By Niama Leslie Williams, Ph.D.

jesus said, i must work the works of he who sent me ….

Dear God,

      It is fitting that I sit here, in Melanie’s home, first in a doorway, then in a passageway between two rooms about to write of the beginning of my life of service.

      I often tell those I am close to or those I am about to become close to of the beginning of my knowledge that God had made me exceptional. My father had left our home the night before amidst tears, punishing silence, anguish and grief. I had been inconsolable on his lap the night before, a flood, a river of tears, but when he asked me to hush up now I did as he asked, ever the obedient Daddy’s girl. The next morning I rose, a happy five-year-old, resigned to the fact that my daddy was gone. I bounced, a little bit less lifeless, to my bedroom door to see what my day held.

      I heard the crying, sobbing. I looked west, down the hall, and there my brothers stood, the oldest’s head on one of Mama’s shoulders, the second oldest’s head on the other shoulder, both sobbing their guts out. I watched that tsunami of tears and rightly calculated that my mother would never be able to bear up under, to carry the weight of so much sadness, so much ripped open pain.

      I said nothing to anyone, but that moment, that moment I observed and made a decision: I would take whatever, I would absorb whatever necessary because these people, these people would never make it without me.

      Forty years have passed since that morning, and I have no grand plans to celebrate my 46^th. I dream now of a mate, a life partner to whom I can quietly communicate my desire for a big splashy birthday party that he totally arranges for me with only my bestest friends in attendance simply because he knew I could tell only him and he would do it, down to the last detail, because he loved me.

      And if there was anything I were to ask, I ask daily of this God I love, worship, happily joyfully thankfully prayerfully give my life over to in service, it is that He hasten this man’s steps toward me.

      The road so long, so long away from the lies and secrets and half-truths my family’s anger and rage implanted. “On Fire” one of my favorite Criminal Intents because Glenn’s cry, “I’m nothin’” rings so deeply in my consciousness. My family’s need had me convinced I was nothing, a person of no consequence who had no right to a life of her own or to her own wishes wants desires choices. I had to be kept near and I had to be kept down or I might find out the whole truth and turn the entire apple cart. I was Papa Ben’s last precious gift, and my Mama meant—selfishly—to have me at all times and forever. She couldn’t have, possibly, the love of her life, the one man with whom she had been completely sexually free and satisfied, the one thing stand-in father simply could not abide, and I was not to go away from her, especially not after he died. That I was still psychically connected to him during his passing probably ripped her up; it made the stand-in insane. He threatened my life and I had to flee.

      But I do not fault my parents for this. If Jim Richards told my mother to go ahead, try it, you deserve to experiment, find out; and if my mother finally gave in to her young Black Southern girl’s curiosity and slept with an older white man who loved shirtless and shoeless and the sea; if she let her guard and all those Black Southern prohibitions down letting him take her to new heights of pleasure she’d never imagined, how go back to high school sweetheart once she’d tasted nirvana? The secret nobody tells is that she broke the stand-in’s heart and he ruined her life in return.

      The fiction I tell myself is that Papa Ben and my Mama talked about the reality of being together and knew it couldn’t be, or maybe he wasn’t brave enough or committed enough to settling down with Lessie B. Maybe they thought it would be too hard for me, God I must muster the courage to find the truth, to search Mama’s bedroom boxes and piece together the truth, they could both go together to the other side if I would go ahead and bust it loose. They don’t just want me in my Jim’s arms, they want me to know and announce who I am and what frightens me, Father, is the massive amount of disbelief and incredulity waiting for me on the other side of that announcement. I want nothing more than to go in there and lay down and snore and sleep and rest my soul in “God’s room” as Melanie’s stepson calls it, but Papa Massey be in there and I can’t lay down in the same room with him. Now that I’ve healed him (shorthand God; you guided me in that work), we both feel the over-abundance of sexual energy we toss out as a matter of our every day living breathing existence.

      And I’m tired, God, I’m tired of dreaming of my Jim, I want his real arms around me but I can only force myself to wait, you’ve told me to wait, that he keeps running and sexual attractiveness so obvious now after the basil tea bath and the olive oil cream in my hair and the cocoa butter lotion on my skin sealing in the basil tea cleansing. And so I smelled of it all, basil and olive oil and cocoa butter and the little young girl lost her mind and said “can we just go make out somewhere?” and I had to tell her no, I belong to someone else and to myself I said, someone whose arms I haven’t even felt yet.

