"My Father, Myself"

HAYWARD RAY HALL, Sr.  "Bulldog"

I was numb.

He was dangerous. 

He was bad.  He was fierce, one of the biggest and baddest linebackers "Podunk" had ever seen.  If you ever found yourself on the opposing team in a football game and had the nerve, the audacity, the unmitigated gall to think that you could or should try to traverse the football field anywhere near him; you were… well, hopefully you're okay today.  He was popular.  No, he would have never been voted "best looking," or even "most likely to succeed," but he, Elvin “Coach” Carlton and the rest of the crew, all but ran Black Hollywood High.  They were the boys that all the teachers kept a watchful eye on.  They were the boys for which all the girls jockeyed to get their attention.  They were the boys the other boys wanted to be.  They were cool, loud, obnoxious, class clowns and yes, the stars of the football team that gave "Podunk" its first State Championship. 

There he was.

There death was. 

In an instant, I found myself standing face to face with death.  I remembered the heaviness of my body as some sinister force began tugging at it, seemingly threatening to yank my entire skeletal system right out of my body.  My legs, once strong enough to run the 400 and 800 meter relays, 100 meter hurdles and compete in the high jump – in one track meet – were suddenly too weak to carry me five steps from the spot that held me.  Colored in the hue of death, his lifeless body, once so strong and impervious, was under siege.  “What have they done to you” I asked?  I had to get to him.  Weakened, I prayed for fortified steel.  Without it, I would have pulled my father and all that was attached to him down on top of me.  I leaned over and pulled him to me.  I tried as hard as I could to smell him, but there was no scent – none.  I tried to hear him – there was no sound – nothing but the incessant beeping of rude machines busy robbing him of his dignity.  His face was distorted.  His body was odd and unfamiliar.  My father – the muthafucka of all muthafuckas – was no more.

My father was not a religious man.  He believed in a higher power, whatever that power may be, but church, the bible, Christians – they didn’t have a chance with my father.  I loved and respected him for that.  Like most of everything in his life, my father lived by his own rules and on his own terms.  No one could tell him what to do or how to believe. 

So, I called them. 

I called them all – God, Allah, Budda, Krishna, Oladumare, the Universe, the Ancestors, Saints, Orishas and even Jesus.  I summoned them all to bear witness of my father, to make an account of his life, his service, his commitment to his people, his art, his passion, his pain, his hopes, fears and joy.  'Remember him and re-member him into your midst, and into your care.  Re-join him with his ancestral clan and set him in a high place of honor.  Grant him space and chance to continue to walk with me, to watch over and protect me.   In the name of all that is good, all that is right, all that is just, all that is peace and even Jesus – Amen – Ase’, Ase’, Ase’o.'

Goodnight daddy, I love you.  I'll see you on the other side of midnight. 
(The above is an excerpt from my novel, title and publication pending)

© Dorinda G. Henry, 2011

THEOLOGIA HABITUS EST!