Circular No 792

Newsletter for alumni of The Abbey School, Mt. St. Benedict, Trinidad and Tobago, W.I.

Caracas, 7 January 2017 No. 792

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Dear Friends,

This is the first time that I have included this short essay in the Circular.

It leaves time for emails to arrive and to be included.

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The make-up girl

Wayne Brown
Sunday, August 19, 2001

A young man with no sisters, I confess I hadn't thought overmuch about the business of girls making-up themselves. But what I saw Sharon achieve with the modelling kid that squally morning -- that, to a young writer's symbolising imagination, was an education I have never forgotten.

When we'd met earlier, the modelling kid had been attractive enough, in that kiln-fired, Jamaican high brown way: nice skin, good figure, long back, long legs -- if not the swan's neck and pre-pubescent torso Twiggy was even then decreeing for models -- with a pretty, sensual, innocent face, and semi-curly, glossy black hair. At 17 or 18 she was really still a child, and new to the work as well, it turned out; and she gave off an ingenuous gaiety that had to do, not only with the prospect of the shoot, but also, it was impossible not to see, with the effect her effect on the cameraman was having on her. Sharon soon fell pensive, glancing at them; and I recalled that back on campus a couple months ago, she had reputedly endured some definitive heartbreak at the hands of the shady character in Econ.

There was a flurry of consultations, and the session began. While the camera crew descended on the beach to choose a spot and start setting up their paraphernalia, Sharon went to work on the kid; and by the time she was finished it seemed to me, glancing curiously at her handiwork, that what she had done was to sharpen the kid's features and highlight the planes of her face, imposing a sort of sculpted immobility upon the innocence and snubbed look of youth.

The ad's "hook" was simple (this, remember, was still the amateurish sixties): to associate the suntan lotion with the desirability of its user and with the legendary glamour of the Doctor's Cave Beach. The script called for the camera, starting in close-up on the supine girl's face, gradually, lingeringly to pull away, while heraldic music rose, until the whole girl was revealed, and then the beach -- the latter with its prostrate population of Caucasian North Americans: a major subliminal prod for the product. ("Subliminal" was a new and exciting word in those days).

And that was all; the other parts would be shot, or had already been shot, in the studio.

An innocent in the advertising field, I was startled when, immediately prior to being ceremoniously laid out on the beach mat, the child's body was anointed, not with the lotion being advertised, but with plain common-or-garden baby oil: a counterfeit which nonetheless had the desired effect of setting her tawny torso a-gleaming like a weapon. Then, though, there was some last minute fidgeting by the camera people because the light was changing, the sun was coming and going -- and next the aforementioned squall swept down on us.

The camera people ran with their equipment, the prop person ran with his props; and though Sharon and the model ran-walked for shelter with Sharon selflessly holding a towel over the girl's head, the latter ended up, back in the pavilion, distinctly bedraggled and close to petulant tears (the producer was cursing and threatening to abandon the shoot).

And then Sharon sent the modelling kid off to wash her face clean, and -- what the script hadn't called for -- to soak her hair and plaster it back along her head; and when she came back Sharon began to work on her again, with a curious intensity; without a word.

I've already told about that part: about the teeming pavilion, the passing squall, the chain-smoking producer and hovering cameraman, and about the great stillness of absorption that quickly developed between Sharon and the bikini'd kid with the towel around her shoulders, her face tilted back, eyes watchful and unmoving upon the stylist's face. That stillness drew my attention -- and not only mine: more and more passersby, sensing something special was happening, were pausing to watch -- and I saw that she, Sharon, had forgotten herself, and was putting her whole being into re-creating the kid's face; and I saw that she was doing something quite different, this time around, and that she was applying to those still unformed features what I can only describe as a kind of drenched and half-blind look.

And it was stunning, the difference!

The first time, the kid's face had wound up sharply-etched, iconographic; now it reflected, instead, a rubbed-smooth psyche elemental as marble. Then it had been almost aquiline, recalling if anything ancient Egypt, desert sands. Now it mirrored an amphibian sensuality and slow passion. It was as though, at the first session, Sharon had thought to marry the kid to the sandy beach itself, and now (in what impulse of sudden self-abandonment herself?) had decided to let her stand, instead, for the susurrus of life without loneliness or pain: for carnal genius of the sea.

Next, I thought that Sharon (staring as appraisingly at the model's face as a painter at a canvas, her own cheeks drawn from concentrating, brush hand poised) was enduring inwardly herself a kind of dying, except it was a dying-into-life, into another's life, or a dream of loveliness; and thinking that, I suddenly understood that Sharon's art was akin to the writer's art -- that it involved the immersion of selfhood in the creating of another world, and in the peopling of that world with various fictions; and I had an intimation, then, that the respective costs of our art -- the costs in good citizenry and domestic solidity and all the other staunch and stolid consolidations of what the peanut-crunching crowd calls "Life" -- might in the long run be about the same for us both.

In this way the image of Sharon got mixed in dimly with my idea of my career, and her art became in my mind a material metaphor for my writer's art. And like that, with an obscure stab of woe, I have thought of her from time to time over the years.

And that's all, really. Sharon never married, so far as I know, nor had any kids; and, last I heard, she was greatly in demand as a stylist, but still living alone with her aged mother, in a old house in Stony Hill. And I only write this now because, out of the blue, I dreamed of Sharon for some reason the other night.

In my dream she was much older than when last I'd seen her -- which was close on 20 years ago -- and had suffered much in the intervening years: all that I could tell from her back, somehow, in my dream. Her back was to me in my dream, and she was bending forward like one preoccupied -- hunched over in the act of re-creating, I supposed, some just-out-of-focus, young girl's face. But it must have been a happy dream, after all was said and done, in the end. Because a point came where Sharon turned around, and I saw that she was gently smiling, and that what I had taken for a model was in fact -- or had become, now -- a baby in her arms.

