the mojo bag (part 1)

Peter’s eyes are faraway and misty. He sips red wine and drifts absently around the room, like a balloon in the current of an oscillating fan. Deborah and I sit at the table, talking intently about the occult: ghosts, tarot, auras, energy. When I mention that I found a turkey feather earlier that day, she says with authority, “That’s auspicious.”  

It’s not every day you meet a real-live psychic, let alone one who buys you pizza and gives you a place to stay!  

Deborah’s hair spills over her shoulders in whorls and corkscrews as intricate as a fingerprint, and behind her black-rimmed glasses, her eyes are bottomless as hot diner coffee. She exudes a powerful energy, like the rush of wind before rain. I sit up straight as she turns her gaze on me, angling her head slightly to the right — the better, I imagine, to peer into the immutable essence of my being.

She seems to like me, and I am very, very grateful. If this person likes me, I must be doing something right.

I’m glad Peter likes me too. I’d forgotten we’d met until he opened the door: the nerdy glasses, the graying ponytail, the boyish smile. That’s right, Uncle Dean’s second funeral[1], the one in New Jersey.  

The first funeral centered largely on Jesus, and the mortician shaved off Dean’s mustache, combed his hair and put him in a suit. I remember standing over the casket, trying my hardest, but I couldn’t summon the tears to mourn this skinny Christian man who bore a passing resemblance to my uncle. 

But in Jersey, it was light-hearted. At the reception, I sat at a table with Peter and a bunch of Dean’s other friends, and we told rollicking stories and laughed so hard we tilted back in our chairs. From up on a cloud, in flip-flops and a NASA t-shirt, his hair pointing every which way, Uncle Dean raised a root beer in a toast.

Peter is a link to my ancestry, to the memory of my mother’s family. He helped her through the death of her father when she was just a teenager. He comforted her when her eldest brother Rich died at age 38, leaving behind his wife and their 3-year-old son and tiny 1-year-old baby girl. He offered support when my grandmother was dying, over six long and painful years. And he was there when Dean, the only other remaining member of my mother’s family, finally had to go too.

My mom lost her entire family. It’s a testament to her strength that she has reached out and created a new one, of fine people like Peter. Don’t let anyone tell you different: The bravest thing a person can do is to love again.

I can see the love Peter has for my mother and my uncles in the way he looks at me. Abruptly, he breaks his dreamy silence. “Deborah,” he says. “Make her a mojo bag like the one you made for me.”

[1] If you knew Dean Powell — whose self-appointed nickname was “Mr. Famous” — you would understand why he had two funerals.