Stealing From the Blind

On the hill where I grew up, there was always something going on. With five girls and four boys, there were times when we can annoy each other or get into some trouble of one kind or the other. There were fruit trees of all kinds around the house such as mango, coconut, custard apple, papaya,  guava, and cashew. Away from the house on other properties, we will get other fruits such as breadnut(chataigne), passion fruit, soursop, red and yellow cherries, pomerac, plums, sapodilla, and a host of other fruits that we consume all year round.

Now the breadnut is an oblong shape, green fruit with white nuts inside covered by brown shells, surrounded by white pulp. The shells are only brown when the breadnut is ripe. The white nuts or seeds are boiled in salted water for quite some time and it is very delicious when eaten.

One day, two of my sisters got this breadnut fruit and after cleaning it decided to cook the breadnut on an open fire. They placed the breadnut in a large can with a lid on the fire and left it for a while.

It was not long after that the youngest of my brothers came along.  Not knowing what was in the can on the open fire, he was curious to see what was inside. I told him he should not open it but he was determined to have his way. Upon opening the can, instead of moving away from the steam that arose out of the can, his face was directly over it and the hot steam hit him full in the face. He screamed. Our mother was in the house at the time and ran out to see what was wrong. My brother was crying and saying that he could not see. The sudden hot steam in his eyes affected him and as a result, he was blinded for three days.

During the period of my brother's blindness, the two of us always played together. We were close in age (he is two years older than me). At lunchtime, our mother will allow us to be at the table and will let him know where the food is on his plate. We will eat together and I will encourage him, all the while chatting about different things because the older siblings were not around at that time.

On the second day, our mother made a dish that was a favorite of mine, dumplings with codfish. As I said in an earlier article, my mother was an excellent cook, and the way she will prepare those meals will encourage us to ask for more. The food was so good. Seeing that my brother was blind, I decided to take one of his dumplings. Imagine that, instead of assisting him in eating, I decided to steal from him. When I was reaching for one of his dumplings, instead of looking at the plate, my focus was on his face. In so doing my hand touched his and he called out to our mother, telling her that I was taking his food. I could not believe that I made such a silly mistake. That was like "taking candy from a baby", but in this case the "baby" caught me. Mother scolded me for doing such an awful thing as stealing from my blind brother.

The following day my brother said he could see something, and it was not long after, that his sight was fully recovered. I realize in our lifetime we experience different situations and it all depends on how we deal with them. My mother was not worried because as the adult in the home, she knew that that blindness would not last long. We, as children, thought differently, believing that my brother's blindness would last forever. We do not know what the future holds, and there are times that we assume the worse in certain situations. On the other hand, if we look at things positively we will be surprised at the outcome because life is like that.