T.T.Y.N...Possibly

"Closer" by Goapele

...sometimes you just have to let it go / leaving all my fears to burn and die / push them all away so I can move on / closer to my dreams...

Finally [I think it's final] I came to a resolve that I should have come to a long time ago.

I have been "talking" to someone for 18 months now. I don't know what the hell "talking" to means but it garners the least amount of questions when explaining the "circumstance of our situation" to friends and other types of consultants.

Nonetheless, we are just as familiar with each other as we were 18 months ago: meaning, we don't know anything. With the exception of exchanging a few stories about things neither of us remember about the other, we don't know each other.

We have been out in the public twice, a large fault of my own because I am awkward about menfolk and I'm a newly born homebody.

We don't talk on the phone or text unless we are planning to meet up. I have a very elementary understanding of what his daily routine is like, just from the nights I have spent over there. I'm pretty sure he has no idea what I do with my life outside of school.

I like him, am drawn to him, and have a hard time leaving him alone. He hasn't done anything [wrong] that causes me to want to leave him alone. He is always very nice. We have great conversation and a similar sense of humor. He is normal. That is very important.

I like him. I haven't been waiting 18 months for anything. I didn't expect to ever like him or for him to be able to hold my attention this long.

But I like him now and in recent months, I have been very frustrated by the fact that he communicates nothing about what he thinks about where this is going. I just realized the other day how long it's been and I suddenly got really tired.

He's normal. That is very important I told you. I have yet to be attracted to a normal gentleman [though my years are few].

I am accustomed to controlling, mean, immature, obsessive, abusive, dysfunctional menfolk, because for a long time I was largley dysfunctional myself.

I still don't feel totally functional, but I have access to this man who won't hit me, will allow me to have my own life, and won't ignore me, but I can't bring myself to open my usually, big, loud, motormouth and tell him what I think.

I am also really disappointed with him. I am shocked that [or so it seems] he could continue this arrangement forever. I'm not that patient.

And it is not as if I don't have other things to be focusing on. I find myself sometimes allowing the idea of him to usurp my energy in the world. I talk to my friends and consultants to no end about this and it is still the same.

I am not willing to do what needs to be done to move this situation. I am bitter and insulted that he hasn't come to me yet. I am simply not ready to be with anyone, I just wish I was. He is normal and I'm starving for some normalcy in my life. Starving.

So I'm leaving it alone. Maybe I'll pick it up next year or next month or next lifetime or never. It's selfish, I know. I should say something to him but I haven't the language nor the pride to spare. I don't want him to feel bad or be upset or bitter, which is why I should say something, but I'm not going to. I have had episodes like this before.

I always go back and he is always happy to have me. Maybe this time I'll really get it together?

You know I'm slow to learn. But I just want someone to be happy to have me.

First Thing Monday Morning

"I Feel Beautiful" by Fantasia

...I feel beautiful, beautiful / I feel beautiful, beautiful / Could not...touch my soul, touch my soul / Nothin' you could do to me can take away my right to feel...beautiful, beautiful...

For real, first thing on Monday morning, I am packing away all my tears, my frustrations, my worries, my sadnesses, my angers, my impatience, my deferred dreams, my disappointments and all that in a suitcase right along with my clothes, shoes, toiletries, and accessories.

No special bag, no special tag, nothing. I'm not going to be a Bag Lady anymore. I've been a bag lady almost all of my life. I have travelled with the bullshit of my sadness in bags, tangible bags, heavy bags. I am packing them in a bag along with my possessions, getting on a plane, travelling to my destiny, cashing in the check of my fate, dropping off the bullshit, and flying back.

We leaving the BS behind. When I get back, I get to start over. No emails, no text messages, no phone calls will shake me anymore. I don't care about the pain of the menfolk, the parentals, the siblings, the former friends, the current frenemies, the have-not episodes, maladaptive coping mechanisms, or none of that. I am not going to continue to mess up my now with the sadness of my yesterday, but I'll always remember. That's the best I can do.

The Gift

"Where Did You Go?" by Jazmine Sullivan


...where did you go? / must be far away / everyday I come through / just to see your face...

I read an article about an artist who I feel that I think similarly to. His name is Lewis Hyde and he is an author of two highly acclaimed books by the name of The Gift and Trickster Makes This World, both of which I need to read. The New York Times describes his writings as complicated, non-sequential, difficult to summarize, and definitive of what art is.

The Gift is a book that works on "establishing an analogy between the making of art and how objects accrue value in traditional “gift economies,”". People make art, out any material they choose, sometimes worthless, rudimentary, or trash even and sometimes out of expensive material. Whatever the value of the components, the art is a product of a human engineer and by virtue of being art, is invalubale, immeasurable in value, priceless, etc., except in a free market economy like ours.

