Grandmas’ Hands

UNDERSTANDING UNDERSTANDING LETTER 4

The tops of Aunt Rose’s hands were loose. Her 80-something year old skin had lost its taught grip on the bones below. They smelled faintly of that buttercream yellow Vaseline moisturizer she used. But the pliable tops of her hands juxtaposed strong, work-worn palms that could deftly mend a torn pair of pants, instantaneously determine the ripeness of a cantaloupe, or produce a litany of pasta shapes from the kitchen of her suburban New Jersey home that I knew and loved. 

Aunt Rose was my grandfather’s sister. Having lost my grandmother when I was only 2, Aunt Rose dutifully stepped in as a surrogate. In the after-school hours before my parents came home from work, Aunt Rose looked after my sister and me. We’d play countless card games and shoddily fill innumerable coloring books, but in truth, I barely remember those things. 

What I remember are her hands. 

I can still see them in my mind’s eye. I knew her wiggly veins like I would come to know the New York subway map. I’d push them side to side, or depress them and watch them reconstitute when my finger was removed while she slept beside me after watching her “stories.” These were the hands that held mine when we crossed the street. They were the ones that would feel my forehead when I was sick or palm me a few bucks to spend on candy like some Norman Rockwell version of a Sicilian pizzo. 

Aunt Rose wasn’t my grandmother, but she grandmothered.

About a decade after Aunt Rose went to the great Sunday dinner in the sky, another grandmother entered my life. I first met Doña Leova on the recommendation of a friend who knew I was going through a particularly challenging time and thought I might find solace in the healing hands of a visiting Mexican curandera (folk medicine healer).

I was emailed an address for my appointment and arrived at a nondescript residential building on New York’s Upper East Side. Opening the door to the apartment revealed a beautifully appointed home covered in antique rugs, a panoply of religious artwork, and the distinct smell of burning copal wafting through the room. From afar, I heard the faint trickling of otherworldly music from behind a screen room divider. Soon, a Sikh man called Roberto emerged and led me to see Doña. As we walked, he explained that he would translate for her as she performed a limpia – a “washing” of the trauma and ailments I was carrying.

Moments later, on the other side of the screen divider, I was sitting with Doña. She flashed me a warm smile, made even more divine by the flickering sparkle of sunlight bouncing off of her gold-rimmed teeth. She grabbed my hands in hers and looked me in the eye. Doña Leova’s hands were like stones. I’d felt these hands before. Maybe not the same texture, but the energy that ran through them. “Okay, muchacho,” she said after staring into my eyes for a few moments. She clapped her hands, laid me on the floor, and proceeded to beat the hell out of me. 

She dug into my belly like she was looking for loose pesos between couch cushions. She cracked my bones, smacked me with bundles of herbs, spat alcohol on me, and generally disoriented me away from my story and my pain. And then she stopped. She got quiet. And after the tumult and the chaos she sat peacefully, laying her hands on my belly and she began to pray. Sweet, gentle Spanish words fell from her lips as she put her full intention into me and my well-being. 

I asked why she was resting her hands on my navel. She cackled in the way that witches do, and said “Because that’s where you started and where the real you lives!”

During the session I cried from both the physical and emotional upheaval, but in the end, I felt so much lighter. So much more free. Afterwards she told Roberto to have me come back tomorrow. She sensed I was seeking something and she wanted to teach me more about her work. Roberto told me she doesn’t usually want people to return so soon. “I don’t know why she wants you to come back so quickly, but I’d do what she says,” my new Sikh friend advised.  

I returned the following day, bruised but happy, with some flowers and chocolate as a thank you for yesterday’s spiritual asskicking. She looked at me in the same way she did the day prior. It felt like she was scanning my soul. Doña’s smile emerged and together she, Roberto, and I shared some chocolate. After a few moments she instructed Robert to tell me that we were about to embark on my apprenticeship to learn the Nahua Peoples’ Tradición de las Abuelas (Tradition of the Grandmothers). She laughed her husky laugh that I have come to know and love and said, “you might be a man, but I’m gonna make a grandmother out of you.”

Over the course of a few years she taught me how to read the pulse in the navel. How to understand, based on its strength, its location, and a variety of other aspects, what we can know about a person. The Nahuas see the navel as the portal to this life. In utero, this was how we were fed and kept alive. But in order to be born, to become who we are, we must sever this life-giving connection. To the Nahuas, when we cut the umbilical cord, one life dies so another can be born. We enter into a bigger womb, where we eat and breathe differently. And we stay here until we are ready to die and be born again. 

As our relationship grew closer, Doña relayed recipes for herbal remedies, lotions, and salves that would come in handy as I practiced this work. She would teach me the songs and prayers her people have used for millennia to aid people who are seeking help. But the most important thing she taught me is how a limpia truly works and how it's  passed down through a maternal lineage.

The Nahua tradition shares its teachings through an oral tradition, relayed by a grandmother to one chosen granddaughter. They intentionally skip a generation because they believe that your mother has too many roles to play. She must be a caretaker, an educator, a disciplinarian, etc. But grandma teaches this work because grandma only needs to be one thing, love. 

In this lesson, my understanding of maternal power deepened. I remembered Aunt Rose. I remembered how even though it might not have been how she once imagined herself grandmothering, she instinctively conjured the compassion and care needed to fill the void. This was the work of Doña, her ancestors, and many women the world over since the dawn of time. The work of connecting and caring for others when they need it the most.  

And right now, in this time and place in the world, and more specifically in America, it feels like we need it more than ever. 

