing the world is round and you too will meet your Waterloo.

I don't feel any better...

Daggerin' Postponed! But what about Dancehall?

I don't know how much you know about what's going on here in Jamaica and the Broadcasting Commission's mission to clean up the airwaves, but before I start let me give you a brief over view. There is a song done by Kartel and Spice called Rampin' shop where they go into great details describing some rather aggresive sex, some radio disc jockeys decided since its hot in the streets they were going to beep out the expletives and play it. Truth is there is no cleaning up that song, there is no way to make it radio friendly because even though they dropped the "curse words" out the song is pretty suggestive, so any 6 year old that is semi exposed to the colourful language of Jamaican patios can connect the dots.
Now this daggerin' phenomena is complicated, they use the word dagger in reference to sex (hence the whole Kartel and Spice song) daggerin is also a dance that strongly resembles rough sex, many artistes have done songs with mention of it, its pretty vulgar in my opinion not fit for general listening but completely acceptable in the dancehall even if you'd never find me "brukin out" like other people.
Now comes the Broadcating Commissions hand in the pot:
Anything with strong sexual content... BANNED!
Anything with reference to violence, guns, condoning murdering people, rape etc. ...BANNED!
Anything with any expletives... BANNED!
There will be no "dropping" the word from the song, no beeping the curse words out, no playing the rythym over the "bad" parts.
And this stands for all genres of music and television shows.
What does this leave us with? About a handful of Soca songs, Hip Hop songs about being in the club, drinking, and making money... and dancehall, it leaves dancehall with a decision to make.
Do we sing the songs twice with one version for the streets and one for the radio? Do we just abandon the streets and make everything mainstream? The reality of the situation is that you can take dancehall out of the streets but you can't take the streets out of dancehall, and if they want to hear themselves on the radio this is the opportunty of a lifetime, lets see how creative you can get. Its a time to see what else you know about other than girls and guns. I know many people see this as the Broadcasting Commission "boxing the bread" from the mouths of dancehall artiste, but with the way the music business is muddled with the introduction and continuous forward movement of technology having your songs on the radio doesn't equal success since people can download your songs. Meanwhile, many artistes get "discovered" on the internet with millions of fans and their names haven't even been mentioned on air.
So to dancehall I say jus' do you, the ball is completely in your court and only the fittest will survive the overhall. I'm excited to see what this brings and impatiently awaiting new consciousness. Music is a strong means of reaching the masses and what is said is greatly influencial, chose your words and topics wisely Mr. Dancehall.