Completion out of the void

Completion out of the void

A Healer, or one who can Heal…

By Akil-Kuumba Kelley

Knowledge of Herbal Medicine is a gift that keeps giving, as glad as I am to be in this field, I never chose it. Instead, it descended upon me. I was first introduced to herbal medicine through foraging wild foods. Since I had learned that several wild plants are not only edible but quite tasty, I was enamored with the idea. I thus decided to make a wild foods cookbook as my high school senior project, even then I had not considered being an herbalist. As my school focused primarily on college prep the future was monotone as far as opportunity was concerned.

More than anything I desired to go on a long backpacking trip on the Colorado Trail. I decided I would study plants and cultivate myself spiritually on the journey. However, with my track record, it was understandable why my mother was nervous. If I had not become an herbalist, I might eventually have poisoned myself. Desperate to distract my growing cathexis, my mom showed me several herbal schools in the state. Looking through the stack, I did not question the path but knew it was for me.

I was raised as a vegetarian, and often used holistic approaches to medicine, so in some aspects herb school was right up my alley. Although, being 18 years old in a class where most students are in their late 20s and early 30s even 50s and 60s was challenging. Not to mention I was one of two men in the class, and the only person of color, truly giving me a new understanding of the word minority. However, the silver lining was all the poetic inspiration easily found within unexpressed feelings. Still, I feel blessed to have learned a wealth of self-care knowledge at an early age. Allowing me to take my health wholly into my own hands. The majority of my class had been motivated out of their own healing needs, While I was there for a reason I didn’t yet grasp.

Once I graduated from the program, I faced similar challenges to any new grad, finding employment wasn’t easy even with certification. Being a young black man in a white women-dominated field is not as exciting as it might sound. Rejection from spaces with a mold I did not fit into became a common experience, and my frustration and disdain for the industry grew. I eventually sat on the stoop with a local legend, a 30-year business owner of an African good store in five points. Hearing me express my disheartening trial, he proposed that I become the store herbalist. Working in a small business is always one of a kind but working in a business owned and operated entirely by one West Indian man is another experience. The work forced me to dive headfirst into client work without much of a safety net. Although it was a pleasure to be able to exercise my newly learned talent freely of stipulation, at times what was placed before me I could only dream of having the ability to treat. This cultural gem was my entrance into the clinical work, however soon that door closed, and I needed to find a new way to continue.

Still living in my parents’ basement, I put together quite the impressive home apothecary. My dad being a carpenter, and mom being a gardener, I may as well have been the prodigal son. Having a unique abundance of medicine and left to my own devices I began a new project I called the mobile apothecary. Attaching a bike trailer to my spray-painted street bike, I called it the chariot. Strapped into it was a chest made of wicker, I liken it to the ark of the covenant. In the wicker chest sat 12 small bottles of my favorite herbs, 6 bottles of homemade tincture, and all the mixing bowls, and scoops I would need. As well as a card table, all sat snugly and weighed just enough to give me a worthwhile workout. I would ride to different events in the neighborhood and pop up the mobile apothecary. Having the rare ability to make custom herbal teas anywhere on the fly, to my surprise was quite an attractive presentation. Not only was I trusted, but I was also protected, never being harassed, or even receiving a complaint. This work was extremely rewarding, as I was fully able to manifest the servant archetype I so desired.

The great plague, Covid 19 swept across the nation only 2 years after I had finished my schooling. I had been watching the spread on an internet case tracker before it entered the U.S. Idealizing it and seeing the illness as my natural enemy, I prepared for the invisible war. Where like an exorcist, I readied my holy fixtures for an encounter with a being much more frighting than I. Crafting several herbal medicines, and clever supplies to be used in the ultimate antiviral regimen. Convinced by the sound of my voice in the echo chamber of my four walls, I began covering myself on the bus and receiving crazy looks a few months before the first lockdowns. The Herbal System I designed used a spray, an oil, a tincture, and the use of daily herbal teas. A mask was worn, then a scarf sprayed with herbal formula was wrapped atop my mouth and neck, hands kept moisturized with an antiviral infused oil, and an immune-boosting tincture was taken on heading out each day. Was it overkill? It's hard to say, still, the regimen couldn’t prevent me from psyching myself out. Causing me to believe I had been infected with covid when I just had huffed too much cayenne.

After playing the saint for a few months, the belief I could help with my holy cures got old. I tapped out, I didn’t want to be a healer, to be selfless any longer. As the 2020 chaos raged on, I changed my focus, and cared only about my progression, moved out, and lived fearlessly through the pandemic. I “switched sides” of the coin and began working the night shift at a convenience store, where alcohol and cigarettes are hot commodities. No longer seeing myself as a servant monk I stopped all herbal work for a year. When an old client would contact me, I would try to please them, yet it would never quite work out. I no longer knew my reason, why was I a healer, is that even what I wanted? Part of me was angry, feeling like I had somehow been co-opted against my will into the abused role of healer. Was this a result of my childhood, where I was emotional support for my parents, often listening to them complain about the other? Was that when I became this machine, one that lived only as a comforter, knowing care not for myself but only for others. Sitting in my shadow I continued to sell poison and move without intention. Still, my healing gifts were activated, when romance would find me making tea, trying to give her whatever she may need.

At the start of 2021, a local apothecary I applied to a year prior, called me for an interview. Soon after I was brought on as an Herbalist, although I was excited to get back in this role, The Dilemma still bubbled. As anyone who works to support the health of people in the community would tell you, it is one of a kind and deeply karmic work. Still, I’m not sure if I am a Healer, I feel more like a phantom with a useful ability. Transmuting trauma and its comorbidities into higher prosperous energy. Consuming their sickness and allowing them to drink from the vital blood of the earth. This is the way I see my practice now; I am a comforting, and healing vampire, a machine who can tap into your trauma, share your pain, and bask in tears like a refreshing rain.