      But I wait.

      The compliment a nice one though and I treated her with special kindness after that. Always be delicate with those who love you whom you can’t love back. And I, wet between the legs ever since Papa Massey’s healing, ever since sitting and listening and hearing what he thought unspeakable unbearable, what he thought made him pariah outcast a horror, and I greet him with love, understanding, insights that showed him why he behaved the way he did and not in a way that would have put him first. Oh how the abused recognize each other! Oh God how grateful I am for the years of therapy and medication and truth telling and audiences and the 12-step rooms that gave me wisdom to share with him that will help him save himself!

      I sat and listened and gave wise counsel and all with Your lips tongue and breath, Father. It was You speaking and acting through me. He was rid of those three powerful dark and controlling secrets, Father, I pulled them toward me, accepted them from his breath, cut the cords so he could be free and the secrets tumbled down my intestinal elevator shaft and at 6:30 a.m. I was awake and coughing and nauseous waving my last $10 and saying “24 hour pharmacy, Ipecac!” Knew I had to call Nana-Essi before doing anything. Called and she was going to be out, so laid down to rest and sleep as body was telling me to do. Don’t often listen to body, but with healing work it’s about taking it slow and the client.

      Big Sis, when she got in, said absolutely not to the Ipecac, basil tea bath and then herb mint tea to drink; cleansing she said and my silent inner voice rebelled: Mama wants to have a say, an input, and she recommends Ipecac. And I all for Mama’s solution til I slowly pour that hot basil tea over my head and down my arms and down my chest my back and all over again. A gallon of tea so three times. I’d plugged the tub so ran new hot water over the collected basil tea at the bottom of the tub and sat down in it and oh my God healing yes cleansing yes soothing. I let the basil encircle surround and depollute me with its secret medicinal curative powers and I listened to my inner self and knew it was time to get out when it started to itch. Heard Nana-Essi’s voice just as clear telling me how long to boil the tea and everything. Intuition can save your life if you let it!

      And last Father I must tell of the Miracle of Norristown High School, the Miracle of Hallway 300. I had put in my application to substitute teach and realized months later as I continued to wait for clearances that this application was the one I was most excited about and why Niama when you’ve sworn up and down your whole life that you would never do K-12? That Parmeleee nearly killed your mother, certainly exacerbated her Alzheimer’s, and you’d seen your LAUSD friends buried in impossible loads of paperwork, how on earth could you be excited by K-12? Yet you were. You thought those clearances would NEVER materialize. And when the second one did and you could finally set your foot in a classroom, oh my there you were, Thursday, 7 something a.m., walking down a hallway in a high school looking for your classroom. And suddenly it swept over you, this was high school and this, this was where you wanted and needed to be. The sweat the fear the tension the false bravado petty hatreds minor cliques and various fiefdoms, teacher and student. You belong here, every day, building hope self-esteem courage brilliance. You have to convince them that they have it all, have it all within, so they will risk trying and not quit before they’d begin, full of disdain, disregard and disrespect.

      By day two you are hurting so bad for them you are at Mr. Krause’s door asking what do I do? How do I reach them? I don’t want to be known as the sub who can’t manage a classroom. What’s my shtick? What will keep them quiet and working and caring? It is not that I want, simply, to become She Who Must Be Obeyed; I want to ask for quiet and get it immediately. I want cooperation and compliance without argument.

      Answer? They have to know I care. They have to know I am there for them. How do I do that in one day?

      And lastly I must make room for this Scorpio of Papa Ben’s birthday. I must make room for her clutter and lateness and disregard for her guests’ needs. I must miss subbing Tuesday for the Monday night staff meeting. Given the birthdate, I choose to make space for Ms. Warm Earth Mother Clutter Mistress for Rev. Massey clutters too and I know this all preparation for Dr. Jim Clutter, the 6’1” love of my life.

      Sleep, girl; sleep. Rev. Massey gone now. Okay to go to bed. Okay to spread your wings of spirit and prepare the runway so all can fly …….