Laventille (Love Until) - Part III

Being ‘born and raised’, and still living, in these hills of Laventille means existing in a state of perpetual conflict, forever straddling that invisible line between love and hate. The older you were the more difficult it became, for every now and then you had to contend with the jumbies of what once was. Those mind tormenting ghosts that haunted those old enough to remember how things used to be.

A prisoner of habit, whenever these jumbies surfaced, Ma would go in the gallery and sit on that old iron rocking chair of hers. The one her deceased husband bought as an anniversary present long before I was born.  No longer white, areas of chipped paint exposed rusted fragments beneath. Ma’s chair stood out among its much younger wooden counterparts. It looked like its creator made thousands of small letter Xs and joined them together to form the seat and back rest. After all these years of sitting though, some of these Xs started to separate, so Ma had to put a cushion down before she sat. Usually, I would leave her to her thoughts, but this night I didn’t.  For a while, she sat in silence ignoring my presence. Then, as if we had always been conversing, she started.

“Yuh know long ago they used to call here Free Town?”

“Where Ma? Laventille? Why?”

“During slavery when de free coloureds from other countries come to Trinidad, dey found refuge in these hills; here and Belmont. So dey start to call it Free Town. Is ah good thing dey change de name, because dis town ain’t free no more…………. Chile, long time these hills used to be different. People used to have ah pride for de place. Nowadays is only violence. Ah sure if dey start quarrying up here again, yuh go see all de blue limestone dey used to mine turn red wit all dis blood shedding.”