©1996 Pam La Born
Love Letters to
a Friend
Volume II
Dedicated to and for P.L.
©1996 Pam La Born
Home | Beloved | Creatures | Offspring | Rooms | Womyn | Origins
|
|
|
I.
Vaginas in Stained Glass |
My sister is the only one I know of who would see
vaginas buried within the stained glass windows of a south Arkansas Baptist
church.
Right there, in the middle of some sermon swimming outside of her open ears,
she noticed the windows (probably fantasizing escape) and the vaginas stared
right back at her.
Now, most 50-year-old women would be hanging on the words of the Preacher, soaking
up any sin or condemnation for the sin right through their Oil-of-Olayed pores.
Most would probably be sitting, legs crossed, in their best Sunday wear –
totally blind to the fact that there were vaginas all over the windows of that
church.
But Sister is quick to point out such things as the female anatomy etched into
so-called ‘Christian’ surroundings. Says they serve as a reminder
that, long before God, there was Goddess – and God wouldn’t be alive
if it weren’t for Her.
This she believes with a conviction that took her half a century to develop.
It’s not that Christianity hasn’t offered her anything. It’s
just simply that she could never fit into the pants, so to speak, of Christ.
They were made, after all, to fit men and men alone, and Sister recognized this
fact long ago.
I am not sure what woke her up, or who. But she and I used to argue about the
pronoun choices of Christians. You know – "He saith," "He
doeth," etc.
"Dear Heavenly Father" turned her stomach, numbed her soul and forced
her to fit her square beliefs into the triangle of the Trinity.
So, somewhere, somehow, someone in her life plopped the Truth in her lap. That
there WERE vaginas in stained glass windows of Christian churches. And that
the Trinity came long after the Wiccan, Pagan, Celtic circle.
Since then, she’s never been the same.
Sister lies sometimes.
She never really lived on a turkey farm, so don’t believe her when she
offers you a free Butterball.
She was sitting to my left when the explosion happened.
And I saw her, out of the corner of my eye, shake her head, ‘no.’
I was fighting a dragon she had confronted before, and she knew I would ultimately
end up losing the battle.
I, however, thought she was wrong. So I fought, anyway.
It was graduate school. The year was 1993. The season was Summer, and all over
campus, the Dogwood trees were still in bloom, having not yet succombed to the
torturous temperatures of an Arkansas June.
That was the year of my Baptism – washed in the blood of a Black professor
named Dr. M. who, himself, had been crucified by others of mine and Sister’s
race. And now he held the Power – as a doctor and a professor – to
determine the course of his white, female students lives – and he used
it to its most destructive degree.
The battle started over skin color and the judgements such a physical thing
can create. Dr. M. inadvertently and very underhandedly labled me a Racist.
That was the line in the sand, as far as I was concerned, and I felt my anger
surge inside and erupt like a volcano that had been seething for centuries.
As I let my mouth take over, hurling arguments toward this Power-hungry Black
man, Sister sat beside me and shook her head. For me, his comments were addressed
to us – and I was fighting for everyone. For everyone else in that particular
course, though, the focus was on the Almighty ‘A’ that would allow
them to walk out of graduate school with a certain measure of academic dignity.
I remember at that moment that nothing mattered. Not my grades, my degree, nor
all other plans tied into the two. I measured my heart, quickly – and what
was RIGHT compared to the COST. RIGHT won.
Class ended before the battle did. My face was hot, my eyes red and full of
tears (as anger always causes tears for me), and I walked into the hallway –
my head spinning with politically correct ways to rid that college of one Black
professor.
Sister came out into the hall and touched me on the shoulder.
"I’ve had him before, and there’s no way you can do anything
about this," she said. "I learned a long time ago to just do the work
and keep my mouth shut."
I didn’t know her, or even her name at that moment. What she said echoed
my own mother’s words at other moments in my life: "Don’t cause
any problems. Just let it go."
