I Said, "Bust a GUT"

Relationships can be tough.  That's no secret. Personally, I think more people would benefit from the ability and willingness to just talk and reason and discuss their way through and out of a disagreement.

It's a truly underrated tool.

That said, sometimes talking doesn't get you where you want to be or it doesn't do so fast enough.  Those are the times that emotion, history, and shared experiences get us over the hump.

Sex is one very useful tool in that regard, but don't sleep on laughter.

Anyone who has experienced this will testify like Aunt Esther:

Few things will breathe life into a relationship laughter.

Have you ever laughed with your partner until you were in tears or holding your stomach?

Sexual compatibility is awesome, but there's nothing like two lovers climbing into bed, somebody says something silly, and you laugh yourselves to sleep.

Together.

The 90-day Rules

Single ladies, if you saw my earlier post, you know how I feel about cliches and jingles that pass for relationship advice.  Steve Harvey is an easy example since a friend mentions him regularly but it's not just him. These so-called "rules" about how long to wait before sleeping with a man aren't etched in stone. And they're sure not fool-proof.

Check this: I'm not saying you should get intimate with a guy as soon as you meet him but that 90-day rule is no kind of guarantee that he's not a dog.  If you wait 3 months to get it on with a man, if he really is a dog, he already met women 3 months, ago, that is going to lay down with him every day that you don't.

Trust from experience. WE WILL WAIT YOU OUT.

Don't base your decision to sleep with a man on so some arbitrary time rule.  Base it on his behavior over that period of time, if you want, but not on the time, itself.  That may sound like the same thing but feel me on this...

I see ladies, regularly ignoring all the tell-tale signs that a man is not AT ALL interested in their welfare* but they swear by whatever Harveyism gives them the green light to take him home.

I learned, long ago, to do my best (that's all any of us can do) to pay attention to the things that women tell me about themselves - explicitly or otherwise.  It saves a lot of time and trouble. The same is true of men.  We tell you the truths about ourselves in our words OR in our actions (or both).

It's up to you to listen.

* - (like only calling you when the sun sets and his nature rises, running from danger before YOU do, or nodding through your stories of what's happening in your life, without truly listening or giving a damn) 

Edited for Content

Rant follows:

I remember a couple of years, ago, I was on a site I frequented and I mentioned the iPad. The dude running the site had to make a comment about how I *had* to mention the iPad - as if the statement I made was an excuse to bring up the device. I don't need excuses. I do my technological dance-of-joy with NO SHAME.

You know what, no one says these things when someone mentions their car, their computer, their house, their husband, their wife, or their lavish vacation. Well, I'm sure someone does, but the point is that most of those things have just become a part of our every day lives, just like smartphones and big, flatscreen televisions have become so common.

It's not (always) about bragging when someone mentions something they have - just because someone else doesn't have it. These are the people, the places, the events, and the things that make up the totality of our lives so no one should feel bad about mentioning their management position simply because there are those who wish they had them. It's when that's all you know how to talk about, when you value nothing but displaying your accomplishments or your things, hoping to make someone else feel inadequate.

Your success does not equal my failure and vice-versa.
So, yeah, I'll mention my girlfriend, because she's a part of my life. I'll mention my job because it's a part of my life, and I've had times IN that life when I had NO job, so I value the good AND the bad. I'll also mention the new and interesting technology that fascinates and inspires and empowers me. Because that's a part of my life, too.

Feel free to do the same and I'll do my best not to make comments that, years later, make you feel a twinge whenever you mention your successful relationship, career, home purchase, or iPad, as if you're doing a bad thing and should somehow filter that experience out of your conversation.

Now BACK to ME!

Today, I almost embarrassed the shyt out of my girlfriend because I'm the kind of person who would (and did) do the following:

I was picking out a new body spray to keep fresh after all the bicycling I'm doing, these days, and the Old Spice brand reminded me of the commercials with the Black dude (y'know, "I'm on a horse").

Right then, a young, white couple walked by. The young lady was near me and her man was approaching. I spontaneously turned to her and said, "Look at your man. Now back to me. Now back to him. Now BACK to ME..."

She smiled. He nervously grinned.

They didn't know what the FUQUE I was talking about!

I briefly explained that it was a popular commercial, then suggested they ask their friends about "I'm on a horse." I then allowed them take their nervous, half-sincere chuckling back to the safety of strangerdom, as I looked for my girlfriend, to tell her the story.

"Sadly," she's so easily embarrassed (or so gun-shy from my silliness) that she even winced and turned away when I asked our cashier if he was familiar with the commercial.

