When I was growing up, I lived around mostly white people. That's okay. I had some of the most awesome friends in the universe. We stuck together so close. I truly felt loved and with a band of brothers. We shared everything together. We ran through sprinklers in our bare feet, played hide and seek, shared our packed lunches, traded clothes and whatever else, whenever else.
When I was in middle school things began to change for me on the inside. In appearance, I was what you would call a lanky size zero, combed down baby hair edges, with a lighting bolt smile. Even with this, I went through a period of serious lack of confidence that lasted for longer than I want to remember, but at least through middle-school.
I have never enjoyed a season of learning without earning near-perfect As. So learning was not my problem. What was, had more to do with inside stuff. I was extremely popular but without true feeling connections. I mean I had this extremely close-knit group of girlfriends where nearly all of them had boyfriends. I did not, not really. As one of only a couple of black kids in my class, the flirty, infatuation period mostly eluded me. As a cheerleader, I had long black shiny hair, flawless mocha skin, chicken bone bowed legs. I dressed really nice and modern. My only problem as I saw it, was the mocha.
Every so often, we had cafeteria dance parties at Evergreen Junior High. I never missed a dance unless I was on punishment at home and dared not sneak out of the house. Yes, sometimes I was out at a dance yet supposed to be at home grounded. Thank God Momma worked nights, which allowed me this risk to take on my own. I am not entirely sure it was worth the risk since I never danced. Not with guys that is…. and not because they asked me.
On one occasion, I did something that has shaped my life even today. As I write this, I have this tremendous lump of embarrassment and shame in my throat. Even at the age of 51, it does not take much to bring it back up. In middle school, I paid guys to dance with me, a nickel each song. This was around 1977, a nickel went a lot further than it does today. After word spread that night, I gave out a lot of nickels. During the dance, I felt liberated. At home I cried myself to sleep for the next several nights. What I did to myself was spirit-breaking. And after that, I could not get my footing back. No matter what anyone said nice about me, inside I was the girl who paid others to dance with her.
By high school, I was greatly endowed in the chest area, a family trait on both sides of the tree. Still skinny to the bone, I started getting a new kind of attention. It would take years for me to put those nickels far enough behind me to allow myself to love me, all of me, for me. Until then, I kept a boyfriend on each arm. A reminder that I was desirable.
It wasn't until I fell in love with me that I let all of that neediness go. Sometimes I still have flashbacks, especially when I see women like my old self. There are a lot of them too. I have a message for these nickels. The message is this. There are not enough nickels in all of the world that will fill a gap in a soul that has not made up its mind it is worthy.
Love yourself first and hard and truthfully and completely. Save your nickels for the bank and keep the interest.
3 Comments
She wanted to leave him. Everyone knew she wanted to leave him. She did not know how to leave. It is not that she wanted to exactly leave, she just did not want him there, anymore, with her. It had come to that. Slowly, overtime, and it with a creepiness to it. Sort of a slow creep-walk to total unhappiness and drowning. This meeting wasn't exactly something I planned to dress up for. I did not want to come across too polished. Like I was overly anxious. I wanted to go in there like I belonged, like I belonged there. I will admit, I was super nervous but I was determined not to show it. In big business matters like this the number one rule, don't come off like you are a fish out of water. I was left alone in a room while waiting on the Big Guy. Let me be honest, I wanted to snoop around a bit. I saw what looked like a book of some type on His desk. Yikes! Was that my book, my book of life? Wait, I am still alive. Aren't we a bit early to be bringing that out? I stepped a few feet closer. Oh my Jesus (sorry God)! Was that the Bible? The Holy Bible! Dang, dang, dang, DANG! Why didn't I brush up on it before coming in? That is even neophyte 101 protocol. Shucks. And I can't wing it. I mean he would be the first to know. Wait just one minute. I know a few scriptures. And in a pinch I can pull out Thou Father Who Art in Heaven......I know that one. That ought to hold his attention. But what if the Big Guy goes old school on me, like the OLD TESTAMENT? Colossal fail on my part for sure if he does. Wait a minute! He called me here. He must need something from me. What am I getting all worked up for? I have nothing to hide. I just need to stay calm and be me. And then as I am waiting I do the unthinkable given God is omnipresent and all, but I simply could not resist. I walk over to that big desk and I carefully, most gingerly as I know how, I creep toward that big book that I now realize is not the HOLY BOOK and I open the cover with my initials on it. What I see completely astonishes me. What I see beneath that cover and throughout each of those pages, all of them is NOTHING, completely blank pages. Nothing. I fall back into a chair and I am left to wonder that meaning. From where I sit, I have a real good view of my surroundings. And perhaps I have joined this party late and some may even suppose I hold my tongue. But when you can't or you just simply don't want to, you don't. So I won't. Hold my tongue that is. My momma used to say if you enter the fight of your own choosing then don't start crying if you get hurt. So I am and I won't. Start crying that is. I am fed up with the