I BELIEVE that most of us have been touched in one way or another by the loss of someone for whom we cared. Death, it would seem, draws near to us like a thief in the night paralysing our sensibilities as we try desperately to cope with the loss and with the anguish that follows.
With what appears to be an unlimited plethora of social issues affecting our nation, when one of our citizens can decide to take their own lives, this, I aver, is a matter that requires our national reflection.
It begs for a conscious respite from our journal of national concerns as we put aside the issues relating to our economy, our water woes, and our rising unemployment for a few moments to join together as a nation in offering our sympathies to the affected families and to empathise with those who now grieve. It must have been as a consequence of extraordinary circumstances that Michael Sobers, who was known to have loved his children, known as a father who would sacrifice all he had for them, would choose to leave them in this way.
It was truly painful to see his children’s photo in the print media and to know that they must now face the world without the love and guidance of their father. It is therefore with great hope that I look forward to their uncles, godfathers and grandfathers taking the reins and doing their utmost to fill the void that is now left.
I would also like to appeal to all fathers and all Barbadian men, in as much as we may choose to mask our feelings and our troubles under a cloak of strength, to take note that what strengthens us the most is not our ability to cope but our ability to recognise that even a tower of strength can fall if its foundations are not flexible enough to manage an earthquake.
Taking time to commune with friends, taking time to ventilate and taking time to look at the alternatives can add flexibility to our foundations while affording us the opportunity to find some reprieve from our daily rigours of vanity and vexation.
– Sean St Clair Fields
