I’m one of the people who thinks like this.

But the wound is still open, and band-aids are not sufficient. And since I love to contradict myself, I’m going to talk about it some more. About the earthquake that has become part of our life. About the earthquake that has become part of the everyday routine. About what followed it as well.

But it’s been nine months, so we have to talk about new things, about the change. Or, if this much-talked-about change is non-existent, we have to say it clearly.

How do we know that time passes through life the way a river crosses a forest? Silently and gently? Because we can see people walking on the sidewalks.

There where four, three, two months ago, people didn’t dare walk, didn’t dare step, we are re-appropriating urban spaces. The pedestrians of the city, smiling, almost nonchalant, step on the concrete, with concrete above their heads and concrete in the air (courtesy of the dust). They walk under buildings made of concrete! What an enormous change for anyone who truly wants to see it!

I wanted to see it. And I saw it. Sometimes it’s so simple, to see time passing under our noses like a mosquito passing through netting. Whatever changes are to come, and they will be many, we have to count on time to breathe in our ears, like the wind in a cyclone, telling us about what people feel.

There’s a saying in Trinidad and Tobago that the only thing less faithful than a man is memory.

Even the memory of the earthquake, the one we want to be sure won’t fail us when we talk about it ten years from now. The memory is there, allowing us to get back to life as we left it. Under concrete, walking on concrete. We will still talk about the earthquake for a long time to come, but our vision of daily life will change its colour and its taste, just the way a mango changes in the sun.

Today, the water of the sea is hot; the waves of my anxieties are calm. We don’t worry about the weather when the water is turquoise and the sky so blue. We just tan. And if we don’t pay attention, we also burn. This is the law of nature: we always end up forgetting our first sunburn. Ah, memory ...

Jonathan

* Popular expression, very resonant, describing the earthquake. You have to say “goudougoudou” and wave your hands around at the same time – that makes it more realistic!