Goddess: Part Eight – Pandora II.
[It’s the end of an era and the start of something new. I’ve been primarily working with goddess archetypes as part of my practice since I was fourteen. Now it seems its time for me to move on. But, in honour of the feminine archetypes that have guided me thus far, this is the goddess series.]
You carefully pour the hot water over the leaves and petals that circle the bottom of the teapot. The aroma hits you immediately, filling you up with a sense of warmth, promise and time. You move in closer, inhale the rising mist a little deeper, it smells like summer and makes you smile. You place the lid on the pot, and move it to the table, just in front of the candles. You find two cups, and two spoons, and a small bowl of sugar, and place them near the pot. You return to your seat and wait… Pandora takes a seat.
Pandora: I can tell you my story if you want. If you tell me yours.
Me: There’s nothing much to tell.
Pandora: Then tell me nothing, and I will listen attentively. (She lifts the teacup in front of her and holds it to her lips. She inhales deeply before taking a sip.)
Me: I took up knitting, sometime before Christmas, I’m knitting a patchwork blanket with the intention of making it a family heirloom. I want it to be a record, a physical representation of a moment in history, depicting me, my family, my surroundings. I’ve put together a small work box, with knitting needles, wool, pins and found and gathered objects that each mean something to me. This will be part of the history I’m creating, something that can be passed down, something that stories can be told about.
I’ve never felt like I have a history, stories about times before I was born, about my family ancestry, I’ve collected from eavesdropping, being invisible I could do that. No one talks directly to me, adults talk to other adults and even in my thirties, I’m not considered part of them, I’m separate. The point is, I envy English families, white families, who have a history and traditions. I envy Asian families who have culture and a base which to build on.
I know my family are from Dominica, I know my great-grandmother’s name, and that’s it and my grandfather’s name, but that’s it, they’re just names. My grandmother and step-grandfather moved to England together with their children, leaving my mum and her brother behind. When my mum was nine, she was brought to England because apparently my grandmother begged and begged. This is something he likes to remind us of, we wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him, we wouldn’t exist.
I don’t really know all that much about my father, I sometimes think he barely knows himself. I only discovered his real name after seeing it on a letter in his old apartment. He, apparently only found out his real name when he was nineteen and asked his mother for his birth certificate. He lives about ten minutes away and I never visit, a fact he constantly reminds me of when I see him in passing. I don’t have the courage to tell him I don’t trust him, he has a history of turning on me when I say something he doesn’t like.
I have no history, no culture, nothing that is my own, no base to build myself on. I tell myself this frees me, I can be open to anything, the whole of history is my history. Any culture I want is mine to taste. It’s not enough though. This blanket is a start. It can’t replace photographs that go back generations or jewellery that’s been passed down, pocket watches from ancestors that served in wars or even a dried flower from a young bride’s bouquet, but it’s a start.
Pandora: There’s a tradition, a very old one. Women carry their stories inside themselves. We tell our stories over and over in our minds until they become imbedded in us. Our stories can either empower us or enrage us, they become like secret children, waiting to be born. They rarely are, and because of this, the world remains the same, in perfect dysfunctional harmony.
Me: What happens when the stories are born?
Pandora: The world burns. Is there anymore tea?
Me: Of course. You promised you’d tell me your story. (I pour out another cup for her, a little of the hot liquid splashes back against my hand, burning it slightly.)
Pandora: I promised no such thing. I said I would, that’s different than a promise.
My story. My story is exactly that, a story. I was the first woman ever created, the model that all other women were based on. I was given something by the gods and goddesses, blessed with something no man had. I was given a hollow inside of me, an empty space that held all things, the potential for life and the potential for death. I was an archetype, nothing more, a representation of what it meant to be a woman. A woman’s hollow, her jar, her womb, can bring pleasure, can birth life. Once a month it will bleed and cause pain and suffering. Then over time this cycle will stop, life dries up, age and sickness come, followed by inevitable death. A woman becomes the symbol for the passing of time and the foretelling of time ending, for everyone. That’s all I am, that’s all I ever was, an hourglass with the sand running through.
Me: Well, this is the most depressing conversation I’ve ever had.
Pandora: No, I’m sure you’ve had worse.
Me: Yeah, actually, yeah. It’s limiting, isn’t it. I find it limiting. There are currently things we’re not allowed to talk about, certain things we have to pretend. Deep down, that’s what being a woman means to me, pretending. I’m limited, not even by anyone else, but by my own body, by myself. Sometimes I feel like I don’t belong in this world, I don’t fit in its structure, it isn’t designed for me. I have to work around my body and its limitations, which means I can’t fit into the world I’m supposed to fit into. Or I have to pretend, I have to deny things.
Pandora: The world never used to be like this. We were more… Imagine a world that moves in cycles, you work when you can, and you rest when you can. Work isn’t about money or social standing, but about the betterment of yourself and the world around you.
Me: I don’t live in that world.
Pandora: But you used to, we all did. Our bodies are naturally attuned to that world. We aren’t limited, just connected, to the natural cycle of all things. I can’t change the world back for you, but…
Me: I can?
Pandora: No. Well, maybe your little section of it. Create your own world that you can survive in. That’s all that I can give you for now. Thank you for the tea.
Concepts of the body are culturally specific constructions, having meanings and functions ascribed to them. What’s interesting though is that a great majority of cultures have stories of bodily transformations. These stories range from turning into beasts, animals or gods, to the metamorphosis aspects of Christianity, God turning into man.
Most cultures also have images of the perfectible body, idealised constructions based on notions of goodness, beauty and or power. Conforming to these aspects of ‘self’ that we think would be accepted by others is not something I think we are even consciously aware of anymore, it’s just the norm. Though, if we set these, mostly unattainable standards, and force ourselves into contortionist worthy shapes, to live up to them, are we creating false selves? To have an authentic self that conforms to a standard of living that we are naturally attuned to, do we have to step out of the society we’ve created and create our own worlds, unique to us? Or put the work into changing the whole world? Are we all just fictional characters, parodies of what we believe should be normal? My gut says yes, everyone is fiction, we’re all just stories.
