It’s a normal morning. It is raining in NY. My alarm, crickets sing, I hit snooze. It is grey. I snuggle with my pillow under my covers, my little cave. I wonder at how much more precious my time in bed seems to me when I have so little of it left to savor. I am sure the covers never felt so nice in the weekend when I can linger at my leisure. The morning blur of electric toothbrush, makeup, lotion, shower, getting dressed finding my bag, my keys, running to catch the train, and finally finding my way to my desk.
My mother calls from St. Barth, there is a bulldozers tearing up the acacia native trees on my island. Trees that have taken an eternity to grow in those desert conditions and battered by sea salt and wind in the valley of Grand Fond. Trees that we have made of point of keeping to preserve the islands identity and to help the wild life that depends on its thorny branches to hide nests in. My mother tells me she stood in front of the shovel forbidding it to advance and she threw stones at it. The family gathers around the workers to protest the thoughtless onslaught on the property that lays beside my grandmothers house.
Ligne de St.Barth, the ruthless and soulless owner of a company who makes lotions of what he claims are natural ingredients on the island, has decided to build another factory, storage or building. My uncle follows him and berates him for taking land from people who trusted him while leaving them with nothing. My aunt calls the lawyers to see if they can put a legal halt to his desecration. My grandmother, I imagine must be sitting somewhere trying to make sense of the commotion.
I am so far from my little island. One of the few places left on earth that still feels a little natural. My home. The land my ancestors refused to sell even as they had no money to eat so that they could one day pass it to the next generation. It is brutal to see how this same land is being taken over so thoughtlessly by foreigners who throw money around and who fail to respect the nature, but even more malevolent is to witness the gold diggers who drill at the islands surface, carving her rocks to spit what they hope will bring more money in their pockets.
I once heard a horrible story about an island called Nauru, that lost her soul. I wish I could stand on the tallest hill of my island and tell her story. Tell them to remember Nauru.
*Nauru is an island that was once nicknamed Pleasant Island for her natural beauty but has since has suffered her entire interior land to have been carved for the mining of phosphorus. Where the island was once a tropical jungle full of birds, crickets and animals, it is now a white pit leaving the inhabitants to ponder their actions on the edges of the island. They now worry that rising sea levels due to global warning will erradicate what slim outline of land they have left.
I was in the bathtub with a red candle flickering by my foot somewhere in the mist. The phone ringing somewhere behind the door. It's my mother. The bull dowzers have returned to my grandmothers property, they have knocked down a stone wall and are now shoveling so close to her little house it has become a health hazard. The family have once again called the lawyers who had initally instructed the family to stand down and not block the bulldowzers, so that they could prove the apposing party at fault , however, now, seeing how how much they have shoveled the lawyers apparently believe we have enough proof and have encouraged my family to take their own bulldowzer to block the entrance. It seems most of the bulldowzers on the island are reserved for construction or there owners are on vacation. My family plans to use their cars until a bulldowzer attained.
