Deb went to Point Pleasant on Friday, March 9th to float out an offering in Joanne's name. Joanne followed Yemaya, an orisha in the Santeria/Yoruba/Voudoun pantheon.

From Deb:

"So on Friday, April joined me to go to Point Pleasant with Trish and Cecily. I was pretty scatterbrained about it -- Joanne's wake had only been two days prior to that. To be completely honest, I was sort of dreading going to the shore. I guess on a deeper level, while the wake was v. sad and difficult, wakes tend to feel sort of surreal. You have the (often times needed) shock of seeing the body, the loved ones grieving, perhaps a sad euology. But it takes place in a funeral home which is nothing ever like anyone's real home and it tends to feel both painfully real and blessedly unreal. I think for me, going to the shore to float out an offering to Yemaya to take Joanne across her ocean was just going to be painfully real for me. Usually I'm v. organized when I'm leading rituals, offerings and outline neatly packed, relevant directions and phone number in hand and I tend to be v. punctual.Ê I was basically a hot mess for this event -- left late, flew into the grocery store to get everything I needed as I was flying out the door, and still not really sure what to say. But Cecily and Trish were kind about it and everything happened as it needed to happen. I had bought a seedless watermelon as it's more precious this time of year, a small bottle of rum, flowers, and the wake card. Trish had bought new pennies to secure Joanne's trip. It was cold, but whenever I get to the shore, I sort of forget how cold it is and get into a ritual headspace. We floated her melon out and sang songs to Yemaya and Joanne and broke up bagels for the gulls. It was beautiful and painful and just what I needed. We went to the Atlantis diner afterwards and had fun talking about pop culture and other such things and laughed because we needed to."