All I did was ask. Oh well.

Ironic Buggin' Out

This won't give the best impression of us or our abode, but...

Just yesterday, I was in a chatroom telling some folks about a big-ass mutant cockroach I'd just smashed. We started talking about pests and I mentioned the poest control dynamite in our home.

I'm the one who takes care of any bug or potential bug in our home because my girlfriend gets the freakin' heeby jeebies. I added however, that in the rare instances that a lizard or something gets in, I'm the one who jumps on the table, holding my skirt out, while my girlfriend goes and grabs the little bugger and sets him free outside somewhere.*

Most are mildly amused by that fact, but a fact it is.

Well, fast-forward to today when I had some errands to run. I grabbed what I needed, jumped on my bicycle, and took off. I was gone for two or three hours, then returned, grabbing some McNasty** along the way. When I got home, I noticed something on the floor.

I looked down to see a dead, upside down lizard, with his guts spilling out while the smell of bug spray filled my nostrils. Yuck.

Helluva coincidence innit?*** Also hella gross.

Best I can figure, the pest control spray I put outside disoriented the lizard and, ironically, lead to him entering our place instead of deterring him. I also gather that, I was so anxious to leave that I didn't notice an upside-down lizard in front of the so I promptly, and quite accidentally, stomped the shit out of it.

Over the next couple of minutes, I sports one of those Peanuts-style gross-out faces, as I grabbed a broom n whatnot to kick the poor lil bastard outdoors. Blech.

Just thought I'd share. Have a great weekend.



* - Whenever possible we opt to eject the creature instead of smooshing it. Ain't that nice?
** - Otherwise known as McDonald's.
*** - It's funny that spell-check pointed out "freakin'" and "heeby jeebies," but ignored "helluva" and "innit."

Finishing First

I'm sure many of you have heard men saying things like "Nice guys finish last." I've heard plenty of women disagree, but I've seen just as many dissing some guy who politely approaches then in favor of the guy who doesn't hold the door for her. Sometimes it seems like there's nothing sexier than a door in the face.

When I was in Houston, I remember chatting with an out-of-town young lady over the phone for several weeks until she happened to be visiting some local relatives. She suggested we meet so one evening, I made my way to her family's home and knocked on the door.

I was greet warmly enough, but it was pretty awkward, walking into a strange environment where the only person you knew... you didn't know all that well. Anyway, while I waited on her to be ready, her very large family's behavior wavered between welcoming and alienating. My friend wasn't that much better, but I tried to take it all in-stride. After all, I was kinda nervous, even though we were just a couple of people .

When we finally left. From the front door to the door of my truck, my buddy's behavior didn't get much better. In fact, it got downright rude. I wish I could remember specific things she said, but I remember having second-thoughts about continuing with the evening.

As I opened the passenger door to let her in, she said something else that kinda pissed me off. I decided to take a completely different path than I normally would. Instead of telling her about herself and cutting the evening short, I told her about herself and then slammed the passenger door before she could get in.

I figured, if she got pissed, she could go back in the house and I could leave. Otherwise, she'd know how I felt, I'd have gotten it off of my chest, and I'd have a potentially interesting evening ahead of me.

What she did was buck her eyes and stand there with her mouth open. I told her, if she wanted to get in, she could open her own door. And that she'd better be quick before I hit the gas.

She actually smiled and then got in.

The rest of the evening was more of the same. Every time I had a smart-ass response to something she said or did, I said it. Usually, she reacted like it was outrageous, but she'd always act like it turned her on or something. Weird stuff. It was an interesting experiment.

We stopped by my place and she ended up more or less throwing herself at me, that evening, after having behaved much more civilly than she did before I flipped the script on her, earlier.

That outcome spoke volumes, to me. What do you think (those of you who're still around).?

The Passing Ritual

Okay. Three funerals in three weeks is enough.

One thing I think I've gained from the experiences, though, is a greater appreciation for practical value of the ritual. While I didn't attend any wakes, I did attend two of the funerals and three of the "repasts"*.

Wakes are almost completely foreign, to me. I don't think I've ever experienced one and I never plan to. Not that anyone's ever excited about attending a wake, but the funeral experience -and its distance from the deceased- seems much more emotionally useful. Maybe I just don't get the true purpose of a wake, though.

I've attended my share of funerals. Even when I didn't know the deceased, the aura of sadness and loss are often enough to make my throat swell and my eyes water a little. Anyone who hadn't had the chance to openly mourn the loved-one's passing can get that extra emotional "push" - the kind that helps you have a "good cry." There are people are to lean on, hold onto, speak for and about the dead, and there's a pastor to slowly bring us back down from the emotional apex of the event. The internment is that last opportunity to say good-bye.

