red EYES.

I'm having trouble sleeping lately and although I've been trying to refocus my attention and efforts and to avoid the obvious truth I can't continue to pretend. You're even in my dreams. And thoughts of you that feel so real in the land of the subconscious bring me to silent solitude in the early morning dark world of the conscious. I understand the inconvenience of the timing and I don't want to be disrespectful to the life you're choosing. I just want to be real for once in my life. This is how I feel and you're who I still want. "been about you and I'm still about you."

 I feel unsatisfied and insatiable. And as much as you should be where you are, I have to say that you should be here too. She's not the only one who needs and deserves you. I often times feel alone in this as you haven't uttered one word to edify what appears to be crumbling before my eyes.  I still would choose you a million times over and will stay in my tortuous lane of best friendship place. I'm so sorry that I was incapable of finding the words to express myself honestly to you when I saw you last. I feel like my actions didn't even suffice, although I was trying to tell you everything, it seems like it wasn't enough. Maybe you heard me but have no reply.

We only exist in secret and that is hurtful to my soul. It's not about acknowledgement from other people or FB statuses and tweets. It's more about respect from people who know and love you as much as I do to know that I too am an integral part of your story and existence. I too have been "putting in work" for many many years to keep our relationship alive. And it has been in full bloom over this last year and that is factual regardless of what may or may not have accelerated it. Sometimes I don't want to be the strong one or the one who's going to be ok or the one who's going to find someone new. Sometimes I want to not be ok and I don't want to find someone new and I can't be strong. This is one of those times and I don't get to choose. The choice is with you and I don't think you're ever going to choose me.

There is an extensive body of work of writing that one day I will give to you, maybe then you'll really understand just how much.

#fasttailedgirls

So I'm late to this discussion per usual, but I did have the depressing privilege of reading this article: http://jezebel.com/what-we-absolutely-must-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-r-1484481115. As someone who has been an R.Kelly fan for as long as I can remember, it saddens me to acknowledge my own blind eye mentality regarding the truth of the man who is a known sexual predator, and who has assaulted not one but countless young women all while I was vibin' to Bump and Grind Remix  in my car and singing it word for word. Let's just start with Aaliyah, because she is the 90s R&B princess who will be remembered for her soothing, sweet vocals, breath taking beauty and for introducing iconic 90s R&B fashion to the mainstream (tim's for girls, baggy jeans, half top, bandana anyone?). She unfortunately is also remembered for a short marriage to R. Kelly when she was only 15 and he was 27. I was about 5 years younger than Aaliyah at the time but when her album One in Million came out, I was just about as clueless as most of us were that just about ALLLLL of the songs on that album were referencing the sick and twisted, no doubt manipulative madness that was her marriage and union with R. Kelly. He also didn't graduate from high school..ewww. He should keep wearing those despicable shades.

Think about it 'Age ain't nothin' but a number,' '4 page letter,' 'Gotta give it up,' all allude to the eerie, inappropriate invisible hand of the child predator who was her then husband. I thankfully had the good fortune of engaging in my first intimate relationship at the ripe old age of 21. Even though I was technically an "adult" then, I was not mentally or emotionally prepared for the roller coaster of emotions I would begin to feel for a man who completely disrespected my virginity and gift I gave to him (I didn't lose it..I knew exactly where it was). Trust,  I wrote a lot of 4 page letters myself. Now looking back at myself in those days I too felt preyed on in a sense. I was young and impressionable and I was more than impressed by this older guy who was 28 at the time who seemingly had it all together and drove a Hummer. But honestly I cannot imagine being 14 or 15 and getting involved intimately with any man, much less a man 10 or 15 years older than me.

Anyway this article of much more import: http://www.xojane.com/issues/fasttailedgirls-sexual-assault-of-black-girls-is-not-a-joke and relevance really got me thinking this evening about why young black women in this country are so sexualized. I remember being told not to wear certain things for all of my life. I'm also from the South which has historically played and still plays it's own role in psychologically controlling women. But I was always reminded that "I" never wanted to attract the wrong kind of attention. If I attracted attention that was the wrong type, it was something that I did. How shameful and talk about a loss of innocence. Will I stop listening to R. Kelly's music tomorrow? I don't know, but I do know I will make a concerted effort to ween myself away from the smooth tunes and catchy lyrics that have been created, packaged and sold from the sexual assault and horrors imposed on young girls who look probably just like me.

green LIGHT

I'm waiting for that green light to appear. It's like magic when it does. I could be doing anything and out of nowhere a sign, that somewhere you're out there and longing to see my Face for some Time. There were times where I would black out my screen and sleep with my computer open, just in case you called. I don't do that anymore, but oh how I long to see that green light again.

