AS TOLD TO BC PIRES

My name is Ayanna Leonard and it took three months for me to find a pet-friendly apartment.

I’ve lived in the West from age 12 onwards. So I say I come from the West, although I was born in South and my formative years were in St Ann’s.

I come from a small family, just my mom, Josanne Leonard (the journalist), me and my brother, Sebastian.

I have a small family myself. Just me and my daughter Jayyiidah-Rae. Jayyiidah is Arabic and Rae is because she’s a ray of light.

It’s taken a while to get there, but we have a remarkable understanding of one another.

From very young, I had a strange way of seeing the world. I’ve always felt like an adult.

It wasn’t difficult, growing up with a mother with a public profile.

I thought my mom was the most amazing thing. I saw her like a creature: enigmatic. I saw how rooms lit up when she walked in. I admired a lot about how she navigated the world.

Baby school was St Bernadette’s in St Ann’s. We lived in Coblentz House, the old plantation house converted into apartments. Gorgeous! Marble! Beautiful! I explored that magical space as a child alone. We lived there from when I was four up to Common Entrance.

David Rudder’s line from Madness always come to mind: she went to Holy Name!

My mom went to London to work in the High Commission, so at 13, I left Holy Name and went to London.

I was so ahead, academically, they pushed me up to do GCSE.

We came back to Trinidad in ’91 and they pushed me back to form three and I had to choose subjects all over again! All my friends I left were now a year ahead of me. School was just, like, ugh.

I was raised RC, but not in my home, in school. Mom grew up Presbyterian.

Asked if I believe in God, I say I believe in Source, an ultimate source.

I believe God is a word assigned to what might be. I’d never pray to God for good weather for the cricket. I’d quicker speak directly to the elements, to the moon.

I choose to not wrap my head around mankind’s necessity to label and affix deliverance through this thing they need to believe in.

I believe we are in charge. We have godlike abilities in the way we can manifest things and approach our own healing.

If BC Pires asks if I mean God is love, I say I am love. You are love. We are all pure manifestations of love. Because, guess what, it’s a polarity. It has to exist.

My journey is not that long.

All of my tattoos have come in the last two to three years. I’ve always had a fear of needles. My daughter got tatted before me.

I did piercings though. I had, like, 12.

The act of tatting, piercings, all these things, are deliverances for me. Sometimes it’s to mark an ego death, sometimes it’s to mark a transition.

[caption id="attachment_1005524" align="alignnone" width="867"] Ayanna Leonard says and it took t