After all that, the repast and procession is like a big, collective hug. A time that may or may not involve much reflection on the life of the deceased, but that can almost be a celebration of life, family, and loved-ones. Seeing those who can't or don't visit often makes us feel good. Eating together makes us feel good. Seeing how our lives are connected and how we affect each other makes us feel good.

It can be hard. In some cases, unfortunately, it can be full of drama. It may even seem to be too much, at times, but I think it helps us all heal from the pain of another's death and grow closer to the living.

I don't think I ever truly "got it," before. Maybe I still don't, now, but I think I'm closer.




* - Apparently, this term has different meanings among different people. I'm generally talking about the after-funeral gathering and consumption of food.

Indignity of Persistence

My aunt was diagnosed with diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease some years, ago. At first she just seemed really sweet and kinda silly. Later, she became more easily confused by things, although she was still fairly aware. She had a regular caregiver who helped my uncle take care of her since things like bathing herself became too much for her.

By the time my grandmother's 80th birthday celebration came around a year and a half, ago, my aunt was still mobile, but unexpressive. Making eye-contact with her caused her to turn away.

In her eyes I thought I could see ... something like what you feel when you experience deja vue. Everything about your surroundings in that moment, seem very, very familiar, but you don't know how or why. Being confronted with one of those familiar faces, in an up-close and personal way, was uncomfortable, I guess.

The next time I saw her, about a year later, she was bed-ridden and unresponsive, needing others to take care of her every need. My uncle took months off from work, to take care of her and make arrangements for others to help.

From what I understand, my uncle was told that the care he could provide her was insufficient so he was forced to put her in a home... where they could take better care of her.

Within a year, she was dead. Some type of infection set in her body. From what we're being told, the city, state, county or whomever is saying that this infection shouldn't be been fatal - the facility should've caught it.

So, my uncle was forced to send his wife away for better care and signs indicate that she received the exact opposite.

I believe an autopsy has been ordered, so we'll see. Either way, the people who loved my aunt have to deal with the mixed-emotions of being sad that she's passed but maybe embarrassed by some sense that the indignity of her persistence has come to an end.

Happy Valentine's Day, Unc.

Biking Shorts - Part 4

Drive-by.
In fact, a funny thing happened along the way back from the flea market. Before crossing a street in a residential area, I made sure to make eye-contact with the driver of a red truck that was approaching the same intersection.

Despite the fact that I had the "right of way," I wasn't crossing in front of this Sanford & Son special until I knew the driver recognized my "right" and my "way."

She nodded and I continued on.

Along the way, I noticed that a vehicle was approaching me, very slowly, from behind. This wasn't too unusual since many drivers go WAY out of their way to make sure they're not going to hit bikers and pedestrians. This time, though, the driver pulled alongside me, with her window down. It was the same red truck from before.

"You wanna put that bike in the back of my truck," she asked. I guessed this was her way of taking pity on a novice cyclist, but offering me a ride home.

"Hehe. No, thanks. I'm good," I replied.

"You just doing that for exercise?"

That was close enough to the truth, so I responded, "Yep."

"Mmm. Well you sho' are lookin' GOOD," she said, as she stared at me through her good eye.

I laughed and thanked her, then she drove off.

Along with the exhilaration of the ride and the surprising beauty of a few hidden scenic areas, her compliment made my "little" trek that much cooler.*

Not a bad start.

Click below to skip to:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3



* But the LAST thing I was expecting was for ANYbody to "holla" at my sweaty, inappropriately-dressed (tank and jeans), wobbly-ridin' behind. :-p

The Other Foot

About a month, ago, my girlfriend and I were driving down the street and stopped for some gas. When I finished pumping the gas, I walked back to the door to find my girlfriend to a 45- to 55-year-old, disheveled, white male through her window. The window was about half-way down, so he had plenty of clearance to reach through and grab her in some way.

When he saw me, he said, "How you doin', man?"

"I'm good, but I'm gonna need you to step back a little."

My initial impression was that he was asking for money. When I saw the clipboard, I was reminded of a time when a previous girlfriend opened the door to someone asking for census information. She gave him all sorts of information, which concerned me, but not as much as the fact that she stood there in the doorway talking to this stranger while I was away. He could've pushed her inside and done anything to her.

He complied and my girlfriend explained that he had some kind of election-related petition. While walking away, he said, "Sorry, man. I just wanted to know if you were registered voters.

