Negril is better than ever! I am here, and I am having a GOOD time!

[gerryg123]

Dont worry, I have some SICK photos -- just have not figured out how to post 'em properly, but I will get it done, I promise.

Banton's was hopping last nite, lots of locals coming and going. There is something I like about that place -- very rare to find any tourists -- and it's got a good vibe.

I bought a huge bottle of cherry juice, love that stuff. They don't sell it in L.A., or if they do, I have not seen it.

I think I have a life somewhere back home, but I just could not leave Jamaica this time. I had to stay. I don't know what it is that has pulled me in, but there was this little voice in my head telling me that if I left, I would regret it.

Sometimes, when I lay upon my raft with nothing but the crashing of waves or the gentle calling of birds as a soundtrack to my thoughts, I think about my Life: There have been some amazing twists and turns through the years. I think I've been denying for years some latent anger toward my father when his business failed in the first recession back in the 1970s/early 1980s, and we lost our house.

I think I blamed him, unfairly, all these years, and the whole thing kind of stunted my growth emotionally. For years, I looked for escapes -- mainly through Rock music, my biggest love, but also through darker pursuits like drinking and drugs and overeating (can't shake 'em all, guys).

I've been up and down -- lived in a big house in Hollywood Hills with a pimped-out white Mercedes in the garage, and within the same three-year span lived in a garage in a seedy part of town, trading in the last of my CDs and cassettes so I would have enough money to eat.

People always say how funny I am and what a great mood I'm always in -- and it's true -- but there are dark, dark temptations just underneath the surface. Negril gives me a chance to overdo it a bit in relative anonymity and without putting myself in too much risk or danger. There's an excitement about this place, a hedonistic vibe that pulls me as much as the great beaches and beautiful ocean and spell-binding sunsets and, of course, the Jerk chicken.

I've woke up each day without any plans, but god I've been so busy that I have not read a single page of the book I brought along (Jackie Collins, I know, I know, a guilty pleasure).

The days have blended together, it seems like yesterday that I arrived, and the one thing I know for sure is the best is yet to come ..... Like the great Joan of Arc said: "Fear not because you are doing what you were born to do."

THIS, my friends, is what I was born to do. My parents instilled a passion for traveling, and I love them for it. My dad is old, sick and dying. I've made amends a long time ago, but he is my thoughts constantly.