In a free market economy like our own, "objects accrue value" via a plethora of standards. Media, celebrity, drama, politics, economy, and other elements of culture contribute to the value of an item. Famous artist = famous piece = $$$$$$.

But it's art. I am unsure how to define art for this humble blog,
but we can agree art is amazing. Art is the true universal language. Every civilization that ever existed made art [paintings, sculptures, music]. We all speak art. Art is amazing, connects us, is bigger than us, is important in the discussion of a people, of our world. How then, does such an emornmous, important thing accrue monetary value?

But really, I have no qualms with art being sold or costing money. I think that it is an amazing feat that art can make a person wealthy. It is such a private, ethereal moment, art is. People understanding that private moment and willing to pay money to keep the product of that moment in their possession is beautiful.

The problem erupts in sharing that moment. Some universities own the sole rights to literature by authors long dead who wrote out of art and not empty commodification. But these institutions sometimes refuse those who want to put the literature in other collections to share with others, even if they pay. Why? How are the words, the art to get out to the world? Influence other artists? Validate other artists? Cure people? Help people? Resonate with people? Change people? Sophisticate people? Because art does all that and more.


I must read that Hyde book soon. If you'd like to read the article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/magazine/16hyde-t.html

Sunshine Band

"Pata Pata" by Miriam Makeba

This is Miriam Makeba. She sang a song called "Pata, Pata" that I heard a lot when I was younger. My father was in my imaginary band and we sang and we danced all the time in our parlor in Madison, Wisconsin.

My Daddy is the reason for my love of music. He used to sing to me a lot and those songs were the soundtrack to our small immediate family. Our music also is what first taught me the difference between African-Americans and Africans. It was what taught me that I was African but it is also what connected me to Americans.

I cannot recall exactly where or when I first heard Miriam Makeba's song, but it sounds like home everytime I hear it: like the home you have always known, as long as you have known yourself.

Funnily, I never knew who sang this song. I never even wondered what language she sang it in because it was happy so it didn't matter what she was actually saying. The song made me happy.

Miriam Makeba died on November 10th. She died after suffering a heart attack following the performance of "Pata Pata", which I think speaks highly of art. I hope to die after a long life of performing my art, whatever that arts ends up being.

Miriam Makeba...4 March 1932 to 10 November 2008

Hegemonic Masculinity

"Mr. Jones" by Amy Winehouse

...nobody stands in between me and my man / it's me and Mr. Jones / what kind of fuckery is this?...

So following reading Betty Friedan's genius, I read another article by Michael Messner called "Sexuality and Sexual Identity".

I liked it. I learned a little bit about the dynamic of male bonding and male relationships and how they strongly influence how a man relates to a woman.

I will admit something right now. I'm a man hater. Yes. Me. I love and I cannot stand them. Yes. I am damaged. But I don't care. And neither do they. Which is why I hate them. The only man I love unconditionally is my Dad. I do not have Daddy issues. My Dad is an incredibly intelligent and charismatic man who was and is very involved in my siblings' and my life. He always told me I was smart, funny, beautiful and all the other things I haughtily advertise about myself. He started it. He told me I could change the world and I believe him

So Daddy is not the issue. Men have just been disappointing. Yes. Because I am damaged.

But I started to feel bad for men a little bit after reading this article. Being a man, socially, can be terrifying and limits the expression of the whole person that every person is. Women still have it harder. I'll tell you why later but read my jawn about the article. My empathy does not shine through very well, but trust me, I see that it is hard to be a guy:

The male version of the problem with no name has been erroneously categorized as having no name. The problem is actually called hegemonic masculinity, a function of patriarchy. Hegemonic masculinity requires a man to demonstrate certain characteristics and behaviors that will socially qualify him as a "masculine man". Failure to do so subjects a man to being called such things as a "fag" or a "sissy" or a "girl", qualifying the aforementioned concepts as negative epithets that are contra-masculine.

The other phenomenon of hegemonic masculinity involves the manner in which men bond. The second article, "Sexuality and Sexual Identity" by Michael Messner, addresses the detrimental affect male bonding and competition has on the intimacy between men and women and the self-image problems it causes for men.

As specifically discussed in the article, sports are an important social tool in portraying masculinity and being accepted as a "man". The aggression, physical prowess, discipline, etc. that organized sports requires and produces identifies athletes as the uber-man. His masculinity is not questioned but he is under more pressure to exert his masculinity. He must be well versed in the language of "getting women" and sexually potent and experienced (or promiscuous even).

The "locker room" culture is a breeding ground for the expectations about sexual behavior and interactions with the opposite sex. Messner poignantly points out that men bond under the condition of "[separating] intimacy from sex (homosocial)" and define their "relationships with women as sexual but not intimate (heterosexual)". This distinction does much to damage potential intimate relationships between men and women. Simultaneously, homosexuality is strictly banned. Homophobia serves as a motivator to more actively demonstrate one's "maleness" by objectifying and hypersexualizing relationships with women.

