“…Bitter/Sweet…”

Rough Cut
By Felix F. Bethel
The Bahama Journal
Nassau, Bahamas


Bitter, sweet or bitter/sweet, this life that is mine is wonderful.
Today I revel in all that happened just the other day.

As it now seems, it was just the other day that I took to heart Terecita Armbrister’s admonition, "Felix Bethel, you better listen to me; you have to take the bitter with the sweet!"

In times of trouble Mother Mary comes to me singing words of wisdom, let it be.

That is what I have been doing.

So it is today that I wish to share some more memories of mine that are stored in those archives labeled ‘Just the Other Day’.

Indeed, everything that has ever happened in my life happens to have happened just the other day. And so it is today that I remind you that just the other day some one murdered Deron ‘Sharky’ Bethel.

Deron "Sharky" Bethel was born just the other day and was murdered just the other day. And it was just the other day, when I tried to bring attention to the stinking fact that the blood-stench was offensive in the nostrils of God Almighty.

As important in this just-the-other-day story is the fact that just the other day Sharky baby born. He is well on the way to manhood.

So it was too that just the other day, a baby boy was born to a young shakira –woman. This woman was persuaded to name her baby boy Deron, Dwayne, Rodney, Felix Bethel.

Dwayne Bethel –his dead father’s brother- is today being called Uncle-Daddy.
I can also report that neighbors, family and friends in the Pines have already freighted this boy with the nickname, Young Sharky.

They do so because this man-child is Sharky’s baby.

Just the other day, I spoke about how when this baby was born, there was a wonderful scream and shout, Sharky baby born!

And so there you have it, just the other day is all about death and just the other day is all about life. In this and for this, we say with the Psalmist David," Give thanks to the Lord, who is good, whose love endures forever." This is how it is in a world where everything happened just the other day. Indeed, one of my favorite ‘just the other day’ memories have to do with the birth and death of a senior brother of mine, Jesus Christ. That this brother of mine was born some two thousand years ago is perfectly beside the point. It was just the other day that this precious child leapt out of his Blessed Mother’s womb.

And it was just the other day when He was murdered.

And it was just the other day, some one who reads some of what I am trying to say through the medium of these feeble, crippled words is of the view that this brother is somehow and for some reason ‘mad’ with the world. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Were I to meet the anonymous one and were I put in a position to explain myself, I would tell the person who thinks that I am ‘mad’ with the world; that the truth is precisely otherwise.

I would tell that person that I consider myself one of the happiest persons in the world.

I would explain to that person that while I am sometimes enraged about some injustice or the other, at some distress or the other; truth is that I am so happy with life that I quite literally exult when I try to wrap my head around the fact that I have come uninvited out of an oblivion of days and that I am headed into an eternity of tomorrows.

And so as I live in this shimmering moment, I am learning that you have to reach out to other human beings if you are to get in touch with your own God-given personhood.

My mind is turned in this direction as I wait like other Christians for the ritual coming of that Child on whose shoulders would sit the government; that Child who was fated to become that man who was scheduled to be acquainted with grief; that king who was fated to come in the guise of a suffering servant; that senior brother of mine who was fated to be denied, betrayed, deserted –and thereafter murdered by the authorities of those times in which he lived.

The people are gearing up for their enjoyment of a unique celebration, the arrival of a king. But even as they make preparations to receive the Holy One, they do so in a bitter-sweet kind of way.

That is so because they know the ending of the story. They know that the arrival that is epitomized with worship-Him ends with crucify-Him.

They know the eternal significance of the gold, frankincense and myrrh. Just the other day, the raucous cry was ride on King Jesus!

This happened some two thousand years ago; that is to say, just the other day.

And now –two thousand years later- the word on the street is "Mama bake duh Johnny cake, Christmas comin’

Lord knows that soon –and very soon- the word on some lips will be to the effect that ‘another year done come and gone.’ And Lord knows, too, that some, who anticipate this end to things, will not be here.

These are the ones who will succeed –one way or the other- in finding the exit; and now, take note of the fact that, just the other day, I visited Deron ‘Sharky’ Bethel’s house in Pinewood Gardens and just the other day, I commiserated in mute sympathy with his mother, Diana Bethel, his grandmother, Geneva Bain and with other family members.

And just the other day, I cried with them as they wondered out loud as to why ‘Sharky’ was dead and why they had to sum up his life and why they had to dress his days in a feeble garb of words about a time for every thing under heaven.

And it was just the other day, when I went to Sharky’s funeral and when I was asked to say a few words {Mr. Bethel, keep it short, I was told. And it was just the other day when some of Sharky’s neighbors demanded that there be no cover-up and demanded that the men who were involved in serving up death would be brought to justice.

And so it is that just the other day, Deron ‘Sharky’ Bethel was killed.
But the fact of the matter is that just the other day, the sweet word in Pinewood Gardens was to the effect that Sharky’ baby born.

This birth of this other man-child we celebrate this bitter-sweet Christmas. We celebrate young Sharky’s arrival even as we remember that very precious Child, who was born of a virgin. We also remember Deron "Sharky" Bethel; and we lament the manner of his departure.

But even as we lament sudden and bloody departure, there is a praise-shout on our lips at the arrival of the man-child who bears his name and those of some other men who have made it their business to help shelter this precious child from the wiles of the Evil One.

Sharky’ baby is my God-child. That makes me his God-father.

Today it seems like it was just the other day I celebrated another bitter-sweet Christmas.

That was some twenty-one years ago when something precious that I once owned was lost; that same time when something infinitely precious was found.

I experienced then –and yet again- the exquisitely mingled bitter/sweet taste of the bitter and the sweet.

November 11th, 2010

The Bahama Journal

Bahamas Blog International