way people treat one another. I mean especially people who go to church together, carpool together, sit across the table for lunch with one another. Those who attend baby showers together, ride buses together. You get the picture I am painting here. It is so much easier to get along and sing aside the bonfire when every thing is fine and chipper. But one thing I am finding is when people have troubles folks scatter like a plague of locust has come to town. I mean not at first. I have seen how we will sign up to take our turn at the MEAL TRAIN or pitch in to get little Susie to cheerleading practice once or twice. How we might leave a voicemail message of "Do you need anything?" But to dive into somebody else's business to the point of inconvenience is not happening like it should. And from where I sit, this is just plain wrong, unchristian-like as momma would say. I mean when did it become okay to watch other people suffer? Did I miss something along the way? Really a voicemail of, "Do you need anything?" Hell yes she needs something. She needs you to stop pretending you care, just for a start! I know we are all busy, present company included but how busy is too busy when somebody in need needs you? It breaks my heart to see how dismissive we have become of one another's suffering, especially long suffering. In this instant gratification, microwave world we have simply become intolerable of anything that troubles our status quo for longer than a mini-series. Well I have a newsflash do-gooders, we are not fooling anyone. We suck at being good people a lot of the time. And we can all do better. We actually may have to live up to those church covenants and ten commandments we keep highlighted on the nightstand bible. Just a thought and listen, I am not perfect. But the first step is acknowledging a problem exist. And the problem from where I sit is this. I need to get up off my rear and invest in someone else's pain and suffering for as long as it lasts. And then the next time I need someone there for me in the way I need them, it just might happen as the bible said it will. I am my sister's keeper. And the Lord is our Shepard with a real good view of us too. What women can do together is stronger and more lasting than anything they can do apart. There is a story being told in the media about poor women who qualify for welfare but have declined the benefits. It took months for social services professionals to understand why though completely these qualified women, particularly those of color, were not signing up for government assistance. The numbers receiving assistance were declining significantly yet the socioeconomic statistics remained unchanged or getting worse. The answer, right under their noses, was simple. These women were coming together to help one another with food, shelter, child care, rides to work, household supplies, small bridge loans, diapers, medicine, hair care, and most anything else imaginable for survival. They formed an informal network of scratching one another's backs. And this informal system of assisting one another has worked splendidly. Taking the steps to receive government assistance proved too cumbersome, intrusive, inconsistent, and uncertain. Instead they lean on one another. When one person has more than they need at the moment they give, barter, or loan to other women in need. This is but one example. We have heard of women loaning money to one another to start small businesses in third world countries. Real money that is loaned and paid back with hardly a default among them. As far back as we can remember, women have been awesome sisters to one another. Like Ruth from the bible, who gave up her home country and all that was familiar to her in order to stay in a foreign land to take care of her widowed mother-in-law. She vowed to never leave her and she never did. Women are natural help mates. We are willing to sacrifice so much for those around us. When women get together we have a natural instinct to seek out pain and suffering and do anything within our power to help in healing. We are able to do this despite having our own wounded wings. Our desire is to make our environments better and more loving. We were made this way. And the world is a better place because we live among all human kind. Our joy comes from knowing we are not alone. We draw our strength from our sisters of every kind. We share a special bond and know the tremendous value we leave behind. The strength of a woman is not measured by the impact that all her hardships in life have had on her; but the strength of a woman is measured by the extent of her refusal to allow those hardships to dictate her and who she becomes. I believe all which God created should have a chance to live and thrive and grow. The most important of these is love. For us to squander His creation in whole or in any part is simply careless. God created love most of all to be shared. He himself is love. All that exists is God's divine creation which is love. So love can be found everywhere and in all things of God. To be reckless with love is akin to being scornful toward God. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things sayeth the Lord. It takes so much effort to withhold love. I imagine somewhere there is a field where love that was ignored goes to die. If you visit there you would see mounds and mounds and mounds of love wasted. I wish we could recycle it. I know a lot of people who could use a little. Best yet, I wish God would make a new rule, specifically a rule for love. The rule will state that anyone desiring to throw away love of any kind must go through him first. Yes, they must write it down and get prior clearance. Want to waste love? Then you must own it, put it in writing, seal it, lick a stamp and see what God has to say about it. You choose to despise your neighbor, hate the color of your bus driver's skin, want to bully her on the playground, want to talk behind his back, cheat on her, beat him up, steal from him, lie to them, slander her, defile yourself. Well before you add anymore wasted love to the mounds in the field, take your case to God Almighty himself first. If he clears your spiteful ways then by all means, go ahead, pile it on. But before you are so quick to throw love away you should know a thing or two about love or whose love exactly you are toying with. Luke 35 But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. ICor 13:4-8 4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil6 but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8 Love never fails. 