The Problem That Has No Name

"Breathe" by Anna Nalick

...yeah, we walk through the door / so accusing their eyes / like they have any right at all to criticize...

I read this article about the evolution of the conversation about the plight of the housewife. The bigger theme of the article is how gender roles can stifle and suffocate people. I thought it was interesting because it identified one of my biggest fears: to be bored with my life.

I am afraid that after I have done all that I am "supposed" to do, as is defined by the culture I live in, it won't be enough. I'll wake up and forget I am alive and do all that I do out of complete robotic routine.

I won't feel anything, hear anything, smell anything, see anyting, say anything, think anything that is real. It will all just be the same thing I had done the day before and for several days before that for years.

That's like death: a complete cessation of a life. It is really not death nor is it as permanent, but to the active, dramatic, brilliant, energetic production that I am, it is like death.

So after I get this degree, I get married, I have babies, I buy a house, I buy a gunmetal colored Range Rover Sport, will I be fine? They say the chase is better than the actual thing. If I get the life I am chasing, will I be complete stationary, not having to run anymore?

I'd like to imagine that I'll at least have to walk some in order to maintain the life I have chased all my life. But asking a sprinter to walk in the race is unfair, and stupid.

I just don't want to be bored. I fear marriage because men bore me. The nicest, sweetest men eventually lose my interest through no real fault of their own, most of the time.

Will being a mother become bothersome? I don't want anything in the world quite like I want to be a mother and so it has been my whole, whole, whole life. But will I take my children for granted and be bored with the miracle that I think children are?

The article diagnosed this problem for me: "The Problem That Has No Name" by Betty Friedan. I don't want to have this problem. I read it and I love it and I wrote a little 'essay' about it. It isn't a real essay in the stringent manner I am used to writing them for class, but it's awesome nonetheless:

The problem with no name addresses the incongruency between the cultural expectations for a woman's life and happiness and the personal expectations of a woman's life and happiness.

As is explained in Betty Friedan's article, "The Problem That Has No Name", girls are socialized to want to marry and have children and understand that their service in family life should be the source of their happiness. Pleasing a husband, rearing respectable children, and participating in a larger community of other "Stepford" households becomes the criteria for a woman's happiness and sense of fulfillment.

But the article explains that with educated women, there exists a disconnect between the "happy" lives they are living (by getting and keeping a husband, having children) and the actual happiness they feel. These women have invested their whole lives in the promise of bliss once they are wives and mothers. Magically, changing sheets, doing laundry, cooking dinners, transporting children, attending PTA meetings and the ilk are supposed to complete these women as human beings; their femininity (as defined by Western culture) shall define their happiness.

Unfortunately, the life investment into this perfect life does not make an adequate return to the woman investor. She has waited her life to be a wife and mother and once in the position, is waiting, hand-and-foot, on people who overlook her existence as a human being and request her only when they need something.

Consequently, a universal moment of pause follows in which they ask themselves, "Is this all?" Interestingly, the woman internalize the feeling of emptiness as a feeling of inadequacy. She feels as if she has the things she needs to be happy and the fact that she is not, demonstrates that she lacks something.

The strangest part of the problem is the silence. Many women, living in the same communities and taking their children to the same schools, have these feelings of emptiness and inadequacy but do not speak about them to each other. Each woman suffers her shame in silence. The silence was eventually broken and has now birthed popular sociological conversations about gender roles and a woman's "place" in society.

The Controversial, Presumptive Survey

"Live a Lie" by Jazmine Sullivan

...if a lie gon get me through, I'd rather not know the truth / if the truth gon make me cry, I'd rather just live a lie...

I saw this survey on one of the blogs I blog rolled: Blak Swan. The author is a funny and rather intelligent guy for his age and race, because you know young colored folks are supposed to be dumbest of the bunch...or at least that is the explanation I get when the unequivocal they are so surprised that I'm smart.

1] Do you have the guts to answer these questions and re-post as The Controversial Survey?

Sure. I feel as though it is no longer okay to ask someone if they have the guts.

2] Would you do coke if it was legalized?

No. I have taken enough chemistry and biology in college thus far to know how much of a compromise for your body it is to use narcotics...I am not including mary jane.

3] Abortion: for it or against it?

I support its legality. As a moral question, that is something individuals have to deal with on their own. But for the safety of women, it should be legal so that it is standardized and healthy. Women died trying to perform abortions on themselves. The moral dilemma is something each woman has to deal with and not up to legislators, other people, or men, who never have to make the difficult decision or endure the aftermath. The rights of the chld do not yet exist because it has not been born. The law already recognizes that the rights of the mother supercedes that of the fetus, as in cases where the woman's life is in danger, abortion is automatically legal. Clearly, their is a hierarchy of value of life. Sure, people can prevent pregnancy, but an unplanned one occurs, and she should have the option to terminate it in a safe, hygenic, and controlled environement. And it ain't like any of yall are gonna help her when the child arrives but you sure wanna preserve some life...shut up.

