CON-TRO-L

Men are the devil. I swear. I just may be single for the rest of my life-by choice. Allow me to explain my reasoning. Last night, my sister comes into the kitchen in the worst funk. She is rude to me, yells, and then goes upstairs into her bedroom. I am left at a lost, wondering what sparked it. A half an hour goes by and one of my friends arrive. He joins me in the living room and we start talking. I hear her bedroom door open, footsteps on the stairs, and then see her appear with tears streaming down her face. She plops down onto the couch beside our friend, puts her head on his shoulder, and weeps. We both look at each other stunned.

Of course we ask her what is wrong and ask why she is crying. She just continues to weep. In an attempt to lighten the mood (and cut to the chase) I jokingly ask, “Did CJ dump you”. She cries all the more. “Humm”, I think to myself. She and CJ are not a couple. They are just dating so he obviously could not have dumped her. “So, he must have done something wrong” I continue thinking to myself. Then she belts out, “He doesn’t want me to be his girlfriend”. Al and I just stare at each other and she continues to weep.

To make a long story short, men are horrible. She and CJ have been “hanging out” and “dating” for 4 months now. He asked her to move to Atlanta with him when he finished his deployment in a year. She lives and breathes CJ. Most of the time it is super annoying to me but I tolerate it because she says that she is in love. Hummm. Now, she is in love with him and ready to marry him at the drop of a hat but he isn’t even interested in being her boyfriend. Humm. This was too familiar to me so I withdrew any emotional impulse to look at both sides of the story. I told her to leave him alone.

Al eventually leaves and she goes back upstairs with a bottle of champagne. I hear Mary J. Blige bellowing out of her room. When I go into her bedroom she tells me to leave her alone. I tell her to be strong and to not give her night away to depression and sadness over a dude who clearly is an idiot because he is leading her on. She yells for me to leaver her alone. So I leave her bedroom. About 45 minutes later I hear her on the phone. Then a little later, I hear her laughing with the person on the other line. I knew it was CJ. “What an idiot she is”, I thought to myself as I lay down to sleep while hearing her voice in the other room.

This morning, she began to talk about him, beginning to explain that it was a mistake and that while he did say he didn’t want her to be his girlfriend it wasn’t exactly what he meant. Again, this was too familiar so again I removed all emotional impulse to be sympathetic. I told her to not be a fool. I was very angry at her and at the situation but I could not understand why I was so angry. It wasn’t until I got into my car that I realized that I was angry because I felt as if I was looking into a mirror.

For two years, I allowed myself to be tossed and turned by the emotional inconsistencies of X-Factor. Humm. When he wanted to be committed I was there. When he didn’t want to be committed I was there. At all times, he dangled commitment and marriage before me like a carrot and I was a hungry bunny rabbit. I foolishly followed that carrot not caring that I could never have a bite. Hummm. So, I was angry because it wasn’t my sister that was being a fool. It was me, the fool, who for two years put a man in the center of my life and allowed his fancies to dictate my feelings, priorities, and plans. I never want to be that way ever again nor be in that situation again. In hindsight, it was truly a horrible place to be. I always wanted a title and he never gave me that. He wanted a pseudo-relationship. I wanted and needed the real thing.

My sister may be a fool but I need to detach my personal emotional baggage from her situation and be there for her. CJ may not be a loser or a liar or any negative thing. He is an individual and in relationships individuals go through things. I need to support her as long as she decides to stick it out. That is what she always did for me.

Yo, God is Faithful

“Without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him”. Hebrews 11:6

So, I have been unemployed (full-time) since September. At times since, I have been stressed out some days and at peace other days. When I took that step to leave that last work situation (which had become hell on earth) I knew in my heart that God was going to take care of me. I left without a replacement job, a place to live, or any formal plan (other than my 3 weeks of road tripping and filing an unemployment claim with the employment commission). I just had enough faith in my spirit to walk away from a lot of money, a lot of security, and a lot of stress. The passion for urban planning and the city was just too much for me to ignore.

Needless to say, my mom thought I was crazy and my sister said that I should have made more plans. I got tired of sleeping on the couch (a tough 2 weeks) and not having enough money to do everything I wanted. At times I felt like an idiot when I received another rejection letter in the mail or had to tell someone that I was “in transition” and not working full-time. But I knew in my heart that God was going to doing something big for me. So I waited and prayed and waited some more. As you know, I even began interning for free and waiting tables to pay the bills. Every month, I was able to pay all of my bills and though at one point I had lost 10 lbs, I still manage to eat healthy and sufficiently.

It all has been worth it as yesterday I got an offer for a full-time position in Richmond with an urban planning consulting firm. I am so excited. The position entitles just about everything I want to learn and do. Our clients work for the “little guy” and are able to build capacity and creatively implement change. God has really blessed me!

