It’s day 4 of returning to school and I’m toast already. Back-to-school for my teen. Yes, the kid has turned into a teenager, and despite my organization and preparation, I’m just not ready. The early early morning rising, the morning shuffle out the door to school, the checking “do you have the following things?” The picking up from school, the car line (oh the car line), sports practice schedules, homework checking, instrument lessons and practice, school laptop charging, bedtimes, enforcing bedtimes, making sure meals happen somewhere in there but not too late. All of that.
It probably feels as hectic and reticent for the teen as it does for me. And then I have the additional concern where I ask, “What kind of world am I dropping my child off into?” I don’t worry about physical safety – although schools are not immune from violence. I am concerned about emotional safety, psychic safety, intellectual veracity, and relational health. I don’t worry every day, but it’s ever in the background of my mind. Indeed it is like having my heart walk around outside my body. Walk around in a society I’m deeply concerned about.
So every morning, I hold the teen’s head and we say “ori prayers.” We say them in Yoruba language. I say mine and the teen’s. Well, we say them together. And right before drop off, as this kid is halfway out the car door refusing to say, “I love you too,” in front of their peers … I translate the ori prayer:
“Let your head lead you. Let your head guide you, and be the best …”
My kid finishes the sentence “you [me] you [I] can be.”
Then I say, “You got this; have a good day.”
This child absolutely rolls their eyes at the rituals I insist upon. They also know that Mama’s ritual come from both love and Spirit. They know that Spirit is in them and guides them. And that I don’t expect them to be anyone other that themselves, the best version of themselves that they can conjure up on that day. I hope the same thing for myself.
These are things that Ifa gives my family.
And the kinds of things that are important parts of my spirituality … but that I rarely talk about.
Until lately.