I wasn't askin' fer money or nuthin'."

He sounded so damned pitiful. And his general demeanor suggested that plenty of people had similarly misjudged him in the past... and that he'd more or less learned "his place."


Plenty of times on this blog, I've gone on about how unfair it is that people see me and grab their purses, cross the street, follow me around the stores, etc. Basically, taking a look at me and assuming the worst said more about them than it did about me... but it still made me feel like shit.

Well, now I'd done the same thing to someone else... and, once again, I felt like shit.

That's all.

You N-Bomber

No grown person owes me anything - including an explanation of his or her behavior.

But if you expect me to respect you on a certain level, a certain amount of transparency would be helpful.

I just left a chatroom where a(n apparently white) guy who's openly and repeatedly dropped n-bombs, continues to have an audience with the other chatters. When I complain about this, no one has any criticism to offer... except about me.

Meanwhile the n-bomber goes on about how he hasn't called anybody a nigger, TONIGHT, as if that makes all the damned difference in the world.

To be honest, I'm definitely typing this while still emotionally charged and I'm not meticulously laying out all of the details of the situation, but I maintain this the above IS a fair representation of the events.

It reminds me of my previous conversations and posts about how it would be strange for me to expect a white friend to cut off a buddy who calls Blacks niggers, but for me to be unwilling to cut off a buddy of mine who's trigger-happy with other epithets, like "fag."

I don't think it's as perfectly black and white as that, but it's close enough for this entry. I don't want to expect a friend of mine to drop a friend of his or hers but whenever I think about being in the presence of such people WHILE the offender is still a part of the group, it feels really, really wrong.

Well, today that scenario went from a hypothetical to a reality. Part of me wonders if I'd feel differently if I'd been called "nigger" more times in my life (to my face, anyway) and had become desensitized to it.

Maybe. But there's another part of me that doesn't give a damn.

Happy Thanksgiving.

$#!+ Like That pt. 2

"$#!+ Like That" refers to encounters where other people's mental laziness, low intellect, or maybe willful ignorance makes life more difficult than it needs to be. It's hard to explain, so here's another example - this time from the workplace.

Supervisor: "Okay, everyone, you all owe us $20, which we'll need by the end of the month when the gift is delivered."

Me & co-workers: "How's that?"

Supervisor: "Management ordered Ursula's retirement present. Remember when we had that staff meeting six months, ago, where we talked about the [x,y,z]? At the end of that meeting, someone suggested that we might want to get Ursula a retirement present."

Co-worker: "I think I remember that, but I didn't hear anything else about it. I'd forgotten all about it."

Me: "Same here. No one told us the plan, asked us if we wanted to participate, or showed us the gift."

Supervisor: "Look, West, if you just don't want to contribute to Ursula's retirement, you don't have to."

Me: ". . ."

See, it's shit like that right there that gets on my frickin' NERVES. The point isn't Ursula or her retirement. The point is that we deserve to choose whether we donate, how much we donate, and what we're donating it for. Telling us that we owe, how much we owe, and when we're going to pay is overstepping, to say the least. It's especially inappropriate coming from those in positions of power over us.

Call me crazy but, personally, I like to "help" decide what gift my money's going toward. My expressing this fact does not automatically mean I don't like Ursula or don't want her to have a gift. It means the situation wasn't handled as well as it could've been.

It's not just the fact that this is a management issue (I'd have felt the same if these were friends or family), but one should recognize that having the guts to speak up to one's "superiors" isn't always an easy thing.

The proper way to respond to thoughtful objection or constructive criticism from a friend, family member, or employee is not to assume that the speaker must be a cheapskate.

See, it's shit like that right there that pisses me off.

History and Hers

B. Good asked how I met my lady. I'm not sure there's enough material in the answer to warrant an entire blogpost, but I thought I'd give it a shot.

M'lady and I met in college several years back. We were both taking a C++ (computer programming) course and the related lab.

We'd noticed each other and were mutually attracted, but we were both already in committed relationships.

We still made little efforts here and there to get to know each other, though. Mine involved trying to sit near her so I could get to know her a little. Hers involved pretending to need more help than she really did.

The ol' damsel-in-distress thing.

I'd finished my program and was helping our classmates with theirs so she was one of many who asked for my assistance. I didn't have a clue that I was falling for the okey-doke.

We were in lab kinda late that day, so I offered to give her a ride home. We stopped at Subway first, ate, chatted, and discovered how much we had in-common. This intensified the attraction.

