Food For Thought

You ever have those moments where things that you have been living with for years start to all of a sudden look different?  I've been having a lot of those moments in 2014 and though it sometimes scares me, I am more often than not delighted by this second sight.  Over the summer, I started to see someone that I have known for years in a different way and that happened out of nowhere.  You know? One moment you are laughing with someone you have known for most of your life and wanting to be with them, then out of nowhere you realize that you've outgrown them.  I also had that same realization a few times with a few other people this school year, you know, there were guys that treated me the way I had always wanted guys to treat me, yet that didn't allow me to overlook the bigger picture so I did what a "big girl" does and I let them go.  But this recent eye opening event was beyond what I've experienced before.
        The other day, tears fell from my eyes as I imagined waking up and not being able to see the Washington Monument from my window, or hear that VERY loud ambulance siren, and most importantly not be able to be at Howard University.  If you have ever attended an HBCU you know that financial aid is probably the biggest struggle and as things are not great financially for me and my family, this year my mom opted not to get a loan.  I was awarded a $3,000 scholarship for the year, loans that I will be paying off until I die and yet in the end, I still had a very high balance that is keeping me from registering for classes.  I am in the final stretch of my college career.  After two more semesters I will have accomplished the biggest and best thing in my life so far, getting my college degree, and I can't imagine getting my degree anywhere else.
        For a few hours, my head throbbed in frustration and my heart broke in pain as I had to contemplate the real reality that I may not be able to afford to finish my college career, at Howard anyway.  It was a seriously scary thought.  You see, a few weeks ago when I was out in DC with a friend of mine, he asked me if I won the lottery, would I still go to college.  I told him I would.  He thought I was crazy, but I honestly and truthfully would not want to miss out on the experiences that I have had at college.  I have grown beyond anything I would have imagined and I have learned things and done things that I have been so blessed to have had an opportunity to do.  Right now I am even writing for my school's newspaper, a dream of mine even before I came to Howard.  I mean, there is so much more, but not only would I have gone to an HBCU in the end, I would have gone to Howard.  I have felt it in my soul from the very beginning that I was meant to be here.  I feel like God intended for me to nourish myself and grow on the very soil my ancestors walked from 1867 until now.
        After balling my eyes out and calming down, my mom called me and told me that she had put the loan through and that everything was going to be fine.  I was beyond elated!  I feel so blessed to have a mother that will do anything to get her daughter this opportunity.  Once I realized how close I came to being back in my hometown wasting away in the house and as a "costumer service specialist" at JCPenny's, I knew that I couldn't and wouldn't be the same anymore.  There are times where I let my bad habits stress me out and make me a bit cold toward the opportunities before me.  You know what I mean? You get so complacent in a blessing that you sometimes forget that it's a blessing.  Being at Howard University is a blessing!  Howard gave me a chance when what I thought was my dream school wouldn't.  Every minute I am here, I grow even more!
        Today, I went through my same schedule, but I had a paper due.  As I was finishing this paper I made my way to the library and worked harder than I have in a while.  But when I went to turn that paper in, I stopped and looked at the campus.  It looked different.  I mean, nothing really has changed since I have been here, ascetically, but today this campus took on a whole new meaning.  And as I walked through Douglass Hall, I didn't take it lightly that it is a pure blessing to be there.  I am blessed at Howard! Beyond blessed! And I know I can make my dreams come true here! Alls I have to do is work hard.  And today I started working with the newer more insightful me!
        I am starting a legacy for myself, for my future children and my future grandchildren and my future great grandchildren, etc.  They will be able to look back at me and say, "she graduated from Howard University.  Maybe I can too."  That scare made me reopen my eyes and see that I can't just keep getting by by pushing myself every now and then, I have to push myself all the time to be my absolute BEST.  And another thing, which was something my uncle told me yesterday, was stop focusing on things that I can't control.  And I did.  I am putting all of that useless energy into something useful and that is me striving to do my absolute best in my work!  I am a journalist, I am a writer, I am an activist, I am Black, I am a Black woman, and just as important...I am a Bison!

Peace.

