Episode 46- Life, Love and the Pursuit of...something that resembles happiness

It's not just me. It's everyone I know...going through things.

It's in the atmosphere. It's background to everything-- even when I have a smile on my face. I'm plotting, I'm planning, I'm forcefully trying to pull my life in another, more positive direction. Life fights me. I fight back. It is what it is. I live, I breathe in and I write. I share bits and pieces of myself so I can remember what got me here in the first place.

The point is... I am here...wherever "here" is at this stage in my life. I'm approaching another birthday in a few weeks. And the only thing I want...

Happiness.

Wrap it up in a box. I get it in fleeting moments, but I want it at least with some degree of consistency. I'm not asking for world peace, just steady peace of mind. I realize that life is not going to go easy on me just because I want it to, but something has got to give...or at least make it a fair fight. I feel like David with a slingshot and a handful of rocks, but my aim is off (I am so using that in a poem...lol).

My point being if I could just get that one thing...everything else would fall into place

...if only. Le grand sigh!

I Got My Ass Kicked By Life and That B!+@h is Wearing Steel Toe Boots

...I think that would be a great book title. Sigh!

Episode 45- SMH. The 'L' Word Part 2

So I'm back from vacation and some interesting developments have occurred since our last installment.

I didn't want to be the one to say I told you so, but... damn it I told you so... see, going back to our last episode, where I was venting about the use or overuse of the "L" word, why is it that now all parties have removed the stardust from their eyeballs and showing themselves for who they are.

DJ and Angie are ok...they met, everything was great. Until... I asked Angie if she was still "in love" and. I. got. a. moment. of... PAUSE, and a sentence that started with "well..."

SMH. You KNOW that is never a good sign... However they are still together and things seem to be going ok. So we'll just let that ride. However...

Nic and Claudia.

Le grande SIGH!

These two...the story is sounding more and more like the Young and The Restless. And if I wasn't hearing it all firsthand I almost wouldn't believe it.

So Claudia backed out of the trip she was supposed to make to see Nic... because of some "work related training" that conveniently came up at the last minute. I would tend to believe that on face value but there are some AHEM, inconsistencies in the way the story was told. I may not be good at math, but um...something doesn't quite add up. Now, I see major red flags all over the place, but I have resolved to keep my opinions to myself, so I let Nic vent and just kinda take it all in. However, here's where I have a major problem...

Nic has some serious life or death health issues. So I'm hoping against hope that I am wrong (smh) and that Claudia, for what it's worth, is being forthcoming, because nothing would be more messed up than for her to turn out to be on some retarded game playing mode and put that kinda undue stress on Nic.

As for me. It's complicated. I am trying to untangle myself and my feelings about someone. I refuse to commit to the "L" word because I know I shouldn't.

I said it before I'm not "in love" even though I might like you a little bit... sigh . WTH?

Episode 44- the 'L' word

I have inexplicably and inadventantly become a matchmaker of sorts within the last couple of weeks...

A few episodes back I wrote about the online group that I now moderate. Well as it turns out, in the last few weeks two different sets of people have managed to find a love connection. Go figure!

That in and of itself was not completely unexpected, the matched couples however were... lol.

Couple #1 I'll call "Angie" and "DJ" came together after a tug of war between DJ and a third party.

Couple #2 I'll call "Claudia" and "Nic"... well basically Nic outright stole Claudia from underneath someone else...lol.

By default I've become the person that all of them come to for advice, although I try to reserve my commentary for any number of reasons, not the least of which is I have a vested interest and a natural conflict of interest in all parties involved, ya dig?

So this morning, I managed to get them all together in a conference call session...which was hilarity in and of itself, but somewhere in the middle of sideline commentary...

the L word got dropped.

It was dropped between Nic and Claudia mutually. This I knew, but to have it confirmed...

When I left the conversation to go to a meeting, Nic had confirmed to Angie (sideline of course) that indeed the L word had been used. Funny thing was, as Angie was telling me the story, she proceeded to tell me that she was/is prepared to drop. the. L. word as well. (and since I started writing this-- DJ has said the L word is in play with Angie)

Blink. Blink.

Needless to say I was (still am) stunned. Speechless in fact.

See, me, (not that I believe any of them are guilty of this) I can't see throwing "Love" out there lightly. Yes I actually said it... L.O.V.E. the dreaded LOVE.

I'm the type of person who will only say it if I mean it. I don't want to drag anyone's emotions through the dirt and I damn sure don't want to say it and get...


*crickets*


On top of that, I've never been a forwardly emotional person. Besides that word is very, very powerful and once it is out there, you ever notice that you suddenly feel obligated to respond to it?

Hence my hesitancy to even use it in the first place. It tends to complicate things anyway.

However...