But the advice from Mom and now this Nameless Woman (who was, indeed, my Twin
Soul Mate unbeknownst to me at that time) didn’t measure up to the scale
in my heart. Not to mention the enticing lure and excitement of a potential
controversy that could change the world….
It’s not that I didn’t try. I went home and thought about what Nameless
Woman had said. I wrote madly in my journal, trying to exorcise the demon of
Black Professor against White Student. (Not to mention the male/female clash).
I called my father on the phone and ranted and raved. I went up to strangers
on the street and asked their advice.
Then I went to my Black Woman Counselor and dove into my own issues surrounding
skin color, Racism, and any possibility that I might be operating from a hidden
Plantation mentality in my own soul.
I came out on the other side sure of myself, sure of my motivation, and sure
of my violation by this Black Professor.
With this certainty, I knew I had to get the man fired.
In the process, I learned Nameless Woman’s name, figured out quickly who
my friends were, and proved to myself that – yes – with action, we
can change things. The world doesn’t have to be the way it is – but
it is because, for too long, we have just let things happen that should have
been stopped.
And people don’t have to be isolated and different from everyone –
because, that summer, Nameless Woman became Sister, and other Sisters rose out
of the ashes, too.
Dr. M., the Black Professor, did move on, but only because we made it happen.
I suppose in his unconscious/conscious way, he thinks he’s effecting change
in this world, too.
He is.
Without him, Nameless Woman would have never become Sister – and the Coven
born from his violation would not gather together to this day.
Just as Sister has said in the past, he does, indeed, deserve our thanks.
She knows what it means to be poor – both
in spirit and in the physical.
She has spent an inordinate amount of time trying to escape from what has felt
like a prison of lack to her.
She will tell you, in all honesty, that she sacrificed great chunks of herself
trying to chisel her way out of what the Universe gave her. Born feeling backwards
and awkward, she searched for ways to become part of the whole she saw on the
outside of herself. She has deemed herself as the ‘kid from the wrong side
of the tracks,’ and has fought blindly to cross those tracks – no
matter how hard the path.
Rich was an answer to her. But Rich made bruises black and blue on her body
and still kept her starved emotionally. So, she clawed her way out of the grave
of a Man’s full bank account and ran away with her children in tow.
It was then she learned, again, physical scarcity and lack and going to bed
with an empty stomach.
Listening to her stories – as she pin-balled most of her life from one
man to others, from money to none, from drugs to alcohol to sex – I think
I have never seen a person scramble so hard to find out who they were in this
World. Sister’s life is quilted with many triangles that never fit what
she was trying to make. And, while I cry in my heart for her sometimes, I laugh
most of the time at the beauty of her colors and the uniqueness of her fabric.
Sometimes she still struggles and grasps at what most people automatically know
is their birthright. It takes her great courage to claim even a small space
in this world – because someone or something has reminded her she’s
different.
Other times, she wakes up remembering she’s different and can dance in
the sunshine of that revelation and sing praise to her Goddess that she ISN’T
cursed with the terminal disease of Vanilla.
I have seen her do both, and I have such a great and deep love for her that
it is difficult to watch her suffer old nightmares …
Her eyes cry on their own, completely unexpectedly – a nudge from her soul
that it’s time to remember her penance has already been paid, and that
there is no need to keep forcing coins into the mouth of a dead beast.
And I, again, watch her revive herself and evolve back into the Goddess I know
she is – the one whose Grace has resurrected me.
Because of her path, she remains grounded in the deep knowledge that safety
is a worldly illusion, and, often, an unnecessary part of our agenda.
Yes – jumping off the cliff with only a balloon and a bit of faith will
take you further – and higher.
She knows this fact better than anyone.
I was once a whole woman, long before I knew her.
This part of my life she did not share – but she witnesses the evidence
of my once-completeness in my 9-year-old son.
The usual things that two women share – the bloody inconvenience of tampons
or maxi-pads – she and I did not … the growing bellies of pregnancies
and the social rituals of gift-giving around these events … the trauma
of a missed week or two in the menstrual cycle, and the pain that exploded when
the flow of life did start … the frustration of being poked and prodded
by males in white coats who "found nothing wrong" and invited our
insanity, insisting the physical pain was "all in our heads."
