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So I kept my own counsel. I saw the world through the eyes of Enid
Blyton, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, Barbara Cartland, (traditional) Harlequin Romances, James Hadly Chase, Louis L'amour and other
popular books of that time. The first time I read a Harold Robins book, "Never Love a Stranger," I was shocked at the cruelty
and selfishness of men. Even though it was fiction I was struck by it but eventually became desensitized as I continued to
read other books of the kind. I also loved reading literature books. My favourite was Dickens, "Great Expectation". I also
loved "Wuthering Heights", "Jane Eyre", "Silas Marner", "Kidnapped", "The Old Man and The Sea", and others. Not surprisingly
my favourite subjects were English language and literature.
I started day dreaming of being a famous and powerful
woman. I was going to make an impact in the world. I would be talked about everywhere. I'm reminded of those two comical cartoon
characters on TV, "The Pinky and the Brain". One was a genius the other one insane. That is how I probably looked then, looking
back now.
I thought of studying journalism and photography which would give me the opportunity to travel the world.
Only God in heaven knows what, if any, dreams or ambitions my husband to be had. I once asked him what he wanted to be when
he finished high school; he said he wanted to be an auto mechanic. I never talked to him about my dreams. He never asked.
He once said to me that dreams don't come true.
One morning I cut school and took off with Saul to the sea wall. The
Coastal Plain of Guyana is six feet below sea-level and the Dutch, who first settled the former British Guiana, built great
dikes and concrete walls to drain, irrigate and prevent the water from flooding the flat lands where most of the country's
populous now live. To this day the walls, the Old Wall and the New Wall, stand there like steadfast concrete soldiers to ward
off the sea and prevent flooding. There are numerous villages and towns still bearing Dutch names. Names like New Amsterdam,
Vreed-en-hoop, Uitvlugt, even Annandale where I was now living was named after the daughter of a Dutch settler.
The
Sea Walls are also like a promenade for everyone. Whether you're the artist, the runner, the lover looking for a quite spot
to rendezvous or if you just want to sit on the wall and look out at the Atlantic Ocean. At the waves coming in and listen
to the roar as they crash against the wall and smell the salt air.
This morning two young lovers decided to take a
walk out on to the Old Sea Wall. It was such a beautiful day. I can still remember it vividly. It was a special day for it
was the day I asked Saul to promise me that he would change. There was a steady gentle breeze blowing in from the ocean and
the rippling waves glistened in the morning sunlight, not a cloud in the sky. I etched the scene in my mind. This was my first
time out there on that particular wall and at that time of day and it was beautiful.
It wasn't long after that, that
Mr. Saul brought up the subject of sex. I was against it. He made the usual excuse about not being able to control his
libido and I reluctantly gave in. Mistake numero uno. Shortly after we became intimate, he paid me a visit at school and told
me he was taking a trip into the jungle, Dora Mission to be exact. (I couldn't tell my family about Saul because they would
have hauled me out of school and sent me packing, back home to my parents away from him, or they would have forced us
to marry).
Dora Mission is an Amerindian reservation and Saul had relatives living there, his father was part
Amerindian. I didn't want to be apart from him and was naturally disappointed. It sounded in my voice. He got angry but agreed
to write me when I asked him to. Mistake numero dos.
I got my much-desired letter alright. He sent it with his best
friend, and it said that he, "...hope it isn't too late but I have been thinking for sometime now that you should
find someone else. You need someone who could love you the way you want to be loved and spend all the time with you."
That he didn't want me to wait for him and that after the way I spoke to him he didn't know if I wanted to wait. I was too
naïve to see the web starting to form. Head-games was unheard of. I didn't know that people do this to people they claim to
love.
By the time I finished reading the letter I was trembling. (Yes, dreams get shattered when man tries to manipulate
his own life and the lives of others, instead of walking in obedience to the laws of God). This was the beginning of the end
of my peace. I wrote him back and asked him, "Why didn't you tell me this before? Why did you wait until now to tell me? I
gave you everything I had. Everything I could offer a man and now you're saying you hope it isn't too late? Life isn't worth
living without love, without you. I don't want to find someone else but if that is what you want then I'll do it." I sent
the letter to him via his best friend.
He sent me another letter. He was apparently scared that I would kill myself
because I had said life wasn't worth living without him but that thought never entered my heart. He came out of Dora Mission
and came to school to see me. When I saw him, I refused to acknowledge him. The next day I saw him and his friends walking
on a sideline dam going towards the main road. I had heard rumors of him and another girl and I knew instantly that they were
going to her house because one of the friends with him was dating the girl's sister. I walked on my way without even looking
at them.
He wrote me another letter: "Hello Margaret, Just these few lines to you cause I don't know what really
to say. I didn't reply you earlier cause I had thought of meeting you in Person (capitalization and grammar, his) and talk
things over with you when I had gone home for easter but It happen so funny that I saw you the day after I went out and you
walk your way on and I know you saw me and the only thing I could do was laugh but deep down in me was something different.
I tried a few times after to get in contact with you after but unsuccessful, I even search the sea wall Easter afternoon but
you wasn't there.
Margaret there is something I did wrong and that is to write you I should have met you
and discuss everything with you anyway the only thing I could say concerning what you wrote is that you must do anything that
you think best. Cause when I wasn't working everybody was naggin' at me to do something even you and now that I'm working
I have to devote my self to what ever I'm doing and I'll be hardly seeing you cause I can't come by you, but you can make
it by me (my home). I'll be coming home on the 3rd May for just one or two days. I don't know what really more to say I'm
feeling so nervous. So long," and he wote his initials.
He enclosed a tract along with the letter, titled, "What
comes next?" This was the first time I would receive a Christian tract and it came from him. The tract spoke about what comes
next, after death. It spoke of God's righteous judgment of the Godly and the ungodly and about the hope of Salvation. With
a final exhortation to: "Act now on what God says: For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that
whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life...He who does not believe has been judged already, because
he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. He who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the
wrath of God abides on him (John 3:16, 18, 16 NASB)."
A few weeks later, he sent a kid with a message to me at
school, saying he wanted to talk to me because he was leaving the country. I bought the story. I met with him. His destination
he said was St. Lucia. He took me home and I met his mother. When he introduced me to his mother he introduced me as his intended.
He got me back into the sack with him, and for the first and last time during our courtship I wept in front of him and later
apologize to him for crying. He told me if I wanted to wait for him I could. Then he said that if I ever went away, "even
to Australia," he would follow me. Ha! Ha! He never went to St. Lucia. That was a ruse. He went back to Dora Mission instead.
After he left and I had time to think clearly, I decided that I would go ahead and find someone else. I wrote him
and told him that I hadn't changed my mind about finding someone else and he replied angrily: "What's all this about that
you've sent me here. Why didn't you put forward these things to me when I was with you, you was waiting for the last moment,
didn't you? (Grammar his). Well hon I don't blame you the woman's blood is within you and I very much appreciate it
that way. You are a woman and you must behave like one but there are certain times when you --- sorry honey I've miswritten
I didn't really mean to mention such things anyway I am not against anything that you do or you are." Well I was confused
because I didn't know what it was I had done wrong. Talk about bad communication!
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