I will freely admit right here right now...

I am not "in love"

You thought I was going to say I was... LMAO... um...no.

Matter of fact, just had a whole long conversation about this. I'll say the door is slightly ajar at best, but if anyone thinks I'm opening it up anytime soon...they'll be sorely disappointed. Contrary to what you think, I'm gangsta leaning against it to keep it closed and I will duct tape it and nail it and super glue if I have to before I go dropping "love" all willy nilly...no matter how much I might like you...and I do like you, but um...it's NOT that serious, thank you! LMAO. At the same time though, I'm not one to tell someone else how they feel or how they're supposed to feel or even when they are supposed to feel it.

That being said... I am now watching two very happy couples in "love" and thinking to myself...

There but for a shut and locked door and a healthy dose of cynicism and skepticism goes I.

Episode-43 Ice Cubes in Hell

You know hell is well on it's way to freezing over when...

1. News of the U.S. pulling out of Iraq is completely overshadowed by Michael Jackson's funeral arrangements.

And...

2. My technologically challenged (as in I still have to explain to her how to add an attachment to an email!!!) mother just sent me a friend request on Facebook.


Sigh!

RIP Micheal Jackson

I had to say...
I had to say something...

I promised I wouldn't post the pic of my mom in her Thriller jacket. I could talk about the kid who moonwalked off stage at my high school graduation--I never could get the moonwalk right. Or maybe, about the time just last summer when I performed the entire Beat It video in the parking lot of Shopper's Food Warehouse to entertain my daughter and god daughter... and dancing with my roommate to that same song in our flat in London. We danced to Heartbreak Hotel at karaoke a few months ago and I remembered how much I loved that song. I remember where I was when the Thriller video came on tv...and when everyone was breathless watching the Black or White video.

So many good memories wrapped in the music. The world misses you already. Sigh!

Episode 41- Letter to My Father

i wrote this about 6 months ago... never posted it, but I figure today it is appropriate.

I don't know why I about to do what I am about to do...but here goes...

I have been doing a lot of thinking about my family over the past week. Was speaking to family member and the subject of Drey's dad came up...they know the story. I don't even mention his name in a sentence anymore.

(I have this seriously uncanny ability to talk up and/or predict things at random. I am soooo not trying to talk up that man-- I won't even mention his name)

Anyway so I was thinking about my own dad. My biological father. I can't really call him a "father" seeing as how I've never met him. I never realized how much it really got to me. I mean I have a father figure in my life, but I just had this weird epiphany moment and so I wanted to write this letter mostly to my dad, but also to Drey's dad and all absentee fathers:

Dear (Absent) Father:

I used to be angry.

I used to be upset.

I used to wonder why we'd never met. Why I wasn't good enough for you to stick around. Why you missed all my firsts--steps, dates etc. Why you missed my graduations (I was the first one to finish college, ya know). Why it is growing up that I had to constantly explain to everyone that asked that I didn't have a dad. He wasn't dead--he just wasn't there. Do you have any idea what it's like to be 9 years old telling people my dad left before I was born? I am the definition of the word bastard.

Do you have any idea how your absence speaks to me? Any girl without a father or a man in her life will tell you, it leaves you feeling unworthy. And empty. And it affects you.

You say to yourself why didn't he love me? You say it a lot because you can't understand why you were rejected.

They say girls form relationships with men based on their fathers. I guess that's why my daughter's father is also absent. I choose someone just like you.

I used to get upset over your absence, but over the years I've just learned to deal. It's not my fault because I didn't ask and I didn't choose. And I understand that you were young and probably scared to death. I'm not absolving you I'm simply saying I understand. We all make bad choices at some point, and maybe if they're not too bad some can be corrected.

Maybe.

And maybe at this point it's too late for me. I don't need a father in my life because I am too old to be daddy's little girl.

That may sound angry, but how can I be angry at a stranger?

Really. I could pass you on the street today and be none the wiser.

I will say this...in case you were wondering-- I'm almost happy. My life has been far from perfect, but I'm still here.

One day I'd like to meet you, over lunch in some nice restaurant. You can tell me about the family I don't know--like how uncle so and so got drunk at the last family reunion. Tell me about my brothers and sisters (if I have any). Update me what's been going on with you. Look at pictures of your grandbaby and tell me how much she looks like me. Laugh with me over a few drinks--like we're friends or something. And then afterwards go our separate ways. Turn and walk in the opposite direction like you did 32 years ago--because then I'll know everything I wanted to know.

Like I said, I used to be angry. Until I realized that I would not be who I am had you been here.

I am a mother. I am a poet. I am a student. A friend. I am a daughter. I am your daughter. I am a stranger. I am...

ok without you.

Signed,

A Daughter Who Is No Longer Lost.