When she was starving with two children, and running away from an abusive man,
I was learning to drive my 1964 Mustang, smoking my first joint and flirting
unaware with my own, future abusive man.
My monthly reminder that I could get pregnant was an inconvenience and a bother
– and my saving grace as that the Playtex tampon box was large enough to
hide a pack of Marlboro Reds in – to keep my new-found smoking habit a
secret from my mother.
The pain would always start low – humming in my back, circling around to
my abdomen – until it jolted my ovaries and could legitimately be called
‘cramps.’ And, only a day later, usually in the middle of some inconvenient
event, I would feel a warm rush saturate my underwear and seep through to the
crotch of my Levi 501 jeans.
Somewhere, in a world distant from any knowledge of me, she felt the same rush
– and probably the same irritation with the blood interrupting her life.
Rinsing out our underwear, neither of us knew of each other’s existences
miles away, even though we were going through the same mediocre ritual. Our
minds were locked into different realities – mine on dates and the horrors
of algebra, hers on the impending electric bill and what to fix the kids for
dinner.
There were probably many weeks we bled in sync with one another and never once
got in touch with the inner knowing that we were doing so.
When Sister submitted to the blade, I do not know – but I do remember my
own ride on a steel hospital gurney into a cold surgery room. Riding the high,
surreal waves of Sodium Penathol, I knew once he cut, there would be no turning
back. I knew that possible children and future monthly reminders that I could
carry those children would be severed forever – tossed into a dump somewhere
to meld back into the earth.
There have been many moments I saw my own uterus, fallopian tubes and ovaries
hardened by the sun and covered with hungry flies. And now that I DO know of
Sister, I wonder if she ever wondered my wonderings: where did they take our
insides – and why did we ever let them?
Just as I was once dependent upon the medical men to get me out of the pain
I was in, I remain so today. She can hear in my voice when the injection of
synthetic hormones has run dry. She sits atop menopause, 20 years my senior,
and provides me with – in desperate moments – drugs to tide me over,
until I can pay them to make me sane again.
She and I can compare our hot flashes, mood swings, sex drives … whereas
we could never share in the other.
For her, it is a passage. For me, it is a battle.
Very few of my Circle have understood the tears and the bitterness leftover.
But she knows I grieve quietly every day, and she gently offers me hope.
Sister knows the dangers of swimming in childhood fishing holes but, at times, seems to like the scare of drowning.
One hot summer day, I trudged to the mailbox with
dread in my heart – knowing the electric bill would be waiting. I had already
formulated a plan, however, so I flipped the door open and stuck my hand in
to grab the damn thing.
Eyes shut, I groped my way to the back of the box and grabbed the thin envelope
waiting inside. When I pulled it out, opening my eyes slowly, I could see the
envelope was blue. And that it was not from the local utility company. Instead,
the return address was White Bluff (something I couldn’t make out) and
the town, ‘Fort Smith.’
Not knowing a single person from that particular town, I checked to see if it
was addressed to the right person. My name was scribbled across the front –
the sender obviously hurried to get it out to the mail.
Once inside my too-cool apartment (hence the dread over the electric bill),
I opened the envelope. Tucked inside was a card – a beautiful card –
and even further inside was writing from a woman I thought had disappeared.
It was Sister, making her true entry into my life – with inspiring words
that nourished my soul.
I had thought her gone – graduated – off to see the world, change
the world. I had thought – and grieved, no less – that she would never
cast her shadow on my path again.
My heart burst with excitement. I wrote her back immediately, choosing carefully
what to say, wanting her so desperately to know that I deeply loved and missed
her in my daily life, but trying to tone my desperation with a writer’s
finesse.
Soon after sending her my words, my mailbox blessed me once again with another
one of her cards – this one more spectacular than the last, full of wisdom
and guidance.
