This year I was on a slow burn to get into the festival mood. For various reasons, it felt like a rinse and repeat of my chaotic 2025. Different parameters but yet again, I was going through it.

Despite all that, I had some releasing I needed to do to push forward. Carrying so much -  anxiety, embarassment, sorrow, confusion, anger while feeling like I'm living in limbo and chaos - stinks. So it was time to let go and get back in the right head space to accept/ take on whatever.

Coz wuh ever happen, happen.

And then I think a bit about our foreparents working ("voluntarily" AND before Emancipation NOT) and about the incomprehensible load they carried emotionally while still having to function. And yet they too, found ways to release.

But now? I ready too! And don' get tie up. Cropover IS about liming with friends, soca, culinary delights, wuk up, drinks and ting but also for me, it's about Art in all its expressions: with craft, folklore, visual exhibitions AND yes, literature - all wrapped in our #seasonofemancipation

But most of all... for me it represents FREEDOM to reset, savour and leggo. 

Coz after all, Life is short, hear?

(C) 2026 Sandra Sealy