DENISE Paul can still recall her school days when she’d help her single-parent mom at work and then make her way to school afterwards. There were certain aspects of the job that her mom, Gomwattie De Putron, just couldn’t handle, so at just six or seven years old, the young Denise would do what she could before heading to school.

Today, she manages an attractive stall with fruits and vegetables along the Riverstown Public Road, on the Essequibo Coast, with all that she learned from her mom, who is now deceased.
Denise, now 54, still wells up with tears whenever it’s time to talk about her mom; she still has not yet recovered from her death. “At the age of six or seven, I started working to maintain them (her mom and brother). I did domestic work; swept the concrete, fed the chicken, swept the yard, washed the toilet, etc. and then head to school,” Denise recalled in an interview with Pepperpot Magazine recently.

This was the routine even when she was in secondary school. “I grew without my dad; how my mom did it, I don’t know. She made sure we got a good education. She died three years ago, and I never got over it,” she shared.
To this day, Denise, now married for 35 years, still reflects on all she learned from her mother. For one thing, her mother taught her to be generous. “She taught us to always give and not only to receive; that’s how I am all my life.”

So she’d prefer to give away her fruits and vegetables before they spoil. “I believe in letting people make use of it. You see your way more when you give,” the mother of four expressed. She, too, has been a good mother to her children with all of them turning out well. Two of them are teachers, one is a doctor, and the other is an engineer.

“My advice to people, especially young people, is to just be there for your parents. Don’t matter what situation may come; you will have misunderstandings but just be there for them because today they’re here and tomorrow they’re gone.”

Describing herself as a home manager today, Denise said she helps her husband to sell mostly fruits, vegetables and provisions which they buy from farmers in the vicinity.
She would set up the stall from as early as 04:00hrs on the public road by bringing out the fruits and vegetables. Having to fetch out the different tubs, her husband would also be there to assist. In fact, he is the one who runs the stall at home while she sells at Anna Regina Market on Mondays and Fridays.

“On Mondays, I wake up at 3:00am and on Friday at 1:00am and then head to the market for 2:30 am. It’s a joy to get up early because I know I am going to do something good,” Denise said.
In fact, waking up early is nothing new to her. “I started to wake up early when I was 17 years old. My father-in-law used to keep noise and announce it’s time to wake up, so I am accustomed to waking up early.”

When she went to live in Riverstown many moons ago, Denise recalled that she was told that the village is a little garden with bitter weeds. “Yes, it is, but you have to know how to make it through. You have to set an example in the way you live and carry yourself,” she offered.