DeFINING Blackness

You know when you have one of those days where you just walk around looking as if you're saying "fuck the world?"--without saying it.  I have been trying to control my mean-mugging as much as possible, but the other day I couldn't help, but to have the pain that I was deeply feeling written on my face.  And I didn't care whether or not people saw it all.  Then there was a guy that I walked pass on campus that looked to be my age or maybe a year younger that said, "damn baby, smile!"
        It always makes me feel down when I look so low and sorrowful that a stranger feels obligated to cheer me up.  But why was I pouting?  I knew, but I confused by it all.  See, every time school starts, I fool myself into thinking that I am fixed; I fool myself into thinking that I am in no need of anymore repair, but then something happens to bring my back to reality.
        And this year, my reality is that I don't truly know where I am in terms of defining who I am.
        This revelation has brought to my attention that I have come a LOOOONNNGGG way from where I was my freshman year.  I have been at Howard for almost four years and I feel like I know this place like the back of my hand.  I feel like I know the culture like the back of my hand; you have the afrocentrics who walk around campus with locks and nose rings, a lot of whom look down on other students, you have the fashionistas that walk campus with their long weaves and runway outfits like everyday is a black tie affair, you have the athletes who always seem to be wearing shirts that tell you that they play for some kind of Howard sports team, you have the business savvy students that are always dressed up like they are going to some kind of board meeting and there are many more kinds of people than I can describe or count, but my freshman year I knew where I fit in and where I didn't. And even though a part of me was hurt by that, a bigger part of me was ok with it.
        Now here I am at age 20.  I feel like I'm wandering between two worlds: one in which I am trying to hang on to what I once was and one where I am determining if I am ok with who I am now.  I have also been trying to decide if whether or not me being where I am now is a good or bad thing.  Yet, I seem to forget that I am a three dimensional person and there is no one word to describe me, just like there is no one word to describe the beauty in this picture.  This girl looks to be creative, classy, sexy, smart and she seems to not care what anyone else is doing.  I remember seeing this picture in a group of pictures from a Jean-Michel Basquit photoshoot.  And when going back and forth on which picture I should use for this post I looked through my collection and was a bit surprised, but humored that my past self loved this picture enough to save in on my computer. Lol
        With this, can't I be like that? Can't I be classy, sexy, smart and not care what anyone else thinks at the same time? Can I do all of that, twerk, drink and still be a civil rights activist that goes crazy over learning something new in Black history?
        First of all, I need to pose the question as to why I have to ascribe to anyone's esthetic of what a militant, afrocentric, intelligent woman looks like? I can't look like Angela Davis, Kathleen Cleaver and Elaine Brown...I can only look like Me! Yeah, I may wear my hair like them sometimes, but what about the times where I have a weave, or box braids, or a crop top and leggings? Does that make me less of a revolutionary? Why?!  I have my own style! I have my own ways of having fun when I'm not on my nerd-flow! I like going to parties every once in a while and I may or may not drink here and there, but I also like going to the library just to read old newspapers and to look at old pictures of the Bison that have come before me, I like to go to museums on weekends and stare at the same old beautiful lace handkerchief that Harriet Tubman wore, I like to sit at my computer for hours and write novels about times I wasn't a live to see, I like to read nonfiction books about historical people and events.
        I am growing up so much and so fast that I can't keep up with myself sometimes.  There are so many things that I used to tolerate that I can't stand now-a-days and at the same time, there are so many things that I have opened my mind to.  Man, this growing up stuff is a trip and I am at the center of it all.
        Each morning, I look in the mirror and see a beautiful stranger, someone that I had inexplicably dreamt I would be.  I mean, I don't have my dream job yet, that dream husband, and that dream lifestyle I used to find myself daydreaming about in middle school, but I am in essence well on my way.  It's funny, when I was a kid I used to think that when you became an adult, you would be this completely different person that had no memory of the desires and wants I did at that time so I prayed that I would be the same person, that I would be nice  and that I would remember who I was if I did change.  Yet I dreamt I would become this girl that was actually beautiful, talented, in-charge, confident, and a head-turner.  Here I am young Blackness!!!  I ain't where I need to be, but Lord I ain't where I used to be!
        So this question I ask myself everyday, what is defining Blackness? I guess it's just me figuring out who I am on my own terms, so not as a sex object for men, not as one of those girls that do what they can to fit in with other girls, but as Blackness doing shit on her own terms! I'm a work in progress, but the key to it all is to see that I am progressing!

