Love & Vodoo--The Curse

"There are wonders enough out there without our inventing any."
-Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark


Commitment is more than an involuntary stay in a sanitarium. In a romantic relationship, any significant personal relationship, for that matter, commitment is fundamental to the love and positive energy that flows through the union. What's real tends to last. What's not tends to fall apart easily and disappoint.

But really, at the end of the day, for me every since I saw my first disaster movie called "The Day After" in the early '80s, I've been mildly concerned with survival should the shit hit the fan. So, for me, I'm thinking who is not going to ditch me, but love, care for and be with me should the Zombie Apocalypse actually go down, you know? Who's going to have my back should civilization unravel tomorrow but me? As I have no children, my primary concern will be for my aging parents. I must prepare, as I just hit 40, to be my own savior. Wow.

After I found out my sophomore year of college that Walt Disney was a known racist, I ditched all hope in the princess fantasy. It was bull, a simple product; and at 20, completely obvious as it was hard to find a gentleman, let alone a prince. Do some women get a taste of it? You bet. But only about half the people who take "the plunge" and have "the wedding" can get through the tough times to actual sustain long marriages. It is a rarity in these days and times for people to be married 40, 50, 60 years. If so, I wonder, how many of those years are spent truly happy? How many are tested by infidelity, mental and physical disorders and acute boredom? How many bounce back?

I was actually confronted with the news that chances were I would never be happy in love around the age of six. Yes, six. My grandmother, the matriarch of my mother's family, delivered the bad news. By this time in her life she was an ordained minister and missionary, so it was only appropriate she deliver this oral history down to me. I was her youngest grandchild.

One summer night in the San Bernardino Valley, as the desert wind howled and the window a/c unit chilled the dining room air, we sat around the dining table after dinner one night and she told me about our family curse. She spoke in hushed tones. A terrible pox was put upon us because of jealousy and  romantic love. You see, my grandmother's mother started the whole thing.

My great grandmother Helen Young was from a well-to-do African-American family. Upon graduating college, no small feat for a Black woman at the turn of the 20th Century, her father arranged a marriage for her with an African prince. If great grandmother Helen would have gone through with it, explained Grandma, we would all be princesses today.

Great grandmother Helen had other plans. By a twist of fate she met and fell in love with a half Black, half Irish musician with a penchant for booze. Grandma actually minced no words, describing her father John Russell as a "bum." However, he was her mother's heart's desire. Upon cancelling her engagement to the prince she was disowned from her family. What's more, the prince, distraught, was said to have gone to his witch doctor for retribution against his runaway fiancee. The witch doctor then put the curse on our blood that no Russell woman would ever be happy in love.

One might believe from the family track record that the curse took. Cut off a couple of my fingers and I could still add up the happy marriages on my mother's side, with one hand. I think that curse followed me back to The Bay.

I've wondered what, if anything, that old witch woman had to do with the situation I find myself in now. Pushing 40, a successful relationship had eluded me. I've had passionate relationships, even lengthy ones (seven years lengthy), but not one I could say was with the person I've really been looking for. The person I've always wanted possessed qualities I'd never experienced in a partner; foremost he would accept me at the place I showed up at and would be willing to grow and build a life with me.

My current relationship of nearly three years has by far been the most promising. We love and respect one another as we are. Our greatest challenge has been the two thousand miles that has separated us the majority of the time. After careful consideration I have decided to close that gap by moving to his state so we can get on with building a life together. It's a big step for the both of us. I'm not taking any chances. Sage, myrrh and frankincense will be burned in our space before I even unpack. My second biggest challenge will be controlling my mind. I'm sensitive and I tend to over-think everything. I suppose because of my life experience often being dictated by Murphy's Law, I just realized how often I wait for the other shoe to drop; in other words, for things to fall apart.

My boyfriend thinks my "curse" is hogwash and says we create our own fate. Part of me agrees. My Great Grandparents had many good years crisscrossing the country in a traveling jazz band, having eight kids along the way. The other part of me isn't so sure. For all of civilizations advances, life is still a great mystery. Who's to say that witch doctor didn't conjure up a magical link between this and the spirit world so strong that it may affect the outcome of this love relationship that I'm working on being my last? Ahh, there's that over-thinking again.

Curse or no, I must believe in the power of our love to overcome all the new trials and tribulations we will be facing together. For, in my heart, I truly believe that living in love creates the best luck of all.