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Two songs for my wife on our anniversary today

Feb 08, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

Today marks 43 years I have been married to my soul-mate, Janet. When I look back on the memories I think of how unpredictable life is. I met my future wife in 1978, at the height of the anti-dictatorship struggle.
I was deeply involved in the politics of the WPA at the time so my wife would have been introduced to several WPA persons. Two of them were her favourites – Brian Rodway and Nigel Westmaas. She also liked Bonita Bone-Harris who visited us at our student flat at the University of Toronto. She knew Tacuma Ogunseye well because of the frequent times she saw me with him.
Life is a journey in which you take different steps in all kinds of directions. Brian is dead. I am not on speaking terms with Bonita and Nigel. How have I changed since I fell in love with Janet? How has my country changed since I got married on this day 43 years ago? When I met Janet, times were turbulent. People were resigned to the permanence of Burnham’s dictatorship.
From the time I befriended Janet, my life was intricately entangled with politics. From UG as a student to the trenches with the WPA, Janet bore up with the craziness of my life and the craziness of Guyana. It has been like that for 43 years. They say opposites attract.
She was into science. I was into philosophy books and history. She was not in the least interested in politics. I was made for politics. We hardly had anything in common. But the same taste in music, poetry and literature and films drew us closer.
It is funny how music can actually cement a relationship. Her definite preference in English music was Neil Diamond. In Indian music, she put Mohamed Rafi on top while I liked the nasal sound of Kishore Kumar. I liked Neil Diamond but he was not on top of my list. I went for Johnny Mathis who she put third on her list after Karen Carpenter. While we were courting, the two songs below we enjoyed immensely and I thought back then and still think today that those two tunes deepened our relationship. Music can do that you know.

Neil Diamond – The Last Picasso
Ah
The last Picasso
The last Picasso
Was just acquired by some old museum
And, Don Quixote
Well, Don Quixote
The old man’s rhyme has lost its reason
Which only reminds me
Have I remembered to say
That without you this life of plenty
Would seem so empty
Ah, The last Picasso
Oh, me and you
Me oh me, oh me, oh me, oh me and you
We, we can sigh
Me, oh me, oh me, oh me we can sigh
Hey
Ah,
The last Picasso
The last Picasso
May gather dust amid the ruins
And Don Quixote
Well, Don Quixote may no longer
Make his wishful tunes
But I still have you
And I will have you
When everything else is done and gone with
We’ll be like one with, the last Picasso

Johnny Mathis – You and me against the World

You and me against the world
Sometimes it seems like you and me against the world;
When all the others turn their back and walk away
I can count on you to stay

Remember when the circus came to town
And you were frightened by the clown;
Wasn’t it nice to be around someone that you knew
Someone who was big and strong and looking out for you;

And me against the world
Sometimes it seems like you and me against the world;
And for all the times we’ve cried
I’ve always felt the odds were on our side!

And when one of us is gone
And one is left alone to carry on
Well then, remembering will have to do
Our memories alone will get us through;
Think about the days of me and you
You and me against the world!

Life can be a circus
They under-pay and overwork us!
And though we seldom get our due
When each day is through
I bring my tired body home and look around for you;

And me against the world
Sometimes it seems like you and me against the world;
And for all the times we’ve cried
I’ve always felt the odds were on our side!

And when one of us is gone
And one is left alone to carry on
Well then, remembering will have to do
Our memories alone will get us through;
Think about the days of me and you
You and me against the world!

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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