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This makes me ponder at the photo of my class, which was sent recently.

In this circular I am going to enumerate the names in the photo of class 1960, so it can be included in our web page. The numbers are in the photo

a1. Louis Lacour - A good friend somewhere in Guadaloupe enjoying fishing, I have not heard from him since 2010.

a2. Manuel Prada - He is well and has a school here in Caracas, and in contact with the group.

a3. Richard Galt - Last known location USA. I have tried to contact him but no luck, he is not communicative..

a4. Michael Herrera - A good friend of Roger and lost contact  My last contact with him was over ten years ago.

a5. David Pampellone - No news on him, maybe someone in TT would inform the list.

a6. Ladislao Kertesz - Alive and writing this Newsletter

a7. Michael Howard - He is in TT, retired

a8. Randal Galt - Just got an email I send with the notice, email unknown

a9. James Seheult - Fear for his wellbeing, hope he is well

a10. Michael King - R.I.P.

a11. Wayne Vincent Brown - R.I.P.

a12. Egan Baichoo - He is in Canada, and is not sending emails

a13. Matias von Fedak - Strange friend of mine, he could be in Germany, his Venezuelan friends and I have lost contact wth him

a14. David de Verteuil - “peanuts” No contact, hope he is well,

a15. Christopher Webster - R.I.P.

a16. Roger Henderson - Long lost contact with him, same as with Michael Herrera

a17. Giuseppe Braggio. – He seems to be in Italy.

a18. Nigel Boos - He is well and lives in Canada

a19. Geoffrey Golding  - Also in Canada

a20. Anthony Johnson – He was the pioneer in our WEB page but dropped out of sight, was in the USA, an accountant. Maybe https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYJ21TR-U6A,

a21. Daniel de Verteuil - Just got a letter from him, he is in Canada

a22. Christopher Knowles - R.I.P.

a23. Maurice de Verteuil – Have no idea where he is, maybe in Canada

a24. Fr. Paul - R.I.P.

We are trying to be in contact with all the above and some of those that were with us for at least a year. These include:

Graham Gonsalves Form I to From II - He is well from news that I get from others and in TT

Richard Gransaull until From IV - No news of his whereabouts, maybe in TT

Basanta dayboy from Tunapuna - R.I.P.

Elias Farcheg, left in From III - He is well and today he is in the TORTUGA Island enjoying a vacation

Brian Goddard, left in Form II - A good friend of mine living in Valencia Venezuela.

Harry Guildner - Starting to get worried since he has not touched the 2017 button, living in USA

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Excerpts  FROM OLD CIRCULARS

Caracas, 9 of September 2003.

Dear Fr. Francis Friesen,

Thank you for the email, it is a surprise that I managed to contact you.

I only have a question, can you receive email??? like the one you received???

Since I mail these newsletters once a week, I would prefer to email you, with the photos, but if you cannot receive the email, then I can post mail you the newsletter.

Does Fr. Paul van den Eynden have an email???

I believe that the two of you are the only teacher that are alive, of the multiple ones that we had in 1955 to 1960, my graduation year.

God Bless and much health

Ladislao Kertesz

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On Tue, 09 Sep 2003 10:20:23 +0200, Berchmanianum wrote:

Dear Ladislao,

Thanks for your email. A splendid idea to keep contact with former co-students by means of weekly exchanges.

I do remember your name and that you belonged to the "gang from Venezuela".

I would be happy to get your publication occasionally, so as to refresh my memory about those happy days with you and the other guys, on that mountain top in Trinidad, so many years ago!

My address, as you have it, is correct, email included.

Let me know your own ordinary address as well, for I am not able to  reach you regularly unless by ordinary letter.

Kind regards to all,

Sincerely,

Fr Francis Friesen

P.S. Our telephone number is 024-3838485

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NEWS - Mount Saint Benedict Abbey, Trinidad 

Mount Saint Benedict, also known as the Abbey of Our Lady of Exile, is the oldest Benedictine monastery in the Caribbean. Founded in 1912 by Abbot Mayeul de Caigny of the Abbey of San Sebastian in Brazil to escape religious persecution, it is committed to the needs of the surrounding area and the people who inhabit it. Becoming an Abbey in 1947, they celebrated their centenary recently, in 2012. At the moment, the monks are involved in pastoral counselling and outreach, spiritual direction, yogurt production, giving retreats, woodworking, and technical education. Primary in all of this is the continuous rhythm of prayer and praise, for which the monastic community gathers throughout the day. Guests are invited to join the monks in prayer, whether on retreat or not. It is a new site for the Benedictine Volunteer Corps. The first volunteers will be sent in the summer of 2014.

Work of the SJBVC

Since Mount Saint Benedict is a new site for us this year, we do not know exactly what work the Benedictine Volunteers will be doing. They may be providing hospitality, doing housekeeping or maintenance, helping with Abbey-sponsored services to the poor in surrounding communities, or assisting in pastoral counseling. The men being sent here are as excited as the Australia volunteers to be pioneers of the Saint John’s Benedictine Volunteer Corps, in the Caribbean.

Those Who Will Serve

2014-2015

Alex Forster

Drake Osterhout

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EDITED by Ladislao Kertesz,  kertesz11@yahoo.com,  if you would like to be in the circulars’ mailing list or any old boy that you would like to include.

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Photos:

14LK1212FBGLA, Gustavo La Grave and kids

15LK1683FBRMA, Ryan Maingot

14LK4462FBAMC, The tombstone of Abbot Mayuel de Caigny

15LK7115FBLCH, Leonardo Chacin DJ in Margarita