“YOU SURE you want to go down that road?” I overheard this while passing two men arguing about weed, one with a cutlass and the other, a blower.
Apparently the blower was disturbing the cutter; and I was privy to the prelude of certain profanity. I decided to walk to my destination, since I’m tired of all the potholes punctuating every parish. Can anyone explain why in the world road tax is so high, since we now seemingly have “statutorily approved” potholes all over the place? They occupy set positions, growing bigger with the passage of time.
En route to my destination, I encountered a wall with, “Gasa not Gullie” (as in, Gaza not Gully). It both saddened and amazed me to think that the azz who’d so artfully scripted those words in paint actually thought he (or she) was the hottest thing since bad weed. Or, perhaps he smoked some bad weed? Are any of you lost in the good weed/bad weed debate?
The topic seems to have become so high on our national agenda that we see almost daily references. I saw an ad in NATION Classifieds: “Farming of Medical Marijuana…was recently approved by President Obama….Call me now at …”.
I wonder which officer made the call to the local listing. But, I digress. Back to potholes and not pot.
As much as walking would take the “f” and “a” out of my “lbs” (you do the appropriate insertions) it is simply inconvenient to try walking from, say, Andrew Corbin’s house in St Philip to my favourite place, Farley Hill. Imagine: you buy a brand new, sleek, smooth riding machine from Roger Moore on Ash Wednesday, then drive it onto River Road. You feel your liver come out as you make your way to St Patrick’s Church due to predominant potholes in transit. You suppress expletives – it being a sacred day and all – until you’re suddenly jolted, almost ending up Down Under, coming face to face with the imitation Bee Gees on their way here. Chassis bent, front tyre flat. In need of a high, so seeketh some spiritual enlightenment at the good place on the corner.
Somehow this topic of potholes keeps leading me back to the weed debate. See, many claim to be spiritually enlightened by puffing the herb. So, if some contend that their upliftment comes from a Church and others, from a plant; and other-others begin morning worship in a plant, praying with workmates, what is the final deduction?
So as not to sound like a bad brain teaser, I’d say this: alcohol was once banned, leading to “bootlegging”; eventually becoming legal (with some really cool jeans named after the illicit trade, too). Freedom of religion was once unheard of. Such freedom is now a constitutional right in democracies. So, what of weed? As Bob Marley said to the BBC, “Weed is a plant.”
By the way, all I meant to dig up in this column is my pothole plight …. Somebody fix the roads, nah?
Veoma Ali is an author, actor, broadcaster, advertising exec and most importantly, a karaoke lover.
