If you refer back to my “Words Unsaid” post, I remember that moment when Sweet Thing said to me that he doesn’t do reassurance.
I remember being so stunned that he could say something so fucking cold and selfish; but I suppose it is one of the few times that he was truthful about himself and his intentions. He certainly went on to prove it.
This has kind of created a kind of anxiety in me about my state of loneliness, and the struggle against it and the ensuing depression has been tough. You know, you’ve been reading.
It’s funny though, Spirit had told me years ago who was my husband, the type of man he was, who he was. At the time when I need reassurance most about finding someone and settle down, have children, live a spiritual life, is when it came. And not from the muddle of confusion Sweet Thing created in my life either. I am now seeing his fuckwittage as a blessing, because he was too weak in too many areas to cut it in the unflinching world I live in anyway.
My Godfather, the Nigerian babalawo who gave me my Hand of Ifa, and I have been emailing back and forth, in the last two weeks or so. He reassured me in the last few days that my husband was coming, that he would be a deeply spiritual man, that we would have children and he would love me. I wrote back and told him his words were comforting and reassuring and they are and have been.
This is the other part of that story: During my Hand of Ifa ceremony, I was initiated as Apetebii, a wife of Orunmila. It is a special kind of status, and it doesn’t always mean the same things, but I in the most basic sense I have discovered that I am a wife of Orunmila. For those of you who haven’t read my blog in the past, Orunmila is my supporting Orisa. In Orisa they would say Orunmila is ‘below’ and Osun is on my head.
From my studies, Orunmila is figure in Yoruba history, similar to Jesus in the development of Christianity. I am not comparing the two religions, I am merely drawing an analogy for those who don’t know, or are not familiar with the Yoruba tradition.
In the Orisa tradition it is said that Orunmila was the only other energy present when Olodumare, the Supreme Being, created the Universe. ‘He’ is the only other being besides God/Olodumare who knows the past, the present and the future.
Orunmila in his lifetime on this earth, now several thousand years ago, was a traveller. He spent many years travelling the known world, learning and teaching. (It is said Jesus did the same; but you need to search ancient texts for that info, the European Bible has exorcised that info.)
He is the Orisa that owns divination, he is the Orisa who controls destiny, he is the Orisa of wisdom and of intelligence. His children, people like me, are protected from a short life span… he looks out for us especially. It is also said that we are naturally psychic.
Osun is Orunmila’s favorite wife; and they work very closely together. Osun is the Orisa of knowledge and we all know, knowledge without wisdom is meaningless and wisdom without knowledge is useless.
When it was happening I swear I had no idea what it meant. Baba told me only that I should marry someone who was ‘spiritually okay’ and that it meant I could cook for priests, share food with any Orisa, and eat with my elders.
There was a special part of the ceremony that dealt with making me this wife of Orunmila.
Baba didn’t go into extreme detail, so for me, to gain knowledge (Osun in my life), I started combing the Internet for info. I found very little. I found only one book available that was specifically devoted to Apetebii, of course, available at Amazon. I added it to my ‘must buy’ soon list.
My life is funny though. When I send a call out into the Universe, I do get responses.
About a week after my investigations turned up the title and author of this book, I went to the Senegalese Ballet that was in Trinidad around Emancipation Day.
I was getting ready to go, and in the foyez downstairs, my sister Ayoka was there selling some books.
We greeted each other, and I was skirting the crowd of people around her table and was about to step off, when, guess what? There it was! I slipped my hand through the bodies and plucked it off the table.
I went to pay and to my dismay I was forty dollars short. I then left my bag at Ayoka’s stall and went search for the ATM they said was just outside. After fifteen minutes of looking for this mythical ATM, walking the stretch of the Savannah, the whole of Queen’s Park West, I decided to walk the ten minutes to Park Street because this ATM just wasn’t revealing it’s location.
The whole time I was walking, I was praying and asking Baba Ifa (Orunmila’s other name) to protect me, to watch over me as I walked, and to accept the walk as a sacrifice. I’m there praying, Baba Ifa, don’t let anybody teef me of the street please. At 10:30 PM, and in Port of Spain, it’s quite possible. Kidnapping is a real serious problem in Trinidad. I think it’s funny now, but I was DETERMINED not to leave the Savannah without the book that night. I suppose it’s a good thing I don’t have any money.
In retrospect, I doubt it was merely compulsion, but more like Spirit directing me. I just let it take over, guide my steps, and protect me.
After getting back to the Savannah and purchasing the book (AT LAST), I went home and devoured it. I got nothing from the first reading. The language in the book was a little strange; obviously written by someone not completely comfortable with the English language and not in possesion of either a good editor or one that had a definitive command of English. So it wasn’t until the fourth reading that the message truly began to filter through.
Apetebii must marry a priest, what’s more, it has to be an Ifa priest. It also speaks to what Baba had told me: that for me to have children, we (my husband and I) must appease his Ifa with a female goat.
So I wrote Baba and email and asked him about it. He replied saying that yes, it was true. What’s more, that I had to marry a knowledgeable priest. I wrote back a little worried, where am I going to find an Ifa priest in Trinidad? Hell, there are hardly any men following the Yoruba tradition in Trinidad, far less a knowledgeable one!
I told him, that I didn’t think I could marry an old man. I know myself, no old man can keep up with me like that. I also didn’t want some prudish man to try to control me, I needed someone who had similar ambitions and drive, imagination and sexual inhibition. (I didn’t tell it to Baba like that, but words to that effect.)
He reassured me. He said I would find the husband of my choice, and that all will go well for me afterward. He told me my husband would return my love, and I would have children.
So there.
Now the thing is for me, I had always known no ordinary man was going to get me. I knew it had to be a man with intelligence, spiritual grounding and someone who was going to love me completely. For my Baba’s divination to echo these things, is starting to restore a certain faith in my knowledge of self, damaged my recent dealings with men, Sweet Thing in particular.
What I am beginning to realise is that this path is going to call me to real spiritual work. My role in the Orisa community is to support the priest and help him to do his work, and even to do work in his absence. Because Orunmila is my Father, it may mean me becoming what is called Iyanifa, or some other initiation as a priest.
This is something coming to grips with is strange. I can see how I can do it, but not from this particular point I am at.
So this is my destiny. No amount of turning away, or ignoring it will turn it away from me or me from it.
My current abject loneliness can sometimes crush me, but my husband is coming, and with him comes my true wealth, children. I knew it all along, and to find reassurance that this pain of being alone will end and fulfilment is coming to me.
I guess what is freaking me out more than anything is that I still have to wait, and to continue to wait until the path reveals itself. I’ve already waited so long, and I want to have children before my time gets short and I get to old to either keep up with them. The thing is, the waiting could be as long as another year, because I hardly think a babalawo is going to just appear, although I don’t put it past the Universe.
Besides, my current state is none too conducive to relationship building. I’m still working hard to build a relationship with myself. That’s the fact I have come to realise for myself.
Next year, I am meant to go to Nigeria to be initiated to Osun. I suppose that will be the only time I will be in the right place for me and my husband to meet. Being in Trinidad is limiting, but that is my current path of growth.
So, the waiting continues, whether I like it or not.
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