30 days of night- part 9

[thejunipertree]

01 - Introduction
02 – Your first love
03 – Your parents (this is long as HELL
04 - What you ate today
05 - Your definition of love
06 - Your day
07 - Your best friend
08 - A moment

Your beliefs


I'm fairly open about what I believe in, I just don't talk about it at every single opportunity which may arise. I reckon if one keeps their altar smack in the middle of the living room, one is basically forced into being open about things.

I never kept it in the living room until the Engineer moved in, it was always in my bedroom. But when he moved in, space went for a high premium and we needed the room in the bedroom. His altar is in the computer/snake room. It's much smaller.


It's gone through a lot of changes over the years. That little orange and pink shoebox looking thing in the center is the only original piece, which started out as an ancestor altar back when I still had no idea what path I was on anymore.


Now, it's largely dedicated to Ghede. I have a few areas for Maman Brigette and the lwa who won't tell me his name, and Legba.


Maman Brigette will always have a place of honor in my household, as she stands as the bridge between my old life and now. After so many years of paying homage to Brigit, one day I realized she was no longer there and it threw me into a tailspin. There was this empty space I didn't know how to handle and I struggled for several years with trying to figure out what the fuck had happened in my head that I no longer felt this...divine connection, for lack of better words.

I didn't come to Vodou willingly; it was a kicking and screaming process all the way. Too much work, too much responsibility. I didn't want it. Ghede bugged the shit out of me the entire time. Dreams, strange occurrences, bizarre things coming across my path. Until one day, I opened a book and saw Maman's face. Brigit, Brigette. I'd been so stupid.

She'd never left me, not truly. She had been trying to lead me to something, only I lost my grip on the reins.


For years, despite the fact that I've never been anything even remotely resembling Catholic, I'd been obsessed with Saint Dymphna and wore her medal around my neck. I'd stumbled across her one day in a short story by Nick Cave and Lydia Lunch, an odd place to come across a saint. Nevertheless, she was there and my broken wee brain, with all its whirls and quorks that caused me no end of discomfort and pain, latched on to her. She's not one of the more well known saints, so any time I found something of hers, it was exciting.

The unnamed lwa speaks with her voice and face.


And then, there's Ghede.


Ghede reminds me that my life is not something to be squandered needlessly. Some days, too many of them in recent times, it's harder to remember that particular lesson. But, it's something I pick up every morning, no matter how heavy it seems. I spent far too long blank and empty and cold, half in the grave as it were and not caring much one way or another if I slipped all the way. A handful of times, I teetered on the edge.


This one isn't on my altar, it's a copy of the last sculpture, only in bronze (and the cigar survived the casting process this time, it didn't in the resin one). He sits by the front door, so he's the last thing I see as I'm leaving the safety of the little den of safety I've created in this apartment.

I touch his hat every time I pass, the brim is beginning to show a bit of wear from this. I touch his hat and steel myself against everything terrible that lies beyond that door. All of the stupid bullshit that makes me want to take a claw hammer to my head or stick a sharpened pencil in my earhole. Life is too good, with so much beauty shining amongst the shitty parts. I need to remind myself of this or feel the ground start to shift under my feet again.

At the same time, he tells me that Death is nothing to fear. My entire life and from a young age, I've been on close terms with death. Heavy exposure, to ridiculous levels, for my age. Combine that with an obsessive thought problem and it usually results in my lying awake at night for hours, unable to sleep, utterly crippled with fear at what's going to happen. Anxiety and OCD are not a fun combination, I should say.

Ghede throws death in your face. It's in his grin, you can't turn away. But at the same time, he laughs. He laughs so much and you can't help but laugh with him. He will throw his arms around you and tell the best dirty jokes you've ever heard. Ribald and foolish, in the actual sense of the word, all rum and the emperor is fucking naked, ya'll. It is amazing.

I tend to feel slightly ludicrous when I talk about this, so it's usually why you don't hear me discussing it unless I'm talking of history and practice, rather than the more spiritual side of things. Any time I talk about something I believe that is of the more googly-eyed variety, I feel that slight pang of goony shame. I don't know if it is logic's sting and my natural skepticism poking me in the kidneys and telling me not to be such a flake. Or if it's vestigial closetedness, left over from my earnest youth.


10 – What you wore today
11 – Your siblings
12 – What’s in your bag
13 – This week
14 – What you wore today
15 – Your dreams
16 – Your first kiss
17 – Your favorite memory
18 – Your favorite birthday
19 – Something you regret
20 – This month
21 – Another moment
22 – Something that upsets you
23 – Something that makes you feel better
24 – Something that makes you cry
25 – A first
26 – Your fears
27 – Your favorite place
28 – Something that you miss
29 – Your aspirations
30 – One last moment

Comments

[biggerstaff.livejournal.com]

I wanted to thank you for this. Thank you for letting us into this obviously very personal part of your world. =)

[rapscallion.livejournal.com]

Very fascinating, especially the Iwa. I have similarly varied devotions.