This is the song

that doesn't end.

I've been singing this song about the same boy (he's now a grown up man boy) for 17 years. Count them, 17 years! He shall remain nameless for obvious reasons, because well if he or anyone we know is reading this (which they surely aren't) then it would be a life shattering, situationship altering event and we can't have that happening. Anyway he is more than the perfect verse over a tight beat. He's actually the tight beat. His coolness just goes on and on like your favorite song on replay. The only problem is he's on someone else's CD player (we're 90s kids). He feels like home in every sense of the word and how can you deny something that feels as natural and warm and fuzzy and inviting as home? But is it true that we all have to leave the proverbial nest sometimes? Does he represent that proverbial nest at this moment in time?

I want to marry him. There, I said it. I want to marry him. But I'm Jules in MBFW (My Best Friend's Wedding- do give it another go over sometime soon, you won't regret it) and my Nigel is unfortunately across the country at Berkeley and therefore not here to give me good advice. "Kimmy" is not nearly as cute, witty or innocent as Cameron Diaz's character in the movie. But one thing that "Kimmy" and the character share is that in real life she has the heart of the man I love. I have his heart too, I know in a different way. I have his heart in the "you'll always be around and one of my best friends, but I won't I fight for our friendship, or stand up for you or stay the night with you after we just had the most incredible night ever."

It's so rare that we ever get to spend time alone, because he doesn't live in the same city and for a long time I was living across the Atlantic. So we would spend countless hours on FT talking about everything and nothing and ultimately thinking about the moment we'd finally see each other face to face. How long I longed to hear my doorbell ring and to open my door to his beautiful face. It finally happened a few weeks ago and I couldn't even hide my excitement. I was wild with delight but did my best to appear as if his presence was a normal every day kind of no big deal thing. My clumsiness of bumping into the piano and table on more than one account were dead giveaways that I was teeming with excitement.

He was thrilled too, but is way too cool to bump into a series of stationary objects more than once. When he finally kissed me, there was nothing else to say. His hands and mine said everything we had already tried to say but couldn't. We've never spent an entire night together and I was hoping that this night would be it. I was stocked up on breakfast supplies because I had already planned an early rising and a badass breakfast that only a fool in love would wake up early and attempt to make on a Sunday. But around 4:00am it was clear that he wouldn't stay and so he left me alone with his scent all over my sheets and his memory swirling in my head. I haven't seen him since then and probably won't again for quite a while. You know, up until this very moment- writing that- I hadn't considered that thought. Sobering, it is.

I know what to do. I know what a friend would say, or an open minded mother or aunt, I know what I would say to a friend who was in a similar situation. I would tell her to enjoy him in the best way you know how as long as it's comfortable and brings you joy. But this enjoyment can't come at the cost of your mental and emotional well being. The other night I couldn't sleep and he has weird early morning work out hours so I texted him just to see if he might be awake. He called me immediately and we had a brief conversation. Just as he'd asked what had me up so early I had a beep. Who the hell could be calling me now?! I was about to dive head first into the same song I've been singing. I had just taken the breath of air to give me the confidence to say YOU have me up at a quarter to four. I'm thinking and wishing and hoping and praying for YOU, when my sister called in the middle of an intense panic attack that I had to nurse. So, in a moment our moment was gone. What I did manage to get out before we hung up was an "I miss you" that was met with an "Ohhhh." Ouch, yes really ouch.

At this point it's clear to whoever is reading this that he doesn't want me, right? Tell me that in the comments if you're reading this please. Be objective which is all you could be because you don't know me, but tell me he doesn't love me or like me and certainly doesn't miss me, because otherwise he would've said it back. Tell me I don't need him or a man at all. I need to believe something other than what I feel because true belief in something (AKA faith) effects your actions. And my actions have clearly shown that I am in love, a fool in love.

I WANT(ed) that

All I ever wanted as a kid was a big beautiful house to invite my friends over to. I wanted to grow up in a lovely neighborhood with sidewalks on the streets where the houses were. I wanted to know my neighbors and to have a crush on the boy next door. I wanted to have a back yard that disappeared into a forest that I could wear a path through from exploring with my friends. I wanted to have my first kiss in that same forest with a beautiful, tall boy who I would later lose my virginity to in my childhood bedroom. I wanted to go off to college and bring home a new guy from far away who fate allowed me to meet and fall in love with. I wanted him to come home to my warm family and home and to meet my Dad and cousins and to just fit right in.

