Commentary
Paolo Kernahan
PAOLO KERNAHAN
WAS local Christmas music always this bad?
People complain about Mariah Carey’s style of music, but have they ever heard of Scrunter?
I mean, don’t get me wrong; the man is a legend – an institution. But so is St Ann’s.
The first real Christmas since Covid19 plunged the world into chaos and the isolation got me thinking about what the season means to me.
As it happens, much of our Christmas cultural identity hinges on music. Some studies conclude that the Christmas holidays lead shoppers to spend more. Perhaps it raises a latent festive atmosphere; it’s just waiting to burst out of us – kind of like the xenomorph in aliens.
To be honest, I didn’t mind Christmas music in my youth. However, as I steadily approach the end of life, my tolerance for the genre has weakened.
In the grocery aisle recently, a popular local Christmas standard started playing on the audio system. For the feelings it evoked, it might as well have been an oil fire in the food kitchens.
“Aye, ah, Mary! Aye, ah, Mary!” – the singer (Singing Francine) is clearly straining to hit the high notes. It’s not soca parang, but banshee parang. However, this song has been around since Jesus was a boy. It and other classics are dusted off every Yuletide season and mercilessly thrown back into circulation.
I am not, by any means, taking away our beloved artists.
Scrunter is our Bing Crosby. Is he honest? Well, he’s clever in an embarrassing kind of way. But if you’re sitting on a porch with long-lost friends and family and someone wears old Scrunts, you kind of know where the evening is going, even though you can barely remember it later.
Still, with this condition I have, loosely coined by specialists as “wretched old bastard” syndrome, Christmas has become a distraction.
It’s such a shame. This time of year used to be my favorite. Now it’s more like carnival for me. I lean over and wait for it to finish. For example, today there is nothing more “Christmassy” than Christmas traffic.
I went on an errand the other day in Chaguanas. Congestion at the Price Plaza roundabout is difficult under the best of circumstances. This time of year, it’s like a hopelessly clogged toilet. You sit there in stationary traffic burning expensive government gas listening to Scrunter’s throaty ode to pork on the radio.
Usually, I treat Christmas like an impending hurricane; I gather my supplies before landing. Everyone in my orbit is getting gifts from either Superpharm or Bhagwansingh’s. Don’t make fun of that flashlight! You will remember me fondly when T&TEC starts playing.
It’s okay to be so humble only if you live alone, enjoying your solitude.
Admittedly, it’s no fun for the others involved. The lady has needed me to put up the Christmas tree for years; it’s been a while I have the same tree you have (unless you’re rich) – the scabby one.
Once it’s mounted, I have to wipe off all this shed hair that gets into everything. Then in March when I’m taking it down, putting it back in the box is like trying to put toothpaste back in the tube. Did the tree grow extra limbs in my living room?
It’s not a bad trend you’re picking up on here (although there’s probably a solution to that). I’ve grown to appreciate a dramatically stripped-down version of the season — without the orgy of expense or consumption. No frantic flights to this store and grocery store in a manic effort to keep up appearances. My curtains are not to be admired, but to keep prying eyes.
Carols at King’s College Cambridge on the BBC. A single pastel, a humble wedge of black cake and an ole meandering mindless chat with friends who haven’t seen in an age.
Another precious Christmas to spend with my elderly mother as her hourglass sheds its last life and light.
I like to think of the whole thing as a fresh, minimalist way to celebrate the season.
Nothing is of greater value than the gift of my presence or my absence. Either way you can be sure to get what you want most.
