Life is a Trip

by Fein, Judith

  Then Ana went to another shelf with envelopes that were stuffed with hundreds of photos. People had sent them from around the world so she could practice long-distance healing.

  “This is my way,” she said. “I pray for them.”

  My job in the capilla varied according to the client. Sometimes I handed Ana the incense burner or brought her the incense. Often I just sat next to her and she instructed me about the candles, the eggs, the incense, the herbs, or prayers.

  One night, when the family was watching TV, I asked Ana why she didn’t use a snake rain stick for healing. She confessed that since she had given hers to me six years before, she never got a new one. The next day, I took a bus to a nearby town and trekked from shop to shop, searching to no avail for a replacement rain stick. As night fell, I visited one last shop and there it was. When I gave it to Ana, I expressed a wish to learn how to use it to pull down the power of the moon. Ana grew silent. I dropped the subject.

  For one week, I was in a constant state of overload and mental exhaustion from the language difficulty, but on the eighth day, there was a linguistic miracle: at six A.M. I awoke suddenly able to understand about seventy percent of what was going on. (Speaking, however, was still difficult.) At seven A.M., Ana announced I was going on a trip with her. A taxi was waiting in front of the door. We got in, and it was not until we reached the outskirts of Juventino Rosas that Ana said she was taking me to some sacred places for healers and witches. I laughed and said I was ready for the Witch Tour.

  For about an hour we rode towards San Miguel de Allende, finally stopping at Santa Cruz de Puerto Calderón. “This is one of the sacred portals,” Ana explained, walking us into a small chapel where we were greeted by a curandera. The woman had sad, sad eyes and was draped in a serape. Four years before, the holy cross in the chapel, which had been there since 1531, was stolen. The woman said she hadn’t been able to sleep, drink, or eat normally since. She told us that the cross came from a time when the Indians were at war with the Spanish conquerors. There was an awful battle nearby, with thousands of Indian and Spanish dead on the battlefield. After the battle, the Indians saw the apparition of a holy cross in the sky, and they understood the power of the religion to which the Spanish had tried to forcibly convert them. They set up the cross as a shrine and eventually a capilla was built there.

  We got back into the cab and drove to a bridge on the old road to San Miguel de Allende. Ana told the driver to stop, and instructed me to climb down the steep, slippery, rocky path that led under the bridge. I did as I was told and saw the candles and paraphernalia of black witchcraft. The rocks had been charred black from smoke and candle-burning. And there were remnants of food on paper plates.

  “What is the food for?” I asked Ana as I climbed back into the cab. “Is it an offering to the devil?”

  She looked at me like I was stupid. “It’s food. To eat. Witches who work their spells get hungry too.”

  As we drove on, Ana explained that at every site where black witchcraft was performed, white witchcraft was also practiced. “They are holy power spots, and can be used for good or evil intent,” she said. “The energy in these places is very intense, and can be used for healing or for harm. Pedro and I have brought flowers and done limpias to cleanse the bad energy from these power spots.”

  Ana turned to look at me in the back seat. “We’re going to the village of Llanito now, and I need you to really pay attention,” she said forcefully. “There will be an all-night vigil and fiesta there on New Year’s Eve, and you must attend. All the Indians come, and pilgrims come, and many witches. You must stay up all night, and I will show you what to look for.”

  I got cold feet. Literally. It was extremely windy and cold in the tiny, nondescript, dusty, run-down village of Llanito. I became panicky at the thought of being there all night on December 31st alone—without a car or a place to rest and with limited Spanish. “Ana, I don’t think I can get here again. I’ll be staying in San Miguel de Allende after I leave your house. I have no transportation, no warm clothes, and I’m too paranoid to eat from roadside stands. I’ll be tired and cold and hungry. I don’t think I can do it. Will you be here?” I asked.

  “No. I can’t come this year. You will be here.”

  Damn, I thought. Damn. I just can’t do it.