We spent a good deal of time avoiding getting TOO close. Meanwhile, years passed. Although, we stayed in touch, on and off, the eventual demise of our respective relationships was independent of our attraction to each other.

That said, we talked quite a bit during my last internship, hundreds of miles away.

Her sweet voice and our long, interesting conversations made my heart grow even more fond of her. By then, I was dying to see her!

When I finally returned to town, I soon resolved to never again be away from her for so long.

She hadn't told me that she'd been in a car accident, until near the end of my time away. In fact, she was concerned that the weight she'd gained due to her limited mobility (it was a bad accident) would turn me off.

Poor thing. "She don't know me vewwy well, do she?!"

The truth was that her added thickness made me even MORE attracted to her! When I FINALLY saw her after being in town for (what felt like weeks and months), I just about gobbled her up!

We've been "going steady" now for six years.

Where Are You?

It's probably both, appropriate and ironic, that my first post in a week is called "Where Are You"...



Classmates, when our teacher arrives late then expects us to stay late or miss material, I spoke up in objection. Alone.

Where were you then?

Co-workers, when our bosses treat us like children, imbeciles, and criminals, I stand up to them. Alone.

Where are you now?

Community, when times get harder and more stressful, I'll do what I can to ease the burden on us. Hopefully, not alone.

Where will you be then?

My Father Figured

*continuing what was a too-long comment from African-American's Dad's recent post about his father*

I think my Pops thinks I hold a grudge with him because of his role or lack of a role during my childhood. My problems with my him have more to do with who he is (and who I am), now, than the craziness (and absences) of the past.

It's kinda of sad to say out-loud (or electronically), but I've given up on us having a real relationship. I may send him a lower-tier card or something to acknowledge Father's Day and the fact that I'll always love him, but interaction is fueled by interlocking personality traits or simple compatibility. We lack that - almost completely.

Without it, we either 1) lie and tolerate each other through clenched teeth or 2) we avoid each other. I reject the former and so am left with the latter.

It's too bad, really, because his relationship with his father was $#!+, too. He says he wanted ours to be better. So did I.

I'll tell you, though: if my Dad ever cared enough to just look me in the eye, or even call, and tell me that he loved me, I'd be "a puddle of water," as my Mom says.

Surreality Bites

Something odd happened the other day. Well, a lot of odd things have happened in my life, lately. Below is one of the latest.

Quick background for those that are just tuning in:

My dad and I have no relationship. We've not spoken in about two and a half years and before that short period of communication, it'd been about two years. And so on. And so on. One strangely ironic reason that we have no relationship (i.e. can't even have a 5-minute conversation) is due to my father's insecurity over the fact that he wasn't there for much of my life, for various reasons. At different times over the past several years, he has taken in a couple of young people that he claims as his children (we'll leave it at that). I've met them on and off since they were babies, but we don't really have a relationship, either. One of them, an 18-year-old we'll call "R," lives with my dad, now. I think Pops sees this as his second (/last) chance to be a "real" father.

We now return to our regularly-scheduled program.

So, I was checking something out on the laptop one evening when my phone rang. I looked at the screen and saw the name of my half-step-brother-kinda-sorta, R.

R and I are cool enough with each other. We don't talk often, but we call or text each other once every six months or so. That said, I was shocked as shit to hear from him - especially since I'd been thinking about him and my Pops over the past week or so.

I answered the phone and we did the quick greetings and howyoudoin's when he threw me a curveball in response to my "How're you doing?"

"Not so good."

Shit. A ton of possibilities zipped through my poor brain in the 1.76 seconds following his reply. The one that endured the most was one of my fears - that my Pops would die or something and, because of our lack of a relationship, I wouldn't find out until it was too late.

Luckily, it was nothing so dramatic. R told me that he and my dad hadn't been getting along all that well. (Although, when I say that back to him, he downplays it, as if it's not that bad.)

Anyway, he shocks me some more by more or less telling on himself. He's not saying that my our father is difficult (which Pops most #$T#! DEFINITELY is!). No.

R is saying that the problem is his own behavior. He says he lies and procrastinates and disobeys and he needs to start doing better. He placed zero blame on my our father.

He goes on explaining how he's not doing what he's supposed to do and I have to ask him the obvious, "If you know what you're supposed to do and you want to do it, what's stopping you from doing it?"

He didn't have an answer for that, which left us both in mild fugue state, trying to figure out where to go from there. I recovered first:

"I'm going to tell you an old joke. Now, I'm not trying to make you laugh, so don't think that. I'm just using a joke to illustrate my point:

A man walks into a doctor's office. The doctor says, 'What seems to be the problem?'
The man says, 'Well, Doc, I really need your help. It really hurts whenever I turn my head like this. Ow!'

