1983 DAY 6 – PARTING IS SUCH SWEET SORROW & MY LITTLE COTTAGE IN NEGRIL.
The pre-dawn hours were our time together. We did most of our planning and had discussions of about our individual experiences and made decisions on how we would proceed before each day begins. We both felt torn as we had fallen in love with Sea Lawn and didn’t want to leave but the lure of Negril and what might lie ahead pulled us in another direction. With great sadness, we decided to stay with Peter’s original suggestion and move on.
It wasn’t even light out yet when we could hear a couple of young girls calling softly to see if my wife was ready to come out. She cried softly and hugged me tight. I knew right then that she would stay here forever if she could. We might go but we could never leave. We began assembling our possessions and repacking our bags as we wanted to leave early to assure our arrival in Negril would give us some daylight to explore our surroundings. We were mentally getting ready for the long bus ride ahead.
We walked up to the verandah to find a small group of youth and a couple of adults waiting patiently for us. A few of the young girls were grabbing at my wife’s hand and pressing scraps of paper with names and addresses and tearfully imploring she would write them back after our return home. Mikey had written us a letter and asked me to read it only when we got home and then suddenly, he reached out to hug me. Perhaps it is only my experience and not that of others but, I have rarely had a Jamaican man (especially a man) or women spontaneously show affection like that and it touched me to the depths of my soul. Tony was there wearing my wife’s gift so I turned to him and said, “You look cool, mon!” which got a grin in return. He motioned me to one side and gave me his address and asked me to write but not to tell Mikey. I agreed as he shook my hand in friendship. I heard Mikey above the excited chatter saying a bus “Soon Come” so we grabbed our bags and made our way up the trail to a regular bus stop a few yards down the road.
To our surprise and delight, we had been followed from Mikey’s verandah by our new friends and actually picked up a few more in the process. Beverly, a shy young girl whom my wife had taken an additional interest in helping, showed up with a woven basket filled with fruits and some bulla, cheese and pear (my favorite) to take on our journey. My wife was really struggling hard to hold back on the tears as she hugged the shy girl and thanked her for the generosity. We all talked, laughed and even shed a tear or two until the bus finally arrived. We got on and moved to a seat near the rear on the side facing our friends. We shared waves and blown kisses until they faded out of view. It was pretty obvious from the smiles of the people on the bus that they had been affected too.
The road was long and the summertime temperature was hot but the beautiful scenery kept our thoughts cool. We changed buses in Ochi and again in Montego Bay before getting on a bus that took the old road to Negril. It was long, dusty, bumpy and rutted but finally we saw a sign for Negril. I had told the conductor on this new bus that we wanted to get off at Firefly. We had taken a seat near the front and noticed him pointing up ahead while trying to get our attention. The bus stopped and we were there.
We walked up to a small house which appeared to also be the office for Firefly. A young couple with a small child greeted us and I handed Peter’s letter to them and waited for their response. The letter had worked at Mikeys and now we were apprehensive on whether it would work here. The lady read it and smiled. “Here, come” she said while leading us towards the beach. “There, on the side”, she pointed, “Are toilets and showers”. It was a small concrete block structure still being built that provided some privacy from the road up to ones neck. We continued walking.
Ahead was a small, wooden cabin barely wide enough to walk around the bunk beds that dominated the interior space. There was one, starkly bright white light bulb on the back wall and nothing else. Well, $15 a night for a place on a beautiful 7-mile beach seemed like a real bargain. We shed our packs and changed into suits and headed towards the beach. Except for a sprinkling of overturned fishing boats, the beach was virtually deserted and seemed undeveloped.
As we soaked our feet at water’s edge, I heard the sound of a small bike approaching up the beach. As it got closer, I saw a radical looking Rasta youth holding a long, green stem of “house” tobacco. He introduced himself and handed me the stem to smell and examine. I looked it over and when handing it back he said, “It’s yours, mon”. “Really?”. I was overcome at the gift when he continued, “For $10 US”. After my $2 Jamaican experience at Mikeys I just smiled, nodded “no” and returned it. Later another youth calling himself “Mushroom Kenny” came with a paper bag of large mushroom heads but I turned him down as well. Too much, too soon I reasoned so I decided to take my time before indulging if at all.
We finished our swim and returned for a shower and to get dressed to continue our explorations. We walked into the town and then continued out the West End road. We walked for a while but I can’t honestly say how far we went. I only know we finally stopped at a crafts area and my wife indulged herself in her favorite pastime; shopping! I just kind of looked around and talked to people while watching her shop. I could see how much “sharper” these people were compared to those around Mikeys when it came to doing business so I was more vigilant. She was an excellent shopper and we walked away with a towel and two small baskets where one fit inside the other. She wanted it for her sewing supplies. Just then I heard a low flying small plane overhead outfitted with loudspeakers on the underside.
“Repent you sinners!” “Jesus is coming!” “There is a revival meeting tonight at 7:00pm at (some place I never hear of)” “Don’t miss the opportunity to absolve your sins!” along with some other phrases repeated on each pass. We had never in our lives heard such a thing. We noticed that a lot of the people around us, especially the women, were saying things like “Thank you Jesus” as the assault seemed to accomplish its goal. As it was getting late afternoon, we headed back towards town.
When we reached the mouth of the Negril River, a couple of fishermen had just returned and were selling fish and lobster. The lobsters were small compared to the ones we see in California but she bought two for a total of $5 Jamaican. The fisherman wrapped them in a piece of paper and we headed back to Firefly. Upon our arrival, my wife knocked at the office door to see if she could borrow a pot of some kind to boil our purchase but the lady insisted she would cook them for us. The lady told us to go up to the wooden beach chairs and relax as there would be a nice sunset today and that she would call us when they were ready. How nice, we thought as we went up to the beach to relax. The sun was just starting to set when the couple who managed the property showed up with the cooked lobster, melted butter and a dish of okra and small Irish potatoes!
How romantic! The perfect end to a perfect day. We decided to turn in early.
September 30 seems sooo awfully far away.....but not NEARLY as far away as when I planned this trip in January!
