Over the past few months, each week I get at least one email from a reader saying that they've noticed that the general tone of my weekly rant has changed - 'angrier' was one word used to describe the tone - and they are querying whether or not I will one day return to writing 'funny stuff' (their words, not mine) like I used to in the past. They say they enjoyed reading those 'funny' pieces and suggest that I return to writing stuff that helps them escape from the world for just a little while.

In truth, I have noticed it too. In the last little while I have been drawn to rant about some things that have been bothering me for quite a while now - the current state of affairs in my beloved country. And it's not funny. What I see is not funny at all.

In 1982, singer/songwriter Bobby Caldwell penned these words for a song entitled Jamaica. "Oh Jamaica, hold me/put out your arms and hold me forever and ever/someone told me love grows here in Jamaica/ leaving you how could I ever."

That was 25 years ago and love only grows in very few quarters in Jamaica these days. What grew instead were poverty, despair, desperation, the drug trade, corruption, hatred, and murder. And it fills me with anger and remorse because there is an amazing five-year-old boy, a brilliant and precocious eight-year-old girl and a devil of a one-year-old boy all of whom I love dearly, but who may never be able to enjoy the country the way they should if things continue to spiral out of control.

When I think that one day, one of them could be hurt by some child at school who has been bred on hatred, envy and all the evil that parents tend to pass on to their children, it scares me to my very core. And when I think that when time comes for them to attend college, what will their tuition be like and what will be the quality of education they will be paying for, it makes me nervous, very nervous. And just where will they work when they're done? All these things weigh heavily on me every single day.

The thing is, I am not alone because I am absolutely certain that I am not the only person thinking along these lines and I am sure they feel the same way I do. The question is what are we doing about it? Some people are trying to do something, anything; their little bit but most of us aren't interested it seems. I am not sure they care. As long as they get theirs who gives a hoot about anything or anyone else.

All it takes is a little from all of us and eventually change would come.

There is so much more to say but I only get a fraction of a page in THE WEEKEND STAR each week so I have to wrap up for this week. So, to all those who take time out of their busy lives in Canada, Ghana, the United States, Australia, and in Jamaica, not only to read what I have to say, but to respond and express their concern, all I will say is that hopefully soon I will find a way back to that happy place that makes me put a smile on your faces each week. Bear with me.

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