  Ana took me into a small chapel in the church called El Señor de los Afligidos—our Lord of the Afflicted. She prayed in front of the Christ at the altar and pointed out that she had the same image of Christ in her own capilla. I nodded. I followed her around like a little perro. Then she instructed the cab driver to take us to three different calvarios, stone altars or shrines with niches inside. In each niche, she pointed out white candles that had been used by curanderos for healing and well-being. Then she pointed out black candles, black wax skulls, and miniature votives for harming children.

  “Children?” I asked. “What sickos set out to hurt children?”

  “If they can’t get to the parents, they go after their children,” she answered solemnly.

  The cab driver ran away, spooked.

  “You must know to recognize these things,” Ana said to me, “so you can deflect their energy, and not let them harm you.”

  On the morning of the tenth day of living with Ana, I felt that I should not impose on the family any longer. I was packing my belongings, preparing to return the bedroom to Ana’s daughter, and I was just about to call a cab to take me to the bus station when Ana’s daughter came running in. “Ana needs you in the capilla—now,” she insisted.

  I dropped everything and ran into the capilla. Ana was with clients—a couple and a baby—and so I sat next to her and listened. The baby had been sick, the wife had been sick, and the man felt that perhaps he had been “witched” by his ex-wife who was envious of his newfound happiness. Ana lit candles, watched them melt, and told the man he was right. “Envidia,” she said with certainty. Envy.

  Then Ana turned to me and said she wanted me to work with the couple. I was totally, completely unprepared. “Sola?” I asked. Yes, she nodded. I stood up and walked to the altar, beckoning the couple to stand on the stone inlaid cross. I felt like an idiot. I knew nothing. Worse, I couldn’t open my mouth and pray to Jesus in Spanish. I just couldn’t do it. I looked imploringly at Ana. She smiled. I opened my mouth, and broken Hebrew came spilling out. I was cringing with embarrassment but no one said anything—not the couple and not Ana. I intoned what I remembered of an ancient Israelite prayer for healing. I was sweating down to my internal organs.

  After the couple left, I was headed back to the bedroom to pack, when Ana pulled at my sleeve. She led me into an open courtyard behind her house, and held up the rain stick I had bought her.

  “Now,” she said, “the time has come. First I had to prepare the rain stick for use in the capilla, and I couldn’t teach you until that was done. Now you’ll learn to call down the power of the moon.”

  She showed me once, and then asked me to try. I held the rain stick upside down, I turned it right side up. I fumbled and felt like a fool. “If I ever try this, the moon will laugh at me and certainly not lend me her power to heal,” I said.

  Ana put her hands on mine, and showed me once again. I did it, tentatively, but she nodded that the gestures were correct.

  I returned to the bedroom, not thinking, just packing. Moments later, Ana and one of her daughters appeared. I thought they had

  come to say good-bye. Ana walked up to me and looked me in the eye. “You are on your own,” she said. “You can do it. You have been ready for a long time. You know how to do it. You are now a curandera, with my blessings.”

  I burst out crying. Ana burst out crying. Her daughter burst out crying. We didn’t talk. We hugged and hugged and bid each other good-bye. I grabbed my belongings and left.

  On December 31st, in the early afternoon, an old friend who lives in San Miguel de Allende dropped me off in Llanito. I was carrying sweaters, coats, hats, cameras, and a plastic bag fu
ll of food; I wondered how I could schlepp everything around all day and all night. I began to talk to people who arrived. Pilgrims—some of them crawling on their knees—had come to pray for healing from El Señor de los Afligidos. Hundreds of people began to descend upon the village, setting up camp in the courtyard of the church. They lit fires and cooked food. They curled up on the ground in blankets and went to sleep. It seemed odd that in the middle of such devotion and piety, there were also rides and food booths and an air of merriment in Llanito. I was offered food by the pilgrims, but declined. I accepted fresh bread that had been baked by breadmakers from a faraway village who had come on a pilgrimage. I trudged around, wondering where to park my body.

  After several hours, I talked to a young taxi driver and told him my predicament. I could deposit my belongings at his grandparents’ house, he told me. He took me there, introduced me to his wife and young daughter, and when he left the room for a moment, his wife grabbed my arm.

