Wordsley, Stourbridge, England: 10 degrees, cold, overcast and drizzly.
We are running up to Christmas night in Brazil and Christmas Day in England in terms of respective importance. It is cold, not as cold as when I arrived in November, but it is cold for an adopted carioca.
For me, it’s amusing how there is so much hype leading up to Christmas, but at the same time, there are moments of emptiness, reflection, doubt, and wondering whether it’s all worth it, culminating in the final anticlimax.
I have had many good and very bad Christmases is in Brazil, with family, ex-families, ex-wives, people that kindly invited me into their homes and lives at that moment, at that time of year, the feeling of being lost at Christmas and just sheer happiness of being with people who you like and love.
More and more, I feel that we live in a manipulative society where we are all sheep, following each other in the same direction, often in the wrong one.
I was born in England in the 1960s, a time that felt revolutionary in its own way. However, I chose to live my life in Brazil. Sometimes I joke that I’m more Brazilian than a native Brazilian, because of that choice and how I’ve fully embraced the culture from the very beginning.
Whether I’ve made the right or wrong decision will only be revealed to me by God and time. I often think of the internal struggle between two wolves: one representing good and the other evil. The question remains: which one is right, which one is wrong, and which one do we choose to feed?
I openly say to everybody that I am deeply disappointed with Brazil. I came with great plans and expectations, but unfortunately, I landed in Brazil when it was trying to emerge from the turmoil and confusion of corruption and the stagnation that comes with it.
Still, unfortunately, it has only worsened, with even more quicksand and mud than anything else. It is also clear to me that Brazilian politicians with the Latin culture embedded within them only know how to fight among themselves like little children at kindergarten who don’t know how to play and share their toys properly with everyone.
And if I had stayed in England, would I have been happy? I certainly wouldn’t have had the life I’ve had in Brazil, and neither would I have my beautiful daughters. Perhaps some other children, but not the two daughters who have fulfilled my life, whom I am very passionate about and whose future I am very concerned about.
We should always be appreciative of what we have had, what we have now, and what we can achieve by fighting for in the future. I am temporarily here in England for the first time in over 20 years. I am spending Christmas with my mother, and everything has been going very well so far. I will be with my brother and his family in three days, and I hope to have a good time in the north of England.
I can only be thankful and live in this moment. Could I have had more if I’d stayed in England? Maybe I could have, but it doesn’t matter now.
If you are reading this, I thank you too. If it helps in some way, which I hope it does, it will make me feel better and proud.
I saw The Shawshank Redemption with my mother, and it preaches a lot of what I have talked about today.
In bed by 11.00 p.m.
Thank you.
Thanks for reading this blog post. Please explore my other posts and share your thoughts in the comments section.
Richard
