July 24, 2014

Birthday Blues...


"You want TOO MUCH!!!"
-Mia Farrow in The Great Gatsby



I had this grandiose plan for my 40th.  I'm talking international trippin', baby!  Family, friends all invited...time, money and the ability to have a GREAT TIME would be the only prerequisites.  I was to have the details of this fabulous and ultimate birthday celebration locked down by LAST August, in order to give folks plenty of time to stack the dollars, and if applicable, find some unsuspecting but safe sucker to watch the kids for 7-10 days.  Of course, I did not do this.  As a matter of fact, here I sit WEEKS away from my birthday and not only have I not booked a trip...I haven't even decided on a destination! Worse than that....I JUST, after nearly 2 years since my name change, sent in for a corrected passport.  This is beyond procrastination.  Sigh.

 I am truly looking forward to turning 40.  I honestly feel something huge and wonderful is on the horizon in my life.  At the same time, I can't shake this nagging...anxious feeling.  Why am I dragging my feet?  Why the indecisiveness?  I think I finally got it.

i don't want my birthday to suck.

Let me explain.  My 18th sucked.  My 21st double SUCKED.  I don't remember my 30th...and maybe because by that time I had changed my attitude about my birthday.  I stopped expecting it to be special...and I surely stopped expecting anyone else to make it special.  I started just being grateful to be alive and healthy and sane (halfway at least lol)...and because my expectations were no longer high, I started actually enjoying my birthdays.  I had plans or I didn't.  I just started flowing with it.

But this 40th...it seems it's too major to just fly by the seat of my pants.  It's too much of a milestone to NOT be marked with something different and special and exciting!!!  Yet every time I've attempted to even think about a plan, I feel drained.  Tired.  Unmotivated.  Why???

I talked to my father about it during his summer visit.  He of course asked me questions until I wanted to scream...forcing me to get to the root.  The conclusion?  I believe, while I'm looking forward to turning 40 and I have many great things presently and on the horizon, like so many others...

life is not what I thought it would be at 40...

I had no vision of going to Paris or Rome or Madrid without a ringed hand clasping mine...or even a ring less hand attached to someone I was in deep LIKE with.  Calling home to check on the "mini me and him".  Call the agent to say hold the contract until we get back.  Real Talk.  Perhaps this is why it took me so long to update my passport and why I haven't been able to decide on a trip.  It's not that I still want to be the name on the passport because I don't. It's simply that I didn't think I would be in this place PERIOD by this scene of my life's play. 

I don't know.  Maybe I can just ride this birthday out and let it be what it's going to be without forcing The Fabulous.  Because anything forced still will not make the cut in my mind.  Do I want too much?  Perhaps.  But...um....so?

bite of the day ~ Life may not be how you imagined, but if you are still on the upside of the ground, it is  ALL GOOD.  There's still a chance to make your dreams come true.  And as the old folks say, it could ALWAYS be so much worse.  I'm blessed.



thirtiesgirl

July 2, 2014

I hate Religion.



Meaningless rituals. Cookie Cut.  Evaporate Your Mind.  Demolish Thinking for Yourself.

RELIGION.

Sunday.

I had decided not to rush my mother out the door after church service, which is what I usually do.  After all it was her birthday so the day was hers to do as she pleased.  Part of my gift was a patient attitude as she took FULL advantage of the opportunity.  After about 45 minutes of "fellowshipping with the saints", we were finally about to leave.  Suddenly another sister approached us...and she was a talkative one.  But I enjoyed her light and humorous personality.  After a while, my rockstar mother was approached by yet another person and I was left with the talkative sister who was now recapping the event that our arts nonprofit, The Anointed Harvesters, hosted last year with Rising Star Christian Keyes.  Then it happened...

"But I do have a bone to pick with you.  Now I know how to break it down...God had to deliver me.  But when y'all played that WORLDLY music...I was really offended.  Cause I thought this was a Christian event.  I'm a holy vessel and I've been keeping myself sexually pure ever since my husband passed away.  I can't do that listening to no BRICKHOUSE."  

She then broke into a rendition of the Commodore's classic right then and there.  And a demonstration of her "breaking it down". Sigh.  Now anyone who knows me, knows that my face is very expressive so I had to quickly put on my acting skills and business hat because, although I didn't initially realize it, she was very serious. And she wasn't just talking to me.  She was talking to The Anointed Harvesters.  I listened as she expressed why it was wrong and a contradiction and not representative and how she's a role model and how the young ones get confused, spirits disturbed and possibly offended too when they witness Christians listening to secular music and how we shouldn't play anything we wouldn't play in front of Pastor.

I listened...truly understood and graciously apologized that she was offended.  Then I explained to her in so many words that I'M NOT RELIGIOUS.  

Quite frankly, I had to stop myself from screaming in her face the date, time and place I last had sex...with my young vibrant affectionate hot blooded self.  It's been YEARS, sista.  YEARSSSS!..and my sexuality and sensuality is increasing by the moment.  So don't insult me by assuming that I'm not walking in holiness because I like stilettos, a sexy black dress and Earth Wind & Fire! (Don't push me cause I'm close to the edge...lol).  I'm a role model, who has never sought to be one.  I'm a Jesus Freak who has NEVER cared who knows it.  I live my life before Him, not because of RELIGION but relationship.  AND I love Israel Houghton...and Stevie Wonder.  Canton Jones....and Common.  I am the same in front of the homeless person and the celebrity.  
If I roll up in front of the church house bumping Jill Scott and Pastor walks out...Jill will continue....with the windows down.  RESPECT.

bite of the day ~ We must all live from the INSIDE out.  Everyone has their buttons or weak spots that can derail them.  We should not judge others or become offended at them based on our own weaknesses. As for me, I'm finding God where ever I can.  Sometimes, He's in Rachelle Ferrell's voice...other times, He speaks to me through Yolanda Adams.  And then there's times it's simply about the song! Free yo-self.

thirtiesgirl