I tucked each one in my underwear drawer and read them over and over. They became
a Bible of sorts for me, and I wanted to memorize everything Sister had written
in them. Her words and her knowledge gave me a direction like nothing else –
and I hung on to them for dear life, at times even sleeping with the cards,
scattered and wide-open, all over my double bed, following my studies.
Then, suddenly, they stopped. I wrote, but nothing happened. The electric bills
came – one after the other – but no envelope with Sister’s scrawl
ever did.
I wrote again, this time allowing my desperation to come through. "Where
are you?" I asked. "Damnit. You don’t just waltz into people’s
lives, change them in some magnificent fashion, and then leave. Don’t you
know that?"
On the eve of my letting go, I fantasized about driving to that foreign town
and searching and asking where one would find Sister. I would buy flowers, chocolate,
and a special, special card and show up on the doorstep – humble, albeit
pissed off. We would have hot tea together, laugh at our grad school experiences,
and then have an honest, heart-to-heart about disappearing into thin air.
We would then hug and I would drive home, feeling like I knew her better –
and that she knew me better – and I could sleep without wondering.
But, I lay there, single in my double-bed, my arms around my 30-year-old stuffed
dog, Noopy, and knew I would never do what I had fantasized.
So, I prayed – I prayed through tears that God help me let Sister go –
and that she be kept safe and sane. And that maybe, someday, she would write
again.
Sister was, after all, a Scorpio – that damnable water sign that fluctuates
between hot and cold and birth and death. Fickle and flaming, passionate and
aloof, on top of the world one moment, and scouring the depths of Hell the next.
I fell asleep with the comfortable knowledge that we were not through –
that somehow we were a bigger part of a larger scheme of fate than we were aware
of.
A year and a half later, my mailbox was full again….
When Sister stopped writing to me, she had made
a conscious choice to die.
In my selfishness and needfulness, it did not occur to me that she might have
drawn the curtains on her entire life and dug a grave, but that is precisely
what she had done.
Struggling with what felt like endless dead-ends, Sister bravely took the spiritual
barge across her own private River Styx and died to the woman I originally met
in graduate school. She knew it was the only way she could BE in this world
without enduring the afflictions of what she had BEEN.
She entered into her sleep Duped – the literal meaning of her given name.
Her mother either had a sense of humor or the foresight to know that her daughter
would bear the brunt of Awareness – and so christened her, "Patsy."
Sister grew up hating her name and its implications. Yet, she naively fell victim
to its predestined meaning repeatedly – caring for two mentally ill siblings
and numerous dysfunctional men to the point of self-crucifiction.
And so, by sheer will, she entered into the sleep – and hibernated until
she was ready to experience her own birth.
Pasted on the walls of her self-induced cave were the stone-aged drawings of
a dead father, an abusive and overworked mother, crazy sisters, a judgmental
brother (who didn't really like her), and another brother who lived a simple
life, sitting on a picnic table.
There were hand-me-down dresses, and charity-given shoes; the social brandings
of poverty and of never quite belonging to the inner sanctum of society. The
kid’s father, the monstrous rich man, and the love of her life – who
shared his time with a mistress by the name of Scotch.
Parties and drunken executives, presidents and their plaster-faced wives, fake
smiles, routine handshakes, the sickening smell of real leather mixed with high
dollar cologne.
Then there were the sexual conquests, victimizations, and spiritual prostitutions
… the sad, black eyes staring out from posed, smiling portraits.
Scandals and rumors, midnight rescue missions and screams, screams, screams.
All of these things she saw and heard inside the cave. Each one a moment of
a lifetime she no longer wanted, even though they created her and brought her
to THIS moment.
Sister stayed quiet and still for many months, buried deep in the Earth, reclaiming
her Soul and ex-communicating her demons.
She walked with Dignity, laid with Disgust, and slept with Intention.
And quietly, without notice, emerged one day on the other side as Bear.
When Sister sneezes, it means you’re in for a long, long night.
In the depths of a dark tunnel, when there is seemingly
no light, I have learned to rely on the wisdom of my Elders before listening
solely to my own.
