The 1950s are my Yesterday. For me, they were the most important decade in history. They built momentum to override my father’s veto of  secular education and drive me into ambitious government schooling never previously seen in Trinidad and Tobago. 

The sixties made the seventies a dream for me.

Not only did I leave home, to live on my own.

Travel-study in the third year of a four year-course in Latin American Studies (University of Toronto, 1969-1973)) helped me understand my father’s veto of any other than an Adventist church school for his sixth child.

I spent 1971/1972 among speakers of French in Quebec, Portuguese in Bermuda, Portuguese in Brazil and also, Spanish speakers, mainly in Argentina. My perspective on schooling among speakers of English sharpened. 

It took decades to appreciate the distinct approach non-English speakers took to Adventist education.

It took even more time to recognise the exertions of seven generations of women in my life . 

He could not see the 2020s, a landmark in provision of schools. This decade brings the fourth centenary of Mossi African and Scottish Scobie presence in British West Indian colonies.

It is unclear how the Mooré-speaking Mossi managed to learn English. They had no schooling. Yet, they mastered a language  "masters" took for granted.

Awareness of language and its relation to schooling brought a degree of clarity on how Yesterday made me what I am today.

That sense of clarity drives this autobiography-by-blog.