4] Do you think the world would fail with a female president?

What kind of stupid questions is this? This questions is incredibly presumptive and demonstrates a lot of what is wrong with this culture that people would even consider such a thing. No woman is less qualified as a human being to do what is right for the people under her tenure than any man nor does she have less potential to be just as cruel and evil as any man.

5] Do you believe in the death penalty?

No. None of us are qualified or perfect enough to decided when someone else's life should be over. If we abhor murder, we cannot murder to correct it. Even if my family was killed, I would like to believe that I would fight for that person's life whether or not he/she was remorseful or whatever. Death penalty is not a deterrent for crazy and to take the life of another requires some crazy.

6] Do you wish marijuana would be legalized already?

Hell yeah.

7] Are you for or against premarital sex?

I don't really care what people do before or after they get married. I think the more important issue is honestly and wholly informing people about sex, its repurcussions, and all the ways to avoid negative consequences. The rapid and preventable spread of disease is motivation enough to drop this abstinence mess and tell the kids the truth. Sexual ignorance is fatal.

8] Do you believe in God?

Yes.

9] Do you think same sex marriage should be legalized?

Yes and I think it will be. We tend to lag behind the Europeans socially, and since some European nations have already legalized same-sex marriage, it is only a matter of time before America does. More importantly, it is getting harder and harder to argue against it using logic and not religion. Not everyone believes in any kind of sanctity. Marriage is about economic relief and social participation: tax breaks and making medical decisions. It isn't about much more than that and all the opponents hanging on to the "sanctity of marriage" argument are lacking heavily in intellect and stuck on how gross they think homosexual sex is. That's all it is.

10] Do you think it's wrong that so many Hispanics are illegally moving to the USA?

No. Life abroad can be very abject. And people are quite ignorant to the expensive and very involved process it is to enter this country legally. Not that it is not a burden to pay for the lives of people who are not documented, but it is not as if these people are living a luxurious life. They are working hard and living poor, poorer than those who aren't working and receive help from the government, so chill.

11] A 12 year old girl has a baby. Should she keep it?

She has already had the baby. What options does she have? If she wants to keep it, she should. No one has the right to take the child from her. Maybe if we were being honest with students about how to protect themselves and prevent situations like these if they choose not to be abstinent, this 12 year old girl wouldn't have had a baby. Something is wrong with this question. The educational and social systems are incongruent in their solutions to teen pregnancy and the disconnect will continue to foster situations such as a 12 year old mother.

12] Should the alcohol age be lowered to 18?

Yes. You can fight a war. You should be able to get drunk. And then improve the public transportation systems so they aren't driving on Friday and Saturday nights.

13] Should the war in Iraq be called off?

This question is insensitively worded. It can't be "called off" without very serious consequences for Iraq and the countries that participated in its invasion. The war must be ended in a calculated and responsible way that does not risk the lives of those fighting or the civilians. The countries who invaded have a responsibility to see that the infrastructure of the country is repaired and the institutions operate such that chaos does not follow once troops are withdrawn. And there has to be a lot of diplomatic onversation as the main tool to accomplish this.

14] Assisted suicide is illegal: do you agree?

If the person is terminally ill and does not want to suffer the coming affects of his/her disease, then he/she should be able to do it. I think the individual must undergo extensive evaluation and be given the option of being treated for depression, but if the person is cleared, then they should be able to take their own life.

15] Do you believe in spanking your children?

Yessir. A lot of mess in this world might have been prevented had some people been whooped. Ain't nothing like home training.

16] Would you burn an American flag for a million dollars?

Who wouldn't? You can't be that gung-ho patriotic in this capitalist nation. Shoot. A million dollars? Yessir.

17] Who do you think will make a better president? McCain or Obama?

Obama. I like most all his policies, he is a calm, diplomatic, charismatic man who strikes me as actually caring. I feel like politicians and compassion/caring are mutually exclusive, but Obama might be able to change that.

18] Do you think Obama will be killed?

Only if White people are ready for civil war part II. He will not be killed. The world needs him too much and we shouldn't even think like that, for the sake of his wife and children and the future of this nation's station in the world.

19] Should child predators be forced to wear signs identifying themselves?

No. And I don't even think I agree with the sex offender registry. If offenders were properly rehabilitated, it wouldn't be necessary because people wouldn't do it again. Their offenses are atrocious, yes, but they are human beings and deserve a fulfilling life like the rest of us. Doing such a thing as is asked in this questions would not grant them such a life. People make mistakes. People are damaged. People need help and not judgment.

20] Are you afraid others will judge you from reading some of your answers?

No. What are they gonna do about it? Disagree?