Melville Cooke
AH! THE carols have long begun trilling from the radio, the air is a bit crisper, there are hints of pixie lists at offices, ham orders are being taken and plans to spend the year-end bonus are being made.
But the surest sign that another Christmas is upon us is that Singer has put out its glossy red-dominated catalogue. Very soon we will be seeing the highlight of the season on television, greetings from farin, where assorted persons peer into the camera, all bundled up against the cold in a heated room, and say in their best 'accident' (the British ones are the best):
'Greetings to me Mum in Crass Keys, Clarendan, me Grandmum in Flowa Ill an' Adassa an' Bredda Sharty. It as been wicked cold since hi gat up ere in October, but hi ham hadjusting.' (Then the whole crew comes in with 'ave a Merry Christmas hand ha prosperous New Ear').
It is also supposed to be the birth time of Jesus, but what does that have to do with late December? It is Christmas, for Christ's sake. Buy, buy, buy, eat, eat, eat, eat, dance, dance, dance. And in January starve and start to pay off the hire purchase bills.
CHEERFUL SONG
One of the most cheerful songs of the season is Tis The Season to Be Jolly, which starts out joyously enough. But it really starts to hit stride like Usain Bolt coming off that turn in the 200m at the last Olympics somewhere around where it says "don we now our gay apparel, tra-la-la-la-la-la la-la-la-la".
Haul and pull and hold a hamstring! Gay apparel? When the song was written, gay certainly meant happy, but now the donning of gay apparel sounds like tailored pants without back pockets for the men and men's pants and boots for the women (OK, some will take issue with me on the latter).
The change of gay from one 'h' to another, from 'happy' to 'homosexual' is not a GLADD situation for many. In fact, it is an Outrage! and calls for a J-FLAG to be raised by the umpire of language.
Still, in this gay supersensitive (I guess) country, many people still sing the song happily in the spending season. Just like how Dennis Brown's Should I, continues to be a big hit from the turntables at sessions, the massive sounding like a chorale on the lines "how could I ever go on, living this way, acting like a child so young and gay".
Aha! I knew y'all never thought about that.
THE GAYLADS
Then there is the singing group once named The Gaylads, which had to change their performance name as the homosexuals appropriated the first syllable of their stage handle all for themselves. Nowadays they sing harmony with Bunny Wailer, but their name is (drum roll please) Psalms.
If Marvin Gaye had been coming up with Tammi Terrell now, I really doubt if we would be familiar with What's Going On?, Let's Get It On and Sexual Healing. And the 'nointment' product called Bengue (pronounced Bengay) could just be taken to be the subject of a Michael Jackson song.
'Tis a pity, though, because I really like the word 'gay'. It is snappy, short, succinct, rolls easily off the tongue and sounds like its mood. Alas, I can no longer say without casting aspersions (or, as they would probably say in those greetings from farin, dispersions) on myself that being around my children when they are not being cranky makes me feel so gay.
Still, as one door closes another opens and the English language does afford me a certain latitude in describing an eccentric, a nutty person without causing offence. You see 'batty', as defined in the dictionary, allows for this.
I don't believe in Christmas, Santa Claus or Jesus as he is commonly bandied about, but for those who do, don thee thy gay apparel, go about thy business gaily and have a gay time at your parties come late next month.
Melville Cooke is a freelance writer.