1Peter 4:8 Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. I have a lot of love to share, so I will leave you with this. I LOVE YOU. And there is plenty more where that came from. One of the single biggest tragedies women live with is the mischaracterization that we invite in the concept of making things bigger than they appear. If we have heard it once we have heard it a million times, don't blow things up needlessly. And there are more women who can be counted that will receive that bit of suggestive insight from the universe and then they wilt back into themselves and suffer in silence. It must be something they did to be in a wilted space to begin with. They invited wilted in. I know a lot of people. I have always been a people person. Everywhere I go I meet someone new. I really like it. And during the first few minutes I can be anyone I want to be. I can become this completely made up person if I want to be. Just for kicks, I could in real time completely fabricate me convincingly. When I was young I felt invincible. There was nothing I could not do, imagine, or realize in my virgin mind. I was just naïve enough to believe that every fragment of my imaginary dream world was achievable. In my circle, we had future astronauts, Presidents of the United States, doctors who cured cancer and billionaires with maids, to name a few. The innocence of dreaming big was not lost on us. But somewhere along the way something happened in many of us. This something was slow and perhaps non-intentional in nature. But like a thief in the night our dreams were snatched away and for many we took a sidecar to our destiny. Sidecar is by definition when you allow someone else to navigate your course. It is the stronger force at the wheel choosing the final direction. When one is riding sidecar they are yielding to the driver at the wheel. They de facto become an appendage in their own journey, riding uncertain of their final destination. The driver will make statements like right Is better than left, there is no time to stop and ask directions, I know what is best here, just be patient, trust, yield to the one holding the map. While paying for the gas, the person riding sidecar is helpless and held hostage. Where they end up becomes somebody’s else plan for them. Without taking the wheel, they are stuck riding from a seat with no empowerment. And before very long, they become lost in their one and only life, left sidecar and feeling like they may have almost gotten somewhere. They completely surrendered to voices of naysay, not now, that will take too long, that is too expensive, those skills are too specialized, that would mean moving, that is already being done, you're too old, that is not for you etc. It does not have to be this way. Not one bit. Life should not be a collection of almosts. I am sure almosts is not even a word. You can avoid almosts by not giving almost power over you. And you do this through a dogged determination not to surrender to any other man, woman or human affairs pertaining to your vision of self. You do not give permission to anyone to make decisions for you that change who you are becoming without your expressed consent stemming from your head and validated by your heart. Just do not do it. If you want somebody’s opinion, ask for it. But do not hand your keys or your wheel over. And when someone else tries to assert themselves, you direct them back to their life. Kindly ask them to back step out of your dream. You've got this. And if you don't have it, you soon will. Your way! I told both of my children I wanted one or both of them to become a doctor when they grow up. They both said no and both meant it too. I handed them back the wheel and got the heck out of their way. If they have their way, one day I will know an Oscar winning actress and a phenomenal architect. Their choice at their wheel. If I am lucky, old and really need it, they may allow me to ride sidecar in the real sense. I am good with that. But while we have breath, the only thing old is the excuses we keep giving ourselves for not jumping into our own lives and taking over. #DoItYourWay2016 The garden was both their idea. Something they could do together as a couple. They each had their part in it too. She remembers his was tilling the earth and laying out the rows for their first planting. She loved watching him too. The precision that he put into the planning of it. He drew it out on paper even. She loved watching him so engaged in their shared project. They were going to grow something magnificent together. Did I mention the sweat? She loved seeing him sweat too. She will try to pretend she does not see the onions he put into a garden they both promised was theirs alone. Full disclosure, I never even used the word sexy in my vocabulary with even a minute characterization of self until my forties. Up until then, I considered myself cute, nothing more. I am what I would call front row smart-cute. The girl that grew up sitting on the front row, shopping from sale racks, still do, and who considered lip gloss going out on the town makeup. My mother, she wore no make-up, so you see where I am coming from. I remember as a young girl being told if I swallow my gum it would never digest. It would sit there in the pit