  “Our marriage is so hard,” she said. “My husband had a terrible childhood. He was treated worse than a dog. He turned to drugs and alcohol and it is very hard for him to stop. We have a child now. We have so little money. We live with my husband’s grandparents but they are cold to him. We pay them rent, but they still treat us like unwelcome guests. If my husband would stop drinking and using drugs, I know we could make it on our own.”

  Without us realizing it, the taxi driver had entered the room, and when he heard what his wife was saying, he dropped his head to his chest in shame.

  I felt terrible for them—they were so young and so dear—and I invited them be my guests for New Year’s Eve: rides, food, whatever they wanted. They happily agreed.

  Late at night, all the revelers gathered in front of the church to watch Indian dancers in gorgeous feathered attire perform the Danza Azteca, a centuries-old ceremonial tradition. The wife was standing next to me, and she started crying, telling me how difficult their life had been and how they had no adults who cared about them. They felt lost and they needed help.

  I knew what I had to do. I had no choice. It was almost midnight. “Would you like a healing?” I asked them.

  They both said, yes, yes, they really wanted a cleansing, a healing for the New Year.

  And so it happened. At 11:45 P.M. on New Year’s Eve, I walked to the most powerful of the calvarios, being careful to avoid the evidence of black witchcraft, lit a white candle I’d purchased in the chapel, and began to pray over the couple in Hebrew. It seemed normal to them, and oddly normal to me. I wasn’t afraid. I prayed from my heart, using gestures and words Ana had taught me, but filtered though my own upbringing. In a language that didn’t seem alien coming from my lips, I prayed and prayed and prayed.

  My last night in Mexico, I ate dinner out and came back to the apartment where I was staying in San Miguel de Allende. As I put the key in the front door, I heard someone call my name. I turned around and saw Ana getting out of a cab. She had come all the way from Juventino Rosas. How did she know the precise moment to arrive? She looked at me. I looked at her.

  “I did it, Ana,” I said. “Just like you told me. I was a curandera on New Year’s Eve in Llanito. I don’t know if I was able to help the people, but I did my best. I tried my hardest.”

  She grinned, and nodded her approval.

  When I came back to the United States, I struggled with whether or not I wanted to practice what I had learned from Ana in Mexico. Like Jacob in the desert, I went to sleep. I didn’t lie on the ground and place a stone under my head, as he did, but, like him, I had a very intense and prophetic dream. Jacob’s dream ladder reached to Heaven, and angels were climbing up and down. Mine led to a healing room, where people with problems were coming and going. The Lord offered Jacob the land and said his descendants would be as numerous as the specks of dust on the earth. My dream offered me clients who showed up morning, afternoon, evening, and night. Jacob woke up afraid and knew he was in the House of God and the place he was in was the gate to Heaven. I woke up terrified and knew that my becoming a practicing healer was the gate to a personal Hell. Jacob’s place was a bridge between Heaven and earth. Mine was the bridge between a great, adventurous life and being confined and trapped. Jacob changed his name to Israel and became the father of the twelve tribes. I changed my direction and became the master of my own life.

  I decided to use what I had learned from Ana only when and where it seemed appropriate, spontaneous, and right. I would never charge for it or make a profession of it, but would offer it when I thought it could help.

  I used my newly-acquired skills on my husband, Paul, who had a thyroid condition. I removed negative energy from a friend who was the victim of envidia or envy at work. An acquaintance had sciatic pain, so I agreed to do what I could.

  It snowballed quickly. People started asking me for healings, and their needs were sometimes serious and urgent. Working with them was depleting and draining. They called early in the morning and late at night. I was haunted by the hellish overwhelming dream. It was definitely time to stop. Ana’s destiny was to be a practicing curandera. Mine was not. I would help people with whatever I knew about healing and transforming negative energy, but it would be in other, more informal ways.

  Without any hesitation, I thanked Ana from the bottom of my heart, and I put my rain stick away.

  Ana’s path was not my path, but her impact on me was enormous.

  I was raised in a specific culture with a particular religion. Although the formal practice and observances never called to me, my background provided me with an ethical, moral, and spiritual foundation and a firm connection to my ancestors . . . from a village in Ukraine all the way back to the foremothers and forefathers in the Hebrew Bible. I honored my lineage but I also longed to know more about other peoples’ traditions and ways of being in the world.

  My apprenticeship with Ana touched something very deep in me. Her religion and her culture are the core of her life and her healing. And yet, when it came time for me to step forward and practice the skills I had learned from her, she respected the language, religion, values, and belief system I grew up with. There was no judgment; on the contrary, there was total acceptance of the difference between us.

  This was the kind of cultural exchange that propels me to set out, travel, explore, test, try on, adapt, adopt, and discover other ways of being in the world. While holding onto to my own values and beliefs, I am open to the diverse observances that exist everywhere in the world.

  It certainly was odd. An Israeli kindergarten teacher, who seemed intelligent and sane, looked me in the eyes as she explained how she met her husband. “I was forty years old, and I was just about to give up on meeting a mate. Then I prayed at the tomb of Jonathan ben Uziel, and two weeks later I met him. Eight months later we were married.”

  I chalked it up to coincidence until I met an Israeli artist who was bubbly, upbeat, and very credible. “My life has changed,” she said. “I was so lonely but then I prayed at the tomb of Jonathan ben Uziel and met my soul mate.”

  I was visiting Safed, in the vicinity of the tomb, and decided to check out the departed matchmaker. Armed with a healthy dose of skepticism, I entered the women’s side of the low, whitewashed building, called a tsyun. The tsyun is made of local rocks, cement, earth, and stones, and houses the remains of the famed first-century C.E. rabbi.

  Inside, a dark velvet cloth was draped over the sepulcher. Women prayed earnestly from Hebrew prayer books and several deposited coins and bills into charity tins. The room was littered with prayer offerings: brightly-colored cloth, silk and chiffon scarves, plastic hair ornaments, and underpants. Underpants?!

  I was in Israel on a personal mission. I was born and raised Jewish, but I was disaffected from institutional Judaism. Over the past few decades, I had bathed my soul in the spiritual waters of many different traditions, but, for me, the world of synagogues and formal, standardized prayer books was dry and uninspiring. I longed for deep connection; I wanted to be s
tirred, moved, and transported to transcendent realms. It hadn’t happened for me in America, but maybe it would happen in Israel. So even though the media assaulted us with daily images of Arabs and Jews attacking, shooting, bombing and threatening to kill each other, I was determined to find out if there was anything spiritual, mystical, healing, and holy in the Holy Land.

  That is what had brought me and my husband, Paul, to the town of Safed in the area known as the Gallilee, in the north of Israel. Although he had little interest in religion, holiness, or other affairs of the spirit (he dismissively lumped all of it under the heading of superstition), Paul had agreed to photograph whatever I found.

  “This is where legendary rabbis inspired the Hebrew people thousands of years ago. It is also where, in the medieval period, brilliant rabbis developed and disseminated the mystical Torah studies known as Kabbalah,” our guide, Nurit, told us.

  The hills around Safed are dotted with ancient tombs. To Jewish believers, these tombs of long-deceased tsaddikim, or holy men, are the meeting place between the living and the dead. People make pilgrimages to the burial places to ask for blessings, favors, surcease from suffering.

  “They do not actually pray to the ancient rabbis; rather, they pray that the departed tsaddikim will intercede on their behalf with God,” Nurit explained. “And because God looks favorably upon holy men and the merit of their lives, he is more likely to grant a request.”

  I wanted the hills surrounding Safed to be a spiritual place for me, but at the tomb of Rabbi Uziel, I was interested and amused, not inspired. Paul came out of the men’s side (men and women are separated in Orthodox Judaism) and when I asked him what had happened, he tersely responded, “Nothing.”

  Nevertheless, I decided to visit one other grave in the small, ancient village of Meron—perched on the side of Mount Meron, with its abundant greenery, trees, and views of Safed and the Galilee. Meron village is the resting place of Shimon bar Yochai. One of the most famous of the tsaddikim, he is credited with being the author of the central book of Kabbalah, called the Zohar, almost two thousand years ago. Believers go to his grave to pray for prosperity, peace in their souls, fertility, and healing.