Over the last few weeks, as I’ve watched the news and talked with friends about what’s happening in this country, my heart feels like it continues to break into exponentially smaller and more fragile pieces. Abhorrent shootings of innocent Americans are ceaseless and rampant. The reproductive rights of our daughters and sisters are being threatened and repealed. Xenophobic trolls are crawling out from the shadows and into Tucker Carlson’s white supremacist spotlight. And all the while, American lawmakers continue to perpetuate their addiction to false premise fallacies and vacant thoughts and prayers. 

These might seem like disparate issues but I urge you to look closer. 

Reproductive justice is defined as, “the human right to maintain bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and healthy communities.” Mothering (and grandmothering) are action-oriented verbs. Women deserve the right to choose how, when, and to whom they mother and to do so in the security of communities and societies that don’t seek to harm them or those in their care. This is especially true for women in black and brown communities where the risk of gun violence is exponentially higher. 

There are endless scholarly articles espousing the legal and moral justification for a woman’s right to choose. Researching this topic further I unearthed an interesting perspective on why, in this day and age, we find so many men opposed to women’s reproductive rights. The paper’s author writes, “Contraception can be viewed in a positive light by patriarchy and hegemonic masculinity as it can be seen to encourage women to engage in sex as they will not need to worry about the consequence, namely pregnancy. Abortion, however, is less acceptable as it is the act of removing and rejecting the sperm of a male. This goes against hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy, which emphasize the importance of virility and fertility of men. As such, a patriarchal society will be more inclined to oppose access to abortion as it is seen, by extension, to be an act of emasculation.”

For far too long America has been under attack by the guns and dicks of emotionally immature men yearning to assert their masculinity through the ejaculation of perceived power. Except this isn’t real power. And this isn’t real masculinity. 

The real power in this world emanates from the hands that reach out to help. It comes from those who work to nurture the needy. The protectors of those who need protection. These people serve and support each other through a shared sense of mutual interdependence and a desire to act with unadulterated compassion. Positive masculinity supports this work, it doesn’t tear it down. It learns from the maternal acts of courage that women take every day in small actions and large. Working together, we can find the strength and resilience to move through this last trimester of darkness and into the birth of a new era. 

Every woman, regardless of her real, inherited, or assumed role, deserves her sovereignty. And because I am the beneficiary of the love bestowed on me by my mother and many other mothers I’ve come to know, I know in my heart that we must defend every woman and her indisputable right to choose how, when, to whom, and if they choose to mother. 

We are living in dark, difficult days. The hard-fought rights women once had are deteriorating. This fight is not easily fought. But in the chaos, like Doña showed me, we can find the strength to supersede our trauma. In those quiet moments I remember the hands of the women who’ve helped me. Who’ve seen me for all my inadequacies and potentialities and loved me into being the person I am today. And together, hand in hand, I know we will see each other through to a better tomorrow.

Take good care,

MV

HAPPENINGS

Events, talks, workshops, retreats…

Things I’m doing and things others are doing that you might find interesting.

SUPPORT REPRODUCTIVE JUSTICE
Now!

Hopefully this doesn’t need more justification. If you are looking for ways to help, there are plenty. The ACLU is actively engaging in a multitude of legal battles to end forced pregnancy. You can support them here. But fighting the battle in the legal world is going to take time. In the meantime, Plan C ensures that women who need access to safe abortions can get them. Stay engaged.

AT THE DAWN OF A NEW AGE
The Whitney Museum of American Art, Until January 2023

Among the Georgia O’Keeffes and Louise Nevelsons shown in this exhibition, you’ll find the work of Pamela Colman Smith. While her name might not be immediately recognizable, all my witch friends will know her as the artist of the Rider-Waite tarot deck. Smith was a mystic and a member of the occultist society the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, which borrowed ideas from Kabbalah and freemasonry for its own spiritual belief system centered on magic and metaphysics. This exhibition celebrates her and the world she created.

DOÑA LEOVA HAS EXTENDED HER STAY
Until June 8th

As mentioned in my last post, Doña Leova, has returned from Mexico to share her offerings with her New York community. Should you wish to experience her beautiful tradition, please email me directly.

OFFICE HOURS
Thursday, June 9th from 12-1pm ET

Drop in anytime, no scheduling required, and let’s chat. Think of it as a cerebral key party. Come on over.

OPPORTUNITIES

Talent, jobs, investments, collabs, and more…

If you or someone you know is interested in making a move or if you’d like to share a need in this section on a future letter, drop me a line. It takes a village.

I’m very proud to announce that I’ve joined the board of Sharks. If you like hanging with your friends and playing pool, Sharks is worth checking out. A new fundraising round just opened to drive geographic expansion and bring groovy times to more people around the country. Happy to pass along the investor deck for those who are interested.

Extra is helping people build credit by using debit cards. This work is helping usher in a new era of economic equity for communities around the US. They’re hiring a ton of folks right now. Check them out.

If you’re a mother and an entrepreneur, the good people of WEM want to talk to you. WEM is a new kind of financial services firm that is solely focused on giving back to the women who are working hard for their families and their vision. Check them out and spread the word.

EPHEMERA

Rotting fruit, Busta Rhymes, lost robots, puzzle jugglers…

Things I’ve picked up while meandering around the internet.

Kathleen Ryan has a knack for making the beautiful a little less appetizing. Her bejeweled sculptures of rotting fruit have me simultaneously enamored and feeling a little barfy.

Busta Rhymes Island is a real place in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts. The island was named in 2005 by Kevin O'Brien who began frequenting and caring for its upkeep. O'Brien named it Busta Rhymes Island as it had "rope-swinging, blueberries, and . . . stuff Busta would enjoy."

There’s a delivery robot meandering in the English countryside and seems to be happier than ever.

And to wrap up this edition of Understanding Understanding, check out 19-year old Angel Alvarado; A Columbian teen who will make you realize you have not focused enough on developing your talents.

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