Waiting On A Perfect Storm

Not too long ago, I heard of a phrase that has stuck with me ever since: you can choose to either be the river or the rock.  This phrase repeats a concept that I am still getting the hang of and this concept is that in life, we HAVE choices.  There is this whole question of free will that I won't get into today, but the thing is, life moves on whether we want it to or not.  Since I can remember, it has been hard for me to let go of people who I had grown to hold fond memories with, but yet it was easy for them to take the scissors and cut me loose like I was those raggedy edges on the side of notebook paper.  I found myself hanging on to something that was either never there or had just faded away, and hanging on made me so blind that it took me a while to see that I was hanging on alone.  It hasn't been that long ago since I realized that you CANNOT force people to stay in your life if that is something that they DON'T want to do.  At the same time, you DO NOT have to chase after people who WANT to stay in your life if that is something that they want to do.  With that being said, it's been a trying process to come to terms with the fact that I can't control the weather, but I'm getting closer and closer each time.
        You can call me stubborn if you like, but I love to hang on to things.  I hang onto words, I hang onto memories, I hang on to rements of things that no longer exist or define my present.  I mean, I don't think anyone likes letting go of things, but they just get better at dealing with it.  More than anything, People have been the hardest thing on the list to let go because I love hard.  I used to jump into the water with my eyes closed both feet in until I realized that once I opened my eyes, the waters had dried up and I was just left there to dig for more by myself.  The worst part of it was that I was aware that that person had left me out to dry, but I still yearned to have them back thinking that things would be different if they gave me another chance.  But after so many heartbreaks and heartaches, I finally told myself that I didn't want to feel that way anymore and that I was getting along pretty fine with what I had before they walked into my life in the first place.
        Then there is this whole thing about trusting God and his will.  I truly believe that he puts people into your life for a reason.  His timing is also divine as well.  From the very beginning I wonder what was the purpose that some particular person posed being present in my life and why were they in my life at that moment for that amount of time.  God always shows me the answers, maybe not when I want him to, but they do become apparent.  Life is about lessons as it is about living.  Every pain and every joy comes with a moral of the story, and I have become the woman I am today because of it all.  It's crazy too because at those moments in time, I thought that I'd never be happy again and I thought I'd never be able to go on without that person, but look at who I am have become; I am stronger and wiser, and those people that left me out to dry also brought me a gift that I cannot thank them enough for: the gift of insight.  But I also believe and have seen that God has something bigger and better planned for me and even though at times, the people in my life can be as temporary as a rental car, they bring me happy memories that show me great insight into what could be in the future with someone who won't actually take me for granted.
        As I am growing up, I am more and more determined to be my number one ally.  I want to be the one I know I can come to for comfort when everyone else is busy or won't answer their phones; I am starting to be the one that believes in what makes me who I am and I am proud of that.  Not too long ago, I used to blame myself for failed relationships or potential relationships, but today I know what I can bring to the table, how lucky someone would be to have me and now I'm just waiting on that one person that can't get enough of me.  My tolerance level for cowardice and plain ole unconcern for my feeling is growing lower, and my insight onto what I do deserve is growing higher.  With that being said, I guess it's safe to say that I love myself enough not to settle for anything less.  I mean, when people show you who they truly are the first time, you should believe it.  So at that first instance you show me something pecular, I take a mental note, but you get cut off if it happens again.  I used to chase after people because I didn't want to believe that the ugly faces they showed me were real and I thought it was my fault that they looked that way, but they were like that loooong before I came into the picture.  You can't change people or their feelings or anything else, they are who they are and they can only facilitate in their own growth because they choose whether or not they learn from life.
        Yet, it doesn't become any easier to deal with the beginning of moving on without someone you thought would be moving with you.  At first I analyze and wonder what it was that could have happened.  I sometimes turn to old habits and blame myself.  But I have begun to see how ugly that other person looks as they seemingly fade out someone who has all of these great things to bring to the table.  In the beginning I try to resist it thinking that there is something that I can do to change the tides, but it's all the more painful to feel the river crashing against me.  And whether I like it or not, the river will keep running, but I have the choice as to whether or not I will run with the river or let it run up against me.  And you know, I used to believe that if I could wait for the perfect time to just analyze everything, things will be easier. But as my teacher said today: "if you try to wait for the perfect storm, you will not move forward."  And that's always been my excuse. Let me just wait until this time, on this day blah blah blah and I will get it together, but I end up putting it off.  But not anymore because today....I CHOOSE to be the RIVER!  I want to be happy, but the only way to make things better is to DO things better and in a different way...and to stay with it even on cloudy days.  I'm done waiting on a perfect storm to come to make me feel confident in my decisions and happy as I always strive to be, I want all of that stuff TODAY!  But things are not going to be easier as time goes on, but I will get better at it.  You'll see!