My life began on February 20th, 1975, in a hospital room in Montego Bay, Jamaica, the second son of Barry and Catherine, and younger brother of Sheldon. My mother and her 4 sisters had agreed to put a saint’s name in addition to their children’s middle names and my first name was taken from an article in some American tabloid article discussing the twenty-five most popular names of the year. So was born Kevin Neil O’Brien Hall. My mother tells me that I was a quiet but curious baby, rarely crying except when I was hungry.
They also tell me of two occurrences that they will never forget. My father was driving us somewhere, my mom was in the passenger seat, and I was in the back between my brother and my aunt. We stopped to get something, and my aunt stepped out and didn’t close the door all the way, when she got back in she had forgotten, and sat on the other side. So now I was against the door, well suffice it to say my father went around one of Jamaica’s notoriously sharp turns, and I in turn, supposedly went flying out the door onto the road I landing several feet from a cliff’s edge with barely a scratch unharmed.
My mom’s story is invariably much more dramatic than what probably happened since she also recalls a story about a 60-gallon fish tank that I managed to knock over without getting myself killed in the process because it fell in the opposite direction. This of course was attributed to the lucky saint O’Brien in my name.
Lucky or not my life has been very eventful, as I’m sure most are. My parents were not oppressively religious at the time (not so true now), but at a young age I gave up on the notion of ‘coincidence’. I still am not very religious, but I do believe in something beyond myself, because ‘coincidence’ happens way too coincidentally for me to ignore. Anyway, my life in Jamaica was beautiful as far as I can remember, both my parents were born dirt poor but by the time I came around they were decently well off, based on their thriving tourist focused restaurant “Hall’s Quick Snack Shop”.
In hindsight it wasn’t a very original name, but they did an exceptional job of making it memorable. Canadians and Americans that visited tended to come back year to year. Beyond that, I was always surrounded by some relative or another, and spoiled way more than any child should be at that age. My brother and I were the center of my parents’ world and it was obvious. From day one they were always mindful of our education. I learned to read at an early age and never stopped until I got to college. My mother was a teacher and coach at the local school, and my dad had been a clerk somewhere. He had never finished school, but he was intelligent and great with numbers.
My parents built a restaurant close in proximity from what was then the first Sandals Hotel in Jamaica. Business was doing well and was getting better as the hotel became more popular. Things were great until Jamaican politics started taking its toll. In 1980 more than 844 people were murdered based on political motivations. 1980 was an election year, which tends to be bad tidings in Jamaica, turning neighbor against neighbor and inciting bloody riots. Politics are taken a lot more seriously outside of the US; if your party is not in power you may lose police protection or even lose your job straight-out. My parents stopped receiving needed restaurant supplies, my father was robbed at gunpoint, and one of our neighbors was killed in a drive-by shooting.
My father bought a gun for our protection knowing that he was incapable of using it on a human being. An attempt was made to break into our house one night, and if it weren’t for the five big dogs that we kept in our yard, his resolve would have been severely tested that night. That incident right there brought about the biggest decision that was ever, or probably will ever be made in my life. 100% made without any input from me. In 1980 we fled Jamaica…to be continued. Thanks for reading thus far.
