Bob-Marley. He is amazing
Originally uploaded by Dorky Pants.
Once, while I was bemoaning my constantly changing nature, a good friend of mine comforted me. “You’re one of the most consistent people I know,” she said, “You head directly for rules and authority in everything you do.” Thanks, Amy!
My next religious direction, at the age of 14, was Rastafarianism:
I listened to a lot of Bob Marley, my boyfriend was Rastafarian, it was suitably exotic, satisfied feelings of white guilt, had plenty of rules – mostly dietary – and oddly enough, it was suitably close at hand. When you’re not old enough to drive, a stero can become your vehicle of choice.
Plus, I got to grow dreadlocks. Very cool.
But don’t let this temporary adolescent wandering make you think I was less than serious about God. I just hadn’t found my home yet, and in the meantime I spent approximately 12 months irritating my family by not brushing my hair, using awkward verbal constructions like excising the word “me” from my vocabulary, eating weird foods and listening to a lot of reggae. I continued to read the bible but there wasn’t a lot of advanced Rasta doctrine available to me so mainly it was a “lived” experience and I keenly remember the absence of oreos (they had lard) and at one point seeing another Rasta on the street and yelling out the bus window, “Do you believe Haile Selassie is God??” because that guy passing by on the street was the closest I’d come to anything regarding Rastafarianism in months.
I jumped off the bus, we found each other, and he said, “Haile Selassie is dead.”
The only negative thing that happened as a result of my foray into Rastafari was that I lost a friend. Her family was Jehovah’s Witness and her mother felt I was a bad religious influence.
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