The Cays.
Dear ideal reader,
How are you? Perhaps you may be wondering if I wonder how you are doing? I do. Perhaps I seem to be way wrapped up in whatever this is to show any sort of concern for your wellness. Of course I care. I’m just really busy writing. And talking about things. Capturing deep confessionals every day. Told by characters who have been searching for a way to get their voices heard. Big screams. Big love. Big healing. Lots of scrubbing. So while this is going on, I wish to know how you are doing. Let me know in the comments. Or you can drop me an email. There’s always a way.
Anyway, let’s talk about what happened to me this morning. Woke up around 7:30, got a notification on my phone that there was a 6.72 Richter earthquake that popped on the northern coast of Haiti. I have an earthquake app installed, because you need one when you live in Mexico City. Need to have an emergency kit with all things important in it, in case you had to bail in a minute, doesn’t matter if it’s at 3am in the morning, as the earthquakes wait for no one. And I know this, because it happened to me in 2013 when my daughter was 8 months old, and I carried her out in my slippers and vowed never to be unprepared again, and I watched the power lines above gain and lose tension, as if we were all being pushed by a wave on a very big boat.
Next one happened in 2017, and I was working in the states. My children were in Mexico City when the buildings started collapsing. I was told of this first by a coworker who told it to me with a smile. Such sickness in the world, to wish harm upon innocent people in order to experience someone else suffer—and so I called, and my children were okay. Completely fine. No issues at all. My mantras in the morning where I imagined being with my children must have had more potential than the smiling courier bringing messages of certain death. I offer light and let it go. But people don’t forget earthquakes when they happen, if you are in the middle of one.
So I thought about all of that, and how there was damage to buildings not only in Haiti but in the Dominican Republic as well, and the prayers went out, and the Mozart went on my headphones and I started writing.
Starting with what I saw on the map — located a place called Les Cayes, which is The Cays, and I read about how The Cays is the number one supplier of vetiver and from there I learned about this incredible plant. And then I really went into writing for the day with all of these synchronicities. And the following pages are what came out of it. Hope you enjoy.
And now it’s chill time. For the rest of the day is all mine.
-W.V.Carleton