of my stomach in perpetuity. Any new gum added would find its way there and there it would fester until my stomach finally bloated into eruption. A long painful but certain demise. This was enough to keep me from swallowing my gum. I passed this omen of truth down to my children. They don't swallow their gum either. My proof? Look no further than their bedposts. Rocks of solidified molten casts. A meager price I pay for getting into their heads early. Scared straight sin-proofing. That is the way sin-proofing happens right? Scared straight tactics. Once a friend told me she was 100% sure her husband would never cheat on her. I asked how she could be so decidedly certain, at least 99.9% was more in order. She said nope 100%. "I have him convinced that cheating is the single unforgivable sin in our relationship. He believes in his every 37,2 trillion cells that I will leave him if he cheats. I probably wouldn't but I have to make sure he continues to believe it. It keeps him coming home to me." Yikes! Sin-proofing. I received a check in the mail a few months back just shy of $30,000; payment for services rendered as a business consultant. Honest days pay for an honest days work I called it. Well kind of. As it was, this check was the second in the exact amount I had been paid for the same honest days work. It was sent by accident, undiscovered by its signatory. I looked at that check for three whole days. I moved it around my office. Took it home. Put it in my purse. Took it out of my purse. Placed it on the kitchen counter top. Sat it atop of the bible waiting for a sign. My sin-proofing tested in full bloom. On the fourth day, I closed my eyes and I acted. We live in a world of loop-holes, constantly sniffing out work-around excuses for obstinate behaviors in our life. We strive for air pockets to our sinful behavior. Nobody wants to own the sin. It is a very difficult thing to do. Who wants to admit to being aberrant? I don't. And aren't there just so many times you can lean on the cross after sinning? The bible says no there are not. However, it also says go now and sin no more (John 8:11) after forgiveness is given. How do you ever get comfortable double-dipping at the cross for the same purposeful sin time and time again? At some point, I imagine Jesus saying, "Whoa wait a minute here, you've got some splaining to do!" My point I think is this. Sin-proofing should not be done out of an act of absolute fear or fear of losing something/someone or fear of being caught. Sin-proofing should be done out of a love of self, a love of Christ and a love of your fellow man. Post script, of course I returned the money. Was there any doubt? This time at least, I returned the money. When you are given the answer you are seeking it is your duty to abide by the truth in it. “For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,” I studied her from across the room. One of those try not to be noticed staring kind of situations. I could not take my eyes off her either. She appeared so put together and I am not just talking about what she wore which was yes incredible. It was the total package of her presentation that drew me in. She seemed so confident and radiated with something sprinkled with special. Something reserved for really special people. I noticed everything. What was really magnificent is the way others responded to her. She seemed to stop time when she spoke. All of the really good air in the room found her and lingered there with her. I took mind notes. How does she do it I thought to myself? What does she have that I don't? I thought of getting close enough to find out. Maybe strike up a made up conversation just to hear for myself what others heard and felt being around her. I didn't though. I sat where I sat and just stared in her direction, taking mind notes. I was determined to duplicate her magic. I would copy her blueprint if it was the last thing I did. Thing is I found myself finding a new "she" everywhere I went. Someone who seemed to have what I didn't and believing within me that they had something I was missing.
The harder I tried to be a copycat the worse I felt. I would hold up the magazines next to my body and sometimes even tear out the pages as inspiration. On more than one occasion I ordered the shoes, the purse and the exact skirt believing I would look and feel just the way that beautiful girl on page 47 seemed to look and feel. I never did. I never even came close. It did not keep me from trying again the very next time I came across the "this one is it" image I wanted to project. It became a cycle of sorts. A hamster wheel to nowhere. I had this idea in my head that people who looked good on the outside had to have incredible lives on the inside of themselves. Somewhere between being stuck being someone I was not and dreaming about somebody's else I wanted to become I had a discovery moment of truth. Trying so hard to be somebody else, I was not making any room to birth who I was meant to be. Who I was magnificently made to become. Further to the truth, I had no idea who that person was because I was so trying not to be her. I was trapped chasing a figment of my mental invention. And God was going to allow it for as long as I chose it. He saw that by denying my true self I was by default also rejecting his design for my life. It would be up to me to change that course and I did. And who I discovered I have come to love and admire. I thank God every day for pouring his magic into me, uniquely. I could be Oprah and wow that would be. I could be Mother Teresa and be her magnificently! I could be Nefertiti for all the world to see. But while I am busy trying to be that "she" who will be busy becoming magnificent me? Embrace your truth 2016. |
La Detra JoyI love being around people. I would rather live falling than break my spirit never trying anything hard. This blog is about trying and retrying life. Categories
All
|