The doctor replies, 'Well, stop turning your head like that.'

'. . .'

'That'll be fifty bucks.'"

The point of that story as well as much of what I said to him for the next 45 minutes or so, was that his actions, his reputation, and his life are largely in his own hands. I wanted him to know that he has more control than he might think.

"Ultimately, it comes down to what kind of man you want to be," I told him. I told him that to get from point A to point B requires effort and commitment along with the simple act of putting one foot in front of the other. Baby steps, even.

I'm not sure if this made a dent, but I hoped it would at least make him feel better. I had to remind myself of a lesson I've learned and forgotten many times before: Sometimes, it's not what you say so much as the fact that you cared enough to say it.

I asked him what kind of man he didn't want to be and he laid that out pretty well. I told him that most men who possess the negative traits he described, used to be 18-year-olds just like him. (Or is he 17?) And at that age, I'm sure none of them planned to be an undependable, lying, rotten so-and-so... well, not most of'em, anyway. Yet they ended up there regardless.

I asked him a question, "You know the difference between them and you?"

"No."

"The difference is that you've got me... and your dad... and the rest of your family and friends, along with the desire and the ability to do better than you've done before." Or something like that."

Eventually, I gave it a rest because it was hard to know, from his feedback, whether any of it was doing any good. I figured that I'd done about all I could for the evening and I told him to feel free to call me again whenever he liked.

I also recommended talking to other people he trusted, including his pastor - not to mention good old-fashioned prayer. It may not be my thing, but it's his and that means something.

I don't know if I can relate it properly, but this whole thing was insanely Twilight Zone-ish. For a variety of reasons:

1) I don't know why he'd turn to me for advice. He never has before and I don't know why he'd think enough of me to consider me. (Not a put-down of myself but an acknowledgment of our limited interaction.)

2) My Pops can be sneaky. I've long suspected that he's told R to call me, but to pretend that he did it on his own, so that my dad could find out something about me or promote interaction between the young man and me.

3) I've never known a young person to come to someone saying he's a problem and wants to stop doing bad things - especially when those bad things have nothing to do with anything big like crime, drugs, or sexuality.

The delivery and content seemed so artificial (and similar to my Pops' past comments) that I had a hard time believing they were genuine. At the same time, I realized that I could be wrong. That's why I treated him like he was dead serious.

Besides, he may not have been telling me the whole story. That's why I threw in some stuff about sex and drugs and crime in there. Just in case.


If this is all rather hard to swallow, imagine a co-worker of yours - one that you're not all that close to, but you've met his/her family at various time throughout your tenure. Now imagine that co-worker's kid, whom you've only met a handful of times, calls you up asking for advice about what kind of detergent to use on his clothes.

This isn't quite that, but it's a good example of how out-of-the-blue and .... just surreal... the whole thing was, for me.

More Than We Know

I mentioned, last week, that I visited my family in Pensacola, Florida, for Mother's Day.

During that visit, my aunt asked her son (my cousin) if he'd shown me the invitations to his high school graduation. He didn't have one for me, then, but he offered a verbal invitation for the middle of the following week. I told him I'd see if I could get the time off.

I had quite a few reasons not to go:

1) I'd just spent a lot of money for Mother's Day.
2) I'd recently traveled quite a bit.
3) My cousin and I have only seen each other a handful of times and, although I have nothing against him, we aren't very close.

The list goes on.

I had one reason to go:

1) He asked me to.

Now, to be honest, it seemed to me that my cousin only invited me at his mother's urging and it seemed clear that she hadn't considered inviting me prior to my arrival the week before. That doesn't offend me at all, but it appeared that I wouldn't be missed if I didn't show.

However, I wasn't completely sure about that.

I should mention that this cousin is adopted. Now, that doesn't make a difference, to me. It's been almost 20 years since my aunt took in a troubled child (a troubled baby, actually) in need of a warm home and a loving family. So he's been a part of the family long enough that I rarely think about the fact that we don't have the same blood in our veins.

Quick digression: It's funny how family, often defined simply by genetic chance, is largely a social construct with boundaries that are only limited by how far we open our hearts and minds.

Anyway, despite the fact that he's family, he may not always feel like he is - especially since he's got troubles that've carried over from his past. That plus the fact that my "real" cousins, whose lives I've tried to be a part of from the beginning, have often left me out of such milestone moments in their lives... made this invitation matter a bit more to me than expected.

