Milestones

Milestones…

So today was a huge milestone for me. One that I was really afraid of for a long time but I finally took that step. My baby and I opened up our joint checking account. Really scary step for me and I was totally freaked out the whole time. But it’s done. The woman at the desk showed me what our names would look like on the check and I just stared at the screen. Isn’t what I thought it would be (because I always imagined his name first and then my name with his last name below). But my baby let me take a little control over it and made me the primary, so my name was atop… his name below and my address. He held my hand the whole time. And kept asking me… what’s up? what’s wrong? — nothing was wrong. It was all very right. And all very real. This man wants to marry me and live with me and grow old with and have kids with and genuinely be with me. It’s huge to me. I told him I’ve dreamed of this… but never really thought about it. And now it’s real. I just looked at his face and wondered what I would see in 50 years. I know we’ll be around to find out.

*

Two for Flinching…

Two for Flinching…

Okay, so even I was afraid to take the trains yesterday going to and coming from work. Because… this is the most consistent I’ve seen the terrorists (outside Isreal and the Middle East) in such a short period of time. I was talking with Domi at one point and he said he thought that they were being so vehement towards London because of the decision to make them the next Olympic site (2012) and NY just “dodged a bullet”. Somehow, I almost feel like… they WANT us to settle into that idea. Yeah… *WHEW* we just missed it. So that we can kind of relax into a false notion of semi protectedness and then wham-o. But we haven’t done that. I’m glad that we haven’t. It would be straight foolish. But… what we are doing, which I’m worried about … is that we’re flinching. Like a paranoid weed smoker. I heard that on the trains today, every 5th person is being searched if they have a backpack. (Somehow I feel like it’s going to play out that every 5th person will happen to be an arab male carrying his regular packaging on to the train… and me who carries a hulking backpack onto the train every day will be allowed to move forward unscathed). Starting to feel like more and more, if you want to keep your privacy in tact… you need to stay home. Cause if you come out of your house, someone’s going to have the right to search you. And while i TOTALLY undertstand the reasons for it… it doesn’t negate the fact that our privacies are being compromised (moreso than normal). But… if we’re flinching… doesn’t that mean that we’re being successfully terrorized? It’s such a connundrum. If we don’t flinch… we end up maybe losing more lives. But if we do… and often… that means we’re frightened. Flinching in terror. I dunno if there is a proper way to handle ourselves right now, without looking like we’re scared. But I think we are. I am.

*sigh* Off to work.

*

Newness

Newness

I’m feeling the resurgence of my old self coming through. I’m really excited about it because… it’s about fucking time. I’m back in the gym next week… the week after that, I’m taking a week from work to clean my house… then a trip down to Houston for some R&R then back to the grind. Since I’m back on my old schedule, I have taken care of 6 pending projects out of 11 that had been sitting there for months. I’ve been going to meetings and taking active part… taking ownership of ALL my work… whether it’s for the man or for myself. It’s paying off. Over the past 2 weeks, I’ve gotten at least 7 unsolicited accolades sent about me through the company and emails from my personal clients saying “You’re on FIRE, girl!” I love it. The endorphins are the only drug I’ll ever need — aside from a smooth grey goose every now and again. Whew! I just hope I don’t lose steam. This is the me that I’m used to. The one who ALWAYS gets what she wants because she works fucking hard for it. Not because she sits back and expects someone will just give it to her (like I’ve been doing for a while). I just feel my power coming back in to place. It’s refreshing. I am the captain of my soul.

My baby and I are back on date nights. Tonight was bowling. We had fun. I broke 100 (118 to be exact) which is HUGE for me. I’d really like to learn how to play for real. Jean tried to teach me (he worked in a bowling alley when we were in college) but the things he was trying to teach me just confused me “Throw the ball down the aisle and just as you’re letting go, shake hands with it..” WHAT? Anyway… I pick the heaviest ball and shuffle to the front line, cock back and release the ball… only when I’m not thinking about it, i get a strike. But if I’m all concentrating and trying to get it perfect… it ends up in the gutter. But we enjoyed our time together.

My girl LuLu left for Italy this evening. I’m happy for her. Her voice sounded TOTALLY different on the phone. She’s free. I hope that the experiences that happened to her over the past month have enriched her life. She went through a rites of passage for lack of a better phrase. And she just seems at peace. And now she’s trapsing off to Europe. She did mention that they’re looking to deploy them back to Iraq in ’06. Heaven help us all.

*

Ressurrection

Ressurrection

I feel like I’m back from the dead. I have time to myself now. Maybe even time to finish my many awaiting projects… clean my room… start going to the gym again. EVEN TIME TO SLEEP… which is most awesome of all. That dreaded project I’d been working on for 5 weeks has successfully completed and I’m no longer bound by it. So… back to regular living… and getting home at a semi decent hour…. having 3 square meals a day (even though… I did lose a considerable amount of weight messin with these deadlines)… and … best of all… getting to hug my sweet baby for as long as he’ll let me. *sigh* You know, he still gets goosebumps when I kiss him…. almost 5 years later???? I had a glorious weekend waking up to him and spending time with him and having him express his affections to me in numerous ways. He was so affectionate and it was exactly what I needed from him. We had a falling out the other day and the ripples from it lasted a few days. But we finally reconciled on Friday morning and it’s been great since then. He’s my beloved and I am his. We have a trip to make to Watermill this weekend so we can pay payment II of our millions of payments on the hall where we’ll be getting married .

On the flip side of living, my line sister (#3) emailed me last night and told me that her mother passed away on Sunday morning. My heart sank. I remember her mom and how full of life and God she was. When Bertie first told me that she was sick I worried for B… But it seemed like she and her sister had it under control. Eventually they sent her (her mom) down to South Carolina to live her days there. And then Bertie packed up and moved down there with her. And things seemed steady for a while. I’d ask about her mom and she’d ask about mine and our answers were about the same. “Well… you know…” So her mother passing came out of left field and really just weighed down on my heart. I couldn’t help to think of what I’d do right now if it were my mom. How destroyed I’d be. I’ll be praying for her and preparing for a trip to South Carolina in the near future.

*

Sugarwater / Pack Light

Sugarwater / Pack Light

I had the honor of going to the Sugar Water Festival last night out in Jones Beach. What an amazing experience. Shouts to my coworker ebro for hooking me up with the BOMB press seats. I was giddy sitting there waiting for the lights to come up. I just sat (really stood, danced, sang along and acted like a damned fool) all night in awe of the effortlessness with which those women manipulated the sound that emanated from their mouths. I’m always quietly envious of it, but more so admiring. I love music. It is my first love, truly. And the way people use music to express themselves moves me in a way that NO other emotion has ever moved me. It’s so powerful to me. In one set, Jill was doing a rendition of “Crossed My Mind” and the drummer was doing this thing with the high hat…. I SWEAR I almost came on myself. I know… it’s graphic… but the music just took me over and there was this overwhelming feeling of ecstacy. I LOVE MUSIC.

Floetry was the background music to us (me and JB) getting our food. Performance wise, they never have excited me. They just stand there at their respective microphones and sing. It was cute, though, because they ended their set with a rendition of “Let Your Soul Glow” from Coming to America complete with