Somebody could walk into this room
And say your life is on fire
It's all over the evening news
All about the fire in your life
On the evening news
I don't want no part of this crazy love
I don't want no part of your love
-Crazy Love II, Paul Simon
It's like Judas doing what he had to do. Everybody makes a bobolee out of Judas for his role in the death of the fellar they called Christ. Judas sell-out poor Jesus to go and die on the cross for all of our collective sins. In a way Judas was the good guy in the whole situation, initiating a course of action that, as brutal and disgusting as it might be, made it possible for all of us to be saved.
If saving is what you think you need. From Satan or yourself. Or the Satan that resides within that might burst through in an ill-timed cuss-out every now and then. My grandmother Ida always used to say she didn't want too many random people kissing her up too much.
And if you asked her why she would say because Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss. For his part in a pre-written script, poor Judas went into a terrible depression and ended up hanging himself. I have a certain level of sympathy for Judas. Although I understand the poetic and revolutionary beauty of a well crafted bobolee.
It's that chance for you to focus all your negative powerless energy on the bad guy. But what happens when we're all the bad guy? When the badness that is manifest in the actions of one is the badness manifest in all of us? And the one we are shocked and horrified by this week is Aunty Verna for her part in the institutionalisation of a woman that none of us knew about a couple days ago called Cheryl Miller.
But we are all Cheryl Miller in one way or the other. We are all over-worked frustrated public servants who think we deserve more. We are also all Aunty Verna making a decision that is just downright wrong, because we convince ourselves that it is the right thing to do.
Forgiveness is not something we have, especially for a woman who has herself been on the frontline of protecting vulnerable people from the madness of state-run institutions that are too large to see humans as real. But I wonder if people are more concerned that Cheryl Miller was put in St Ann's because there are other ways to deal with outbursts or because we have such an insane fear and embarrassment of the stigma of mental illness.
Because we have lots of children in schools who are victims of abuse that act out their frustrations in class and are labelled as troublemakers instead of being referred to a mental health professional. Mental health is another can of worms that nobody wants to open here, although we all joke that there are more mad people outside than in. But if all the mad people in Trinidad were to be sent to St Ann's, would there be enough room? Most definitely not.
People are outraged for the same reason that my grandmother was suspicious of kisses. Because there is always someone, a friend, a family member, someone in your office who is, for reasons unknown to you, reading your behaviour, rightly or wrongly and passing judgment and making decisions that could affect your future. And the terror that puts into our hearts is too much for us to bear.
I don't know Cheryl Miller. But I know what she represents. Cheryl Miller is every woman who doesn't have a personal assistant to help her through her period pains and her menopause and her absent-mindedness during pregnancy. Cheryl Miller is every woman who gets blasted vex for doing too much work. For being a multi-tasker and still functional.
Cheryl Miller has no one to defend her, no taxpayers' money to spend to bring her sister along to make sure she doesn't trip out at the wrong moment. Cheryl Miller is just an ordinary woman who is apparently not entitled to the same level of understanding that is reserved for us feminists and female holders of office.
I do know Verna St Rose Greaves. And what she represents to me is someone attempting to make a difference without all the necessary resources or the support. She has a strong sense of what is right. And that is both a blessing and a curse. And mixed in with the dangerously transformative nature of politics and hey presto you have Cheryl Miller in the mad house.
Both these women responded to a situation that was unacceptable. Both of them did something that the rest of us think is a kind of mad-people action. Hopefully they both recover from the trauma. Hopefully they can forgive each other and themselves for being Judas and bobolee and martyr.