He's a young man trying to forge a bright future and he asked me to be a part of the ceremony that initiates this. I couldn't say, "No." After securing the leave time, I agreed to go.

My girlfriend hadn't seen my family in a while (and vice-versa) so it was especially nice that she cared enough to take time off and accompany me.

We arrived in Pensacola, went to my cousin's graduation, noting how few of us (the family) showed up, took a bunch of pictures, loved him up, then went to an "after-party" of sorts, at a local restaurant. This get-together was organized by a member of my aunt's religious assembly, for lack of a better word. Besides my aunt and cousin, my girlfriend and I were the only attendees who weren't members of that religious group.

That's another thing. This religious group, to which my aunt and cousin belong, isn't quite "mainstream." My aunt changed from the predominant religion in our family to her current religion, decades, ago. My family's response to this was between extremes. Not great, but not terrible, either.

"Lukewarm" sounds about right.

So, members of my aunt's biological family (my girlfriend and I) interacted with my aunt's religious family, which I don't think has ever happened before. It went well.

I found out that my cousin had told people that I was coming and how happy this made him.

This surprised me. A lot.

In the end, we all laughed, filled our bellies, and generally had a good time. After it was over, I began to re-evaluate how much this event meant to me, to aunt, and to my cousin.

For me, it was nice to feel wanted and welcomed by family.
For my aunt, I think it was nice to have a positive interaction between her two families.
For my cousin and my aunt, I also think it was nice to feel that someone else in the family was taking an interest in his happiness and future.

So, I guess this was my long-winded way of saying that the choices we make and the things we do for and with our loved-ones can matter much more than we realize, at the time - even to ourselves. I'm glad that, in this instance at least, I didn't pass on an opportunity to bring some of the family even closer together.

For that matter, I'm also very happy with my girlfriend's choice to be a part of the whole thing - even when my grandmother's health was a concern and we accompanied her to and from the hospital, yesterday.

Test Anxiety: the Belly & the Book

In her recent post, "Testing, Testing, 1-2-3," B. Good discussed the ways that so many of us test those we like and love. These test may take the form of an apparently harmless question about how we look in a particular outfit, a statement of opinion designed to elicit a reaction, etc. Whatever the case, the response to our little tests are scored and recorded in our brains and may be used against our friends, foes, and loved-ones, at any given time.

We all test each other to a degree and I think that's fine. Some folks take it too far, though. Here's an example from my life:

The Book
I spent some time in up North, during an internship, some years, ago. Shortly after arriving on the job site, I was introduced to a friendly, very attractive young lady. The person who introduced us was an older Black male with whom I'd bonded a little since I'd arrived. This kinda gave her the stamp of approval, from my perspective. She and I talked a bit, then exchanged numbers before going back to our respective duties.

It's no secret that I'm very stimulated by good conversation. Well, she and I talked on the phone for what seemed like hours.

She had a ton of questions and opinions from various angles and perspectives. This might have turned some people off, but I was quickly becoming hooked. Here was someone who'd given a lot of thought to a lot of different things and was interested in other people's perspectives. That's no small thing, as far as I'm concerned. In fact, it's pretty rare.

I couldn't wait to see her, again, and she seemed to feel the same, so it wasn't long before we were hanging out at her place. The chemistry was already strong and the conversation was on-point, so things were looking good.

At some point, she stepped away, for some reason, while I stayed in the living room. While waiting, I noticed a paperback book on the floor and picked it up. The title was something like, "1001 Questions To Ask A Potential Mate."

Hmm.

I flipped through the book and saw a lot of very familiar questions. Sure enough, she'd been more or less interviewing me over the phone, using this book as a guide. "Guide," nothing. She asked the questions word-for-word.

Honestly, I'm not against the idea of owning such a book. I was struck, however, by how very much of our conversations and (my impression of) her personality came from a $5 book instead of from the young lady I was just getting to know.

In a sense, I felt deceived or maybe even betrayed. Here she was, testing the hell out of me without offering as much of herself in-return. I began to question what I thought I knew about her.

Ultimately, we continued spending time together, despite the red (or at least orange) flag that book sent up in my mind. That was both, a good and a bad thing.

The Belly
In time, I thought less about that book, as she and I grew pretty close. Then, one day, she told me she was pregnant. I was floored. I knew that, despite safe or safeR sex practices, pregnancy's always a possibility. As the shock began to fade a bit, I embraced the idea and began talking about how we'd work things out, considering my work and living situations. I've always wanted to be a father, so it was really something to 1) feel that reality approaching and 2) find out she lied about the pregnancy just to see how I'd react to it.