Also, I get to live in a real urban area again where I can hear some good live music, go to plays and museums, and bike to work (if I am not wearing a pencil skirt and Nine West heels that is). I think my life is just beginning again…28 is going to be the shiznitttt!!! Maybe I’ll get a boyfriend (opps, I guess I just dropped one of my New Year Resolutions).

I am now 28...

On Saturday, January 7, I turned 28 years old. I am actually still in shock on some level. I cannot believe that time has flown by so quickly. It seems as if just yesterday I was in undergrad living carefree: chilling with my home girls, pledging my sorority, cheering for my basketball-playing boyfriend at his games, drinking excessively, going to parties, and taking some time out to go to a class or two.

It is as if the last 6 years have been a dream…but they have been highlighted by some keen moments. I have had some very exciting times and some very difficult times as well. My approach to life has been to live it in moments and at the culmination of my life to be able to have some really great stories told. The folks I was blessed to share those great moments would be the people that have had the most significant impact on my life.

So, this weekend I pondered the best moments of my 28 years and the things I still want to do and accomplish. I can say that if I died today I have a lived a life to be proud of. I have loved and lost, laughed and cried, planned and accomplished, conceded and fought, and for the most part lived life completely unscripted. I’ll share some of the highlights that I thought about on my birthday. Now, all of these are not the top highlights, just some thoughts that came to my mind. Also, they are not in any chronological order.

1. Driving to Toronto with 2 Mel and Amy to see John Mayer live (I love him). The Canadians were so rude to us all weekend (we got cussed out 3 times without provocation!!!). I responded by acting like a dumb American. Everywhere we went I asked if they accepted American money. They were so pissed.
2. Going to an NERD concert with my twin, and two friends. They were my favorite band at the time and we had a ball! I was beautiful and the company was perfect. My twin and I were in VIP before the show started and drunkenly talked Chad’s ear off. It was classic.
3. Completing graduate school at UVA. I really busted my ass in graduate school. I earned straight A’s two out of the four semesters I was there.
4. Storming President Torgeson’s office at Virginia Tech as an undergraduate student. A racial incident occurred and the administration’s response was not appropriate (in many students’ opinion) so we stormed the President’s office. It was my first act of civil disobedience and a defining moment in my life. I wasn’t the ring leader but I was definitely on the administration’s radar after that. Many of my friends and associates began to jokingly call me Angela Davis and Rosa Parks.
5. Performing a dance in tribute to my Grammie at our family reunion. It made her very happy.
6. Taking a train ride from Virginia to California (a total of 6 days). It was horrible! At one point I had to sit beside this Asian dude who kept farting without ever saying ‘excuse me’! Argh. It was so horrible. I’d never do it again nor subject my kids to do it.
7. Rededicating my life to Christ in 2003. It completely changed my life. It was such a supernatural event. I cannot even explain it.
8. Driving from Detroit to Virginia in an SUV packed with all of my worldly possessions. There was stuff in the front seat and we couldn’t use the rearview window. It was classic. At one point, I almost drove off a cliff. At that moment, all I could think was, “if I kill us, everyone is going to hate me for killing Rashad”. Classic moment. After that, I wasn’t permitted to drive for the remainder of the trip.
9. Seeing my nephew born. I saw the entire thing! My views on childbirth were completely changed. It was horrific, violent, and gross. But it was definitely a miracle. During the delivery I kept thinking, “a baby is supposed to come out of there?” This may seem so stupid but I was expecting her entire vagina to expand and then the baby would slide on out. That did not happen. That dude busted his way out. Blood, guts, more blood, and then my darling nephew. Wow. I am not going to have the 5 kids I wanted when I was a little girl. I am going to adopt.
10. Losing my virginity. It was a beautiful moment in a very committed relationship. Although, you should want until you are married and all, I don’t regret having that experience. It was perfect.
11. Standing in line with my homie Shawn for 6 hours in the freezing cold and dead of night waiting to going into Rosa Park's viewing. It occurred to me mid-way through 6 hours wait that her body probably wasn't even in the casket and how that fact changes the entire magnitude of what I was doing. But, hey at that point I could see people at the front of the line (although they were the size of ants) so I couldn't leave then. At least I was a part of history.
12. Spending a year in Detroit doing Missions work. So many things happened: twisting my ankle during an attempt to D-up a kid in a pick up basketball game, meeting crazy homeless people, going to the Pistons Parade after they won the NBA championship, learning how to drive in the snow, and establishing longstanding relationships.
13. Going to a Sacramento Kings game then having my and Rashad’s face plastered on the arena’s jumbo sized television screen. It was the official NBA KissCam and I had to kiss him in front of thousands of people. I have never been more scared in my life!!! I blank out but from what I vaguely remember, I lean over and kiss him and then he opens his mouth a bit and then I open my mouth and I inadvertently slip him some tongue…enough said. I was so embarrassed that I could have died right there. Classic.