Sadness...

I haven’t been in T&T for very long, yet I have had the good fortune to meet some fantastic people here. As in all most places that I have lived or visited, there exists a group of people who are creative, enthusiastic, loving and joyful. It did not take long for me to become attached to some of these people here and on May 6th I learned that one of the very people that I had grown close to was badly hurt and in a coma.

I had last seen Gilles on May 4th and while we limed his wife Terry reminded me that I had promised to take her to Aripo on Saturday. That morning I realized that I didn’t have their phone number and so I stopped by the Tattoo Farm on my way out of town – it was ten after twelve and the shop normally opens at noon, but I decided that it would not be completely unusual for a tattoo parlour to open late on a saturday morning and made my way to Aripo alone.

Upon returning to Port of Spain I decided that I should stop by the shop to see Gilles and apologize to Terry for not hooking up for the trip to Aripo. I fought through a considerable number of traffic jams and considered giving up several times however I felt a certain amount of conviction in making my way to the shop.

When I finally arrived I entered the shop but did not see Terry or Gilles. I was greeted instead by Gus who seemed much less energetic than usual – I asked him how he was doing and he explained that Gilles had been in a bad motorcycle accident while returning home early Saturday morning. He had suffered significant head trauma and was in critical condition. At first I did not believe Gus and tried to think of some sort of reason why this might not be true, but left the shop sad and taken aback.

This is tragic for so many reasons – Gilles is a loving husband, father and friend, he and Terry were in the midst of moving to a new home and he is a central figure in the creation and fostering of a great community.

My thoughts are with Gilles and his family and my fingers are crossed that his resolve will pull him through this one – so many people are counting on it.