Confession

I have to let some stuff off of my mind. I realize that most of my entries have been extremely oriented around some social cause or whatever but I need to just be personal right now. This may be long. I don’t know yet. Put your phone on silent; grab a coffee and a doughnut. If you want to read, cool. If not, cool too. This entry may shed some light on who I really am and why I feel the way I do regarding certain topics. I am going to be figuratively naked before you right now.

Yesterday I cried. I was watching a news story about Live 8 and heard a statistic about the number of Africans who would have died by the conclusion of the concert. I cried. That story was followed by a short story on Luther Vandross’ death. I cried again. It was only fitting that I cried yesterday because I cannot remember the last time I cried- and I am a crier. On an average, I cry twice a week. I cry at church, sometimes at home when I pray, while watching Xtreme Home Makeover and TLC’s A Baby Story, and when I am hurt or angry.

I didn’t use to be a crier. Growing up, I was a very tough girl. I grew up in poor areas most of my life and I had to learn how to fight at a young age. I remember learning how to fight when my family first moved to a VA housing project. I was in elementary school and my ‘play cousin’ taught my sisters and me how to defend ourselves. We’d moved from a decent neighborhood in DC and hadn’t had to fight yet. Since we were extremely skinny girls, other kids used to pick fights with us often. However, we quickly earned a reputation for our fighting skills and my twin and I were dubbed, the Terror Twins. Because when one person picked on any of us, they got both of us in a rumble. I always hated to fight even though I was good at it. I didn’t like having to get angry enough to hit someone. Yet, I did what I had to do in those situations and endured. I grew up and got out of those areas and arrived at a classic middle-income institution—college.

In college I had to learn to deal with conflict (i.e. anger) in a different manner. I couldn’t just fight everyone and fight my teachers. However, I had a quick and bad temper. I learned how to play certain parts and maneuver through certain conflicts. One of my friends in graduate school helped me with my anger. Whenever I got mad at him he’d stop me in the middle of my tirade and ask me to close my eyes. When I did, he’d tell me to envision a setting he would describe and tell me to breath deeply. He’d say, “[my name] I am not fighting with you. I am on your team.” I learned how to manage my anger inwards and not lash out in a loud verbal or physical altercation. I even took a conflict mediation class to learn to help others manage their conflict issues.

So, I became a crier. Not in public, mind you, but a crier nonetheless. It is just that in a world where one can get beat upon mentally, emotionally, and psychologically one must have an outlet. When I stopped partying or fighting away my pain I had to find a new avenue and I became extremely internally sensitive. I wrote poetry and cried.

The only other way I know how to manage my anger is to erect a high wall blocking all emotional input and output. For the last month or so, I have been this kind of angry. I haven’t really been too sad or too excited about much of anything. I have been pretty ambivalent about everything. This wall has been shielding me from much pain and has allowed me to exercise power over situations in my life, particularly the termination of a couple relationships—one ‘romantic’ and one ‘platonic’.

The romantic relationship you all know a tiny bit about but to summarize this emotional see saw…me and dude ended whatever relationship we had back in November. In December he comes around again and then in February he flakes again and he comes back again in May and in June I tell him I just need to be left alone. At the end of it all, he tells me that he was never in love with me. He only was in the relationship because he didn’t want to loose my friendship as I had become one of his best friends. I think when he said that I actually heard my heart break. Apparently, I had been in a romantic relationship all by myself. The platonic friendship that was terminated was over betrayal and money. My best friend since 9th grade borrowed a significant amount of money from me during a trip in June. When we got back he decided that he would not pay it back because he didn’t want to. In my face, he looked me in my eyes and told me that. Again, I am pretty sure I heard my heart break. It didn’t break over the money but over the blatant disregard for my personhood. I honestly do not know why he did that. He could have had the money if he needed it. He didn’t have to treat me like that. I was so mad and hurt that I called my father. He confronted him and had to subtly threaten to do bodily harm to my friend in order to get my money back. So I have had to deal with 2 great losses in a short span of time—one stole my heart, the other my money.

I then just cut myself off emotionally from the world. I didn’t feel a thing. I haven’t even allowed myself to think about either situation because I didn’t want to feel anything about either of them. So, I know that is why I have been so angry with lots of things—particularly the black man/white woman thing. On a good day, I don’t care who marries whom. But when I am angry with the men who hurt me, I am angry and distrustful of all men. It’s like, if I couldn’t even trust two of my closest male friends, then which men can I really trust?

So, I cried yesterday while watching TV. True indeed those news stories were sad but I think I cried for different reasons. I just needed to face some sadness and loss in my own life. I really don’t know how to be hurt or angry in any other way than the two ways I wrote about. I am trying to learn a happy medium. Maybe crying is cool. I do hate the fact that I cry so much and that I am so sensitive. But I suppose there are many other tougher people in the world to balance my kind out.