Still down in the south of the island with Khem's family. We're leaving for the north "sometime this morning" which means between 11AM and 1PM.

This house we're staying in belonged to his grandmother, who raised 10 children inside it by herself. It was much smaller back then. Two rooms. Over the years his aunts and uncles scrappily added to it, gave it stone walls (mostly) and stone flooring (barely), put in electricity and plumbing and all the fancy stuff. Now the house is under an unofficial collective ownership of all the siblings, though the majority don't live on island.

Despite the fact that another uncle in his 60's lives here full time too, and his mother, K pays all the bills for this house. His room is big enough to fit a desk, a chair, and a full-size bed. This cramped, dark room is where he's worked for the last decade to save up to buy the land in L---.


Yesterday K's mother and uncle Tino went down to their half-brother's farm in LaPwet because a young pig was being slaughtered. While they were gone I rolled a spliff and focused on getting to my word count. MJ is the only thing that helps me focus. I remember trying ritalin and adderall, when I lived in the states. Magical, scary.
While they worked wonders I didn't have the insurance/willpower to get a prescription for either. It's impossible for me to get those here. Psychiatrists on island don't believe in ADHD and they certainly don't believe a woman could have it. It's probably for the best I don't take addictive pharma drugs anyway so why complain.
A Native girl I knew once told me (quoting her herbalist mom) "the difference between medicine and poison is dosage". The herb is not "recreational" for me, but a true medicine. One spliff a day, sometimes half, that's it. With lots of tolerance breaks.

Anyway while I worked Khem did some DIY on his Mazda truck, screwing a piece of wood under the bed door handle and duct taping the ripped foam on the steering wheel so it fit under the cover. The truck needs a lot of work but it drives and clears the potholes. Starting to see why people hype up Manual so much. Down South, where the roads are wide and open, no traffic, it's a dream.
K's mom came back from Lapwet with lots of pork which she got to stewing immediately. Lucians know two ways to cook pork (and every other meat):
- Stewed
- Roasted

While she cooked I kept working in the living room. Then suddenly-- BANG! "AHHHH!"
I rushed into the kitchen. She was fine, but staring in shock at the shattered glass lid of the pot.
Most of the glass stayed intact. I helped her get the lid outside and sweep up the shards. Luckily it was the pot with the sweet potato, plantain and dasheen. AKA intact tuber foods easily siftable, instead of soup. Yikes. Not much glass got into the pot so it was deemed safe. But I did look carefully when I picked out my portion.
After we cleaned it up she immediately called her brother Tino off the island superstition about glass breaking, or something. Tino was fine, but it still had us wary all afternoon.
When I went down to the road, Khem was still working on the truck. I told him what happened with the pot cover and he told me once they bought a stove from S&S (think island Walmart, but 200x cheaper and worse) and while baking some bread the glass door exploded all over the kitchen.
I finished the rest of my spliff while K fiddled with the door handle some more. He doesn't smoke at all, or drink. An old light brown stray dog, ribs sticking out, came to watch. It had a long, slender face like K, and specifically like his father. I thought what if the breaking pot was about K's dad, but I didn't mention it.

We both went up and his mom (who does have a name, I promise) was done cooking. I ate, did the dishes, worked some more, then K came inside and ate, and I can't remember how we passed the rest of the afternoon but Tino came back with Black Pudding which was a treat, and there was even more pork to go around.
Later that night me and K watched that movie with FKA twigs. I give it a 5/10, he gave it a 6.
We were very tired, and I slept right after we finished the movie. For some reason I've been sleeping like a baby here.

My diet was f'ed up yesterday. I want to put on some more weight but eating pounds of fatty pork and sugar and salty SALTY food is no good.
Today we're going up North like I said, which means staying with my side of the family.

More later - J