There have been many instances during which I have deliberately sought counsel
from the precious circle of women I now surround myself with. Their voices are
renewing, and often open doors for me that feel closed. Each one offers an avenue
different than the other, yet all leading to the same result.
Sister is one of the voices I seek when life hurls perplexing moments at me
and challenges me to waver from my path. I know that I can stand still and listen
to the wind and hear her words to me.
Lightning has often struck her, causing her to brim with the knowledge of Sun,
Moon, Stars and Universe. She speaks steadily, slowly, carefully editing her
language. Her eyes go black, reflecting all colors and patterns of ancestors
and ghosts, karmic debts and Goddesses.
It is her Bear that rises up from thought hibernation and stands on its hind
legs, yawning to the sky. When she becomes this regal creature, she carries
with her everything she’s ever needed.
Once, while the steamy hot summer pounded down upon us, Sister and I floated
together – suspended in conversation while the water carried the weight
of our bodies.
Her hair, blackened by the wet, lay slicked back and dangling on her shoulders,
copper-colored from the sun. I watched her prop her elbows up on the side of
the pool and lean her face upward toward the warmth.
The air had been filled with words only a moment ago, the two of us diagnosing
the Why’s and Wherefore’s of an insane world – both inside and
outside of ourselves. Now there was stillness, with only the occasional screech
of a hawk that flew overhead in the distance.
I let the silence sit and the warmth of the June sun soak into my skin. My heart
swelled, full of love for this woman, who was letting her hair grow long for
her 50th birthday, and who had helped me live through yet another one of my
dying moments.
I was grieving and Sister Bear gave me warmth, wisdom and encouragement.
I knew at that moment, I had glimpsed a small piece of Heaven.
I could only hope that the rest of it would be much the same.
Sister nearly got me killed once on an interstate
in the middle of Arkansas.
It’s not something she would be proud to admit – I mean, after all,
she knew I had no life insurance. And, I think it was partly my own fault. I
think if I hadn’t mentioned witchcraft to the driver of the car –
who was a devout, but rather devoid, Catholic – we might have been just
fine.
But I have this thing about bringing up rather touchy subjects in bad company.
So does Sister.
I know that somewhere, in a past life together, Sister and I burned at the same
stake. We keep having too many near-misses in this life to not have.
- Flour-covered hands at 10 a.m. on a Sunday morning
- Hot, fresh coffee steaming up early – the mist mixing with the smell
of chlorine
- Lightning flashing far in the distance in dark, midnight air; bottles of French
wine and the flicker of a witch’s candle dancing with the breeze
- Veggies and rice and waitresses with pierced noses and tongues
- Sitting together, our tears flowing in sync with one another, touched by the
velvet-smooth voice of a Black Woman/Goddess reading poetry
- Dashing in and out of tiny shops in a fairy land full of ghosts and energy,
both of us drawn there, still, without knowing why
- Beer and cheap tacos dripping grease and hot sauce down our arms, laughter
and the bright, red face of a new man who had just finished an old game of golf
- A stuffed panda bear that offered the silky comfort of a forgotten Noopy
- Peace pipes and birthdays and snores in a theatre
- Tears at the Yuletide while memories of a missing and much-missed daughter
danced with sugarplum fairies
- Blatant honesty
- Blatant friendship
- Falling stars at 3 a.m.
- Walking shirt-less, bra-less, and bare through an unoccupied campground just
to see what it must feel like to possess the automatic freedom to undress in
public.
- Breakfasting on the balcony overlooking the shrine to football at University,
devising ways to change the world
- Sneezes and snorts and roll after roll after roll of toilet paper
- Hand-me-down books, well-read and bursting with new conversations, revelations
- Mountain travels to an old woman who tapes the future from a deck of cards
- Letting go of old ways, trying to find the new
- A wonderful face in the sterile, hostile surgical unit of a hostile town
- Ropes, naked men and poetry
- Growing up and growing older – together
- The top floor overlooking a grand, old Mother
These are the things I think of often.
These are the gifts from Sister to me.