I should also mention that, for over a decade, I've been having very vivid, very long, and certainly very enduring dreams about having children. Invariably, I wake up, realize that none of it was real, and then I, for lack of a better term, mourn for the child I lost, but never had.

So, finding out, during my waking ours, that I was really going to be a father, becoming comfortable with that "fact," then being told it was all a lie... err... "test," bordered on devastating.

Eventually, she turned out to be a rather destructive person, to herself and those around her. After more than our share of drama, the internship came to an end and I left, never to see her, again.

I say that staying with her was both a good and a bad thing because, despite the drama and deceit (or maybe because of it) I learned a lot and we had some good times.

In the end, though, I guess I've formed my own "tests" that I consciously or subconsciously administer to the people that I let into my life. Maybe that's fair. Maybe it's not. But above all else, I do my best to be completely upfront and honest about my intentions and who I am.

After all, what does it say about a person when they fail their own test?



I welcome your questions and comments.

It Should Go Without Saying

It's a familiar phrase that's usually used in a somewhat contradictory manner. Here's a hypothetical:

"It should go without saying that she's one of the most brilliant, ground-breaking, critically and commercially successful authors of our time."

But it doesn't go unsaid. You said it, anyway - largely, I'm guessing, for the sake of flattering the person being introduced. Plus, this informs the unlikely few who weren't familiar with the person, beforehand.

I think that's what this usually comes down to: accommodating the unlikely or the uninformed.

Or maybe these sayers of that which should go unsaid have been burned in the past:

"I think our workflow system has gaps that we could address with a few quick and simple procedural changes."

"What? Are you saying that the rest of us are so stupid that we couldn't set up a good system or identify its flaws? So, you're basically saying we're useless - that we're bad people - no good for the company, our families, or ourselves?!"

Okay. No one verbally responds that way, but that's what often goes on inside their heads. Whether its due to their own deep-seated personal insecurities or professional shortcomings, many people react to suggestions and criticism assaults on their right to exist and an indictment of their worth as human-beings.

Because of this, time gets wasted on explanations and disclaimers that "should go without saying:"

"I think our workflow system has gaps that we could address with a few quick and simple procedural changes... Now, I'm not saying that the boss or you guys did a bad job setting up our current system. In fact, I'm sure it aligned with our needs and the time-constraints of the time. Because of your skills and hard work, we've accomplished so much over the years. Now, with your help, we can execute a system that will allow each of us to achieve even more for this company and for ourselves."

Oh my goodness.

Why, oh why, can't we grown folks just say things to each other in the simplest way, without having to worry about so many unjustified* assumptions and people leaping to conclusions?

"Wow. You look really nice, today!"
"What, I look like shit every other day?!"

"We shouldn't have gone into Iraq."
"Why do you hate freedom/America?"

"Hi. I just want a fade and a trim, but please don't cut any lower/higher than here."
"What are you saying, that I don't know how to do my job? I went to this hair care school and have this much experience, blah blah blah blah blah..."

Folks know I'm good for trying to "read between the lines," but even I don't think people should have to say:

"You look great today, which is not a statement in favor of or against any physical aesthetic you've had in the past or that you may exhibit in the future."

"I'm against the war, but I'm support the troops and don't want America reduced to the plaything of ideological extremists."

"Here's how I'd like my hair done, but my preferences are in no way meant to tread upon your lofty credentials or many years of experience in your field."

Sometimes it really should go without saying, if only we, as listeners, would just let it go.







* - because, y'know, sometimes there are valid reasons to be offended or feel attacked

Counseling Commentary

chele recently posted about counseling/therapy, which prompted me to drop the following lengthy commentary:

It’s funny you mention this, as I’ve been considering just this, recently. In fact, I (even more recently) said that I wasn’t gonna do it because I knew I wasn’t in the right place for what I knew was to come.

I’ve also had experiences in the past which told me the one thing that often changes people’s impressions of those they consider to be mentors, counselors, teachers, parents, etc: I realized these folks were only human - and not necessarily all that great at what they do.

I used to basically have complete faith in these people, but I’ve seen healthcare professionals who didn’t respect patients’ rights to privacy, teachers who were knowledgeable, but couldn’t teach, managers who were experienced, but couldn’t manage, and counselors who’d received some training, but who really couldn’t offer me much more than an ear to bend.

If that’s all I need, then cool, but if I want to feel like this person is going to challenge me in substantive ways AND listen to what I say, I tend to worry that I’ll end up with a dud.

That said, when weighed against the alternative, counseling may turn out to be a fine option.

Your questions and comments are welcome.