I wanted to live in a place I could feel safe and secure in. I wanted to have family dinners on Sunday and an open minded Mom and Dad who talked about art and politics and who hosted book clubs and drank wine and went on dates together who I would occasionally catch kissing and holding hands because they were still so in love. I wanted to see love modeled for me all around and represented in the home I lived in, the food I ate, the conversations we had, the activities we did. I only realize now what the big beautiful house represented to me. It represented far reaching love that touched every part of my existence. The kind of love that makes your parents stay together and set aside their differences for the benefit of the whole family,  so that their daughters and sons know life (not just a few intermittent days) with their father and mother. The kind of love that makes adults live and work like adults so their children can come home to an actual home they can be proud and not ashamed of. The kind of love that embraces people's differences and welcomes would be outsiders that their children have befriended. The kind of love that makes people have Sunday dinners without TV and cellphones. The kind of love that allows children to be open with their parents about sex and relationships and everything else in between. The kind of love that need not utter a word through sobbing and tears but only knows a warm embrace in moments of despair.

Instead I got no father and a family of JW's that preached love but practiced exclusion at every opportunity they got.

launDRY.

Moral of the story in Beyonce dropping a new album yesterday is 1) The sex is damn good J. Hut ab. and 2) Just do the work. Don't talk about it..at all, be about it. Just do the work and drop it. Understood Beyonce. Thanks again for the inspiration, amazing visuals and something else to work it out to on the dance floor.

So it's Saturday which means, get my ass up, clean my house, go get groceries and support my Mom and the family at the surprise anniversary dinner for my Great uncle. Today doing the work means showing up for my family. And I think B would give a nod to that.

peeriod.

What do girls do now who get their periods? Is it the same weird, embarrassing thing like when I was 11? I would imagine it is. But with the lid being blown off things like, let's say strip culture (thank you Miley for doing a disservice to proud strippers everywhere who were twerking before you could walk) I would imagine there's more openness about periods and the young developing female form. Must find some cool 10 and 11 year olds and pick their gentle brains.

Do young girls tell their friends first? Or Google? Do they secretly order their own pads and tampons on Amazon with their Dad's credit card? I just wonder what the culture is NOW surrounding periods.

XMAS sale

I like that but it's not on sale. Quite frankly, I'm tired of always having to shop on sale. I wonder what it's like to just pick something and buy it just for liking its sake. One day I will know what that feels like ,but that day isn't today. At the end of the day I don't want to be someone who is drowning in the sea of America's consumer culture. I never want to buy for buyings sake, but like I said I do want to buy for liking sake.

Sometimes a pair of shoes can speak to you. And I'm not one of those crazy shoe ladies. You know how there are crazy shoe ladies, bag ladies (Erykah..), cat ladies, hat ladies and so on. I digress. Anyway, I'm not a (insert noun) lady. Okay I take that back at the moment I am a black only lady. In Florida wearing all black seems to make several statements. 1) I'm hot- literally because it's eighty-five degrees at 1:00pm in December, and because obviously I'm hot in the other way..I think. 2) I'm not from here, only I am from here, but dare not to be mistaken as such. It's actually ok if people know I'm from here, but hopefully my black uniform says resoundingly I left this God forsaken place and learned somewhere far away from here how a respectable person dresses ones self. 3) I had nothing else to wear but I'm still chic because I'm in all black and what could be chicer than that. 

Now I'm thinking of black chicness and a cool Brooklyn bar in New York that I've never been to. LORD HELP ME.

expat BACK

I'm back in America. Not just America, but the American South which at this point seems like the worst place in the world. Is it just me or does it seem like the worst stereotypes of American culture were born here? Guns, drawls, obesity, beer in cans, strip malls and Super Wal-Marts are just a few of the daily injustices I have to endure. I've been taking solace of late in my sister's stand up piano which I've been slowly learning to play, the small 2 bedroom house that's been salvaged for me (courtesy of my grandmother and mother), my Berlin memories and a few close friends. Just today I went for about an hour and a half before work to help out at Kale Cafe which is Daytona Beach's first vegan cafe and restaurant which also happens to be owned by friends. Being there was nice and through tears of onion prepping and a few of my own I realized that I have to do so much more to build the life that I desire.

Right now lost is an understatement. To say I'm lost would be undermining the gravity of the state I currently find myself in. As of now I have a failed business (my dearest babysittersclub brought in a whole €34 last month and I'm on the verge of dissolving the entire thing with a few strokes of the very keys I'm typing on now), a lack of general confidence (in my appearance, goals and abilities), a failed fling with the love of my life and best friend and I feel chubby.

Corporate work duties call so I'm off to work and will try to pick up where I'm leaving off now later..although that usually never happens.