I AM ARÁU is a beautiful story we wanted to share with you- the words are dedicated to a girl coming of age and experiencing her first period. This story has been written by Robinson Martinez and we hope that you all love this story just as much as we do. Please share it with others, like you, who are on the journey of self-discovery!
(Annoying) Journal School Assignment
MY GRANDMA IS WEIRD
I really don’t know what my name means, but Áma knows. She’s my grandma. She takes care
of me (my parents died and I really don’t want to talk about it right now, maybe later).
Anyway, Áma knows EVERYTHING. But she is also KINDA weird. And a little disgusting too. If
this wasn’t my Top Secret Journal that no one knows exists, except maybe my future
great-great-great-grandchildren, as the teacher said, I would NEVER share what I’m about to
share with you, well, because it gets kinda weird, AND like THE HARDEST THING I HAVE EEEEEEEVER DONE IN MY LIFE.
Okay, so what do I talk about? Oh yeah, I guess I can talk about the weekend that Áma and I spent together in the woods, which happened to be the time she utterly DESTROYED my plans
to go to the Sheep Fair, which is like THE ONLY exciting thing that EVER happens around here.
She told me we were supposed to go to the woods together because it was really important, that I would soon become a woman and this was the most important thing in the world for
me–oh yeah? So is the SHEEP FAIR! In this stupid little town, that was THE ONLY THING IN
THE WORLD I LOOK FORWARD TO every year!!!! I was soooooooo mad at her. But she
wouldn’t budge. She said that we were going to go camping and that was that–WHEN I HAD ALREADY MADE PLANS TO GO TO THE SHEEP FESTIVAL! Seriously?!
“Come on, Áma! Why can’t I go to the sheep festival? I already made plans like 3 weeks ago!
What are we gonna do that is more important, huh?!”
She sipped a cup of tea and continued chopping celery for her chicken soup she was making.
She laughed and looked at me with this gushy look, as if I were a little kitten.
“You are becoming a woman,” she said.
“No I’m not. I’m still a kid.”
She chuckled. She ALWAYS laughs at me. SOOOOOOOOO annoying.
“This is a very special, sacred thing. A beautiful transition. It is intense and painful and crazy too, but beautiful and empowering because you are now connected to the cycle of the moon and the cycle of the earth herself. It is your divine right. It’s happening soon, that’s why I want to
show you something very important.”
“This weekend I’m going to give you the first key of what it means to be a woman. And for your information, young lady, it is way more important than a sheep festival that happens every single year.”
“I don’t want to be a stupid woman. I wanna be free,” I said. “And plus, I’m supposed to meet Aya, Violeta, Karen, and…also…um…Omepo is playing the violin (🎻💘💞💖💖💖) with his
band.”
She stirred the pot, adding sea salt and tasting.
“Ohhhh. I see. I remember. Hmmm. I love you sweetheart. I understand what you’re feeling. I once was in the cocoon too like you, long long ago, so I am sorry to have you miss your weekend. I know this means a lot to you, honey, but tomorrow, I don’t know if it will be my last breath. The great universe might have me breathe my last breath at any moment. I am old so I
can’t take any chances. As you know, my dear, I love you very much and as long as I am alive I have some very important seeds to water in you, do you understand?”
“No, I don’t understand and I don’t wanna understand.”
She laughed out loud. She knew I did understand.
It freaks me out to hear Áma talk about her laaaaaast breath. Why does she have to say things like that? She is so dramatic.
Anyway, so fast forward to this weekend. She packed her backpack and I mine and off into the woods we went.
I was starting to get a weird sensation in…not exactly my stomach but more like my private area. I wasn’t altogether sick sick, but I felt off. Tense. Slight stomach pains. And a bloated feeling in my intestines. It was starting to feel terrible.
I was able to hike fine, just these weird sensations kept worrying me because I did not want to get sick in the woods with Áma. Because, with her around, she might make me drink something
disgusting like deer urine or something even worse, like, I could totally see her saying, “Eat this squirrel poop, it will help your nausea.”
Even though I was doing ok, the second night of camping with Áma was THE WORST NIGHT
OF MY LIFE.
My phone screen said it was 2:22am. Weird. The crickets sounded like they were in pain too.I remember it as clear as as all the stars that were out that night. I woke up and my stomach was hurting in a way it hadn’t hurt before, and my breasts, they felt weird like it hurt just having a bra on. I felt angry at Áma for dragging me here. I was scared because there are bear and mountain lions in this area. And as Áma says about mountain lions, if you see them, they saw
you first a while ago. Scary. Anyway, the pain in my stomach was unbearable. My heart was beating really fast. I could still smell the aroma from the fire we had built. It was down to the embers. The earth was way harder than my bed but I was nice and warm in my sleeping bag. Áma was snoring. I just started crying. Crying because I missed mom and dad so much. I was
still so mad at them for dying. I was mad at God too for taking them from me. How could a good God do that to me? That night I wanted to die. I cried and cried. And though I was with Áma, I felt alone–I wonder if crickets know that I’m crying? Do crickets cry? Are they as lonely as I am? Is that why they sing into the night?
I thought Áma was asleep because she scared the crap out of me. She abruptly hugged me
and I screamed so loud that it scared her and for a second she thought a bear or something
was about to hurt us so she grabbed her rifle and pointed it all around me as if she were an
army leader and we were under attack. But then she realized that it was herself who freaked
me out. Omg. She laughed h.y.s.t.e.r.i.c.a.l.l.y. I was crying all the ocean outta me and there she was, laughing hysterically, shaking the barrel of her rifle and slapping my back and holding her belly. Who is this woman?
Though it was dark, the half-lit moon and stars made it slightly visible. After she wiped her
laughter tears, she reached for my face and wiped mine.
“Come here my beautiful,” she said more softly. She held me, my head resting on her warm big chest. There was a soft breeze through the pine trees outside. The frogs were out too. I almost
felt hugged too by their murmuring.
When I woke up, I felt like I kinda had peed my pants, so I reached down to check. My fingers were bloody. WTF!
Besides my parents dying, this was the most shocking thing I had ever witnessed. My stomach pain had become the worst. What made the pain almost manageable was huddling fetus-style,
one hand holding my stomach, the other, staring at my bloody fingers. My pj’s had blood on
them too. Oh god! I wanted nothing more than to take it all off and go into the shower.
Áma smiled at me. A big annoying smile. She opened the tent, left and came back with tea thatshe had heated on the fire. The fire was a soothing gentle flame.
She handed me a cup.
“Drink.”
“What is it? I said.
“It is woman nature tea,” she said with a mischievous smile.
The tea smelled great. It was floral and not altogether sweet but with a wonderful aroma. After half a cup, I noticed that my stomach pain was more tolerable. I felt more relaxed.
Holding a tin tea cup with vapor becoming invisible in the air, she said to me,
“Your society will do all sorts of things to make you feel like what you are experiencing is wrong or that because of what you’re experiencing, it makes you weak, or less than a man.”
I wondered why in the world she was saying these things.
“Do you understand? She said.
“No, I don’t.”
“My sweet Ra-Ra, you are becoming a woman. The blood from your sacred opening is a most practical and profound cleansing that your body will go through for many many years.”
“So you’re saying that blood coming out of my vagina is making me cleaner? But it just stained my favorite pj’s. (????)
Áma laughed. She got up, grabbed a handful of rocks and walked to the edge of the lake. She picked up a rock and threw it in. She waited. Then she threw the other one and another one.
“Do you see the circles on the water? Do you see their overlapping? ”
“Yeah, what does that have to do with anything?”
Holding back from laughing, she said,
“Cycles, sweetheart. Everything in life is a concentric circle, and all of us overlap with our ups
and downs, our light and our darkness and our light back again; your cycle connects you with the moon and all the other planets that are dancing their spherical Godly choreography in our galaxy, swirling around the sun.
The fire crackled.
“Okkk (??????)”
“Don’t you see sweetheart? You are a woman now, and you are made of earth, of air, of fire, of
water; of spirit. And you, if you were to mate, are now capable of conceiving a child! This
ability, to be the holy carrier, the divine creatrix , the holy assembler and producer of life is a divine passageway into your womanhood. And this directly connects you with mother earth. Mother earth, this planet that we reside on, is the mom of us all, it is a female version of God that gives us fruits and veggies and animals and air and the trees and all this beautiful land. In a
small and profound way, someday, if you choose it and if it is written in your soul, you will be a mother to a child that for a very many long months you will grow in your belly and it will be connected to the pain you are feeling right now.
Áma had a tan face. I liked her wrinkles. I also liked how her black eyes lit up when she was
excited.
“Imagine all the planets in our galaxy dancing in circles around our great sun, the giver of consistent loving rays, these Godly miracle-wave-photons that make everything flourish into something better and beyond themselves; into blossoms of gorgeous orchids of potentialities.”
“Huh?”
I was sitting on a log feeling like crap; feeling dirty, feeling uncomfortable and disgusting with, Iremind you, BLOODY underwear (!!!!!) and here Áma was talking about planets and cycles and faeries! Ugh.
“ÁMA, I love you but I really need to change. My pj’s are ruined and I feel like crap. I wanna go home.”
“Good,” said Áma with a smile, let’s dig a hole.
“What! What are we going to do, plant a tree?”
“No, we are going to communicate with the earth. We are going to let mother earth know that
you are a little earth too, a new woman.”
(This lady is crazy! Sooooo, we dug a big hole. We used a stick from a dead branch. And she
had me dig WITH MY BARE HANDS, using only the stick to help me dig. I got a blister on my index finger, which was annoying (oh yeah, she told me I had to be barefoot the whole
time?????
So as I’m digging, she is going on and on about the earth–even though she’s weird, I love that crazy woman (I remember her saying so many times, a little crazy is good, it helps you be YOU better!).
When the hole was dug, she motioned me to place both open palms over it while I said ‘thank you’ 18 times.
My feet were a little cold. But I did feel relaxed. It was weird because for a second I felt that the earth was a big mama bear and I was petting her.
I saw a big shooting star in the sky. Áma raised her arms.
“We ask all the divine beings of the highest vibration of love and compassion to bless my
granddaughter on her transition into womanhood and possibly being a planet, mother to a little son or daughter in the future, a new little planet in her womb, if she so chooses it thanks to the
wonderful free will that we all possess . Bless you Aráu. May all the ascended masters bless
you. May all of our ancestors bless you on your journey ahead. May you be truthful and honest with yourself. May the purity of this earth, of these beautiful woods always be with you, may you always strive to protect the purity that you have within you. Today we plant that purity into the earth. And may a perfect plant or oak or flower or herb grow from this place. My sweet Aráu, you
are connected with the earth now in energy.”
She handed me water and a towel. She motioned me to clean myself on the spot we had dug.Your womanly purity and power is cleaned into this soil. May you be strong. May you be healthy. May you be happy.
We shoveled soil back into the hole. And at the end we went swimming in the lake.
When I think about that weekend in a weird way, I feel special. I feel good inside. Like I have a very special luminescent butterfly that lives in my heart. It makes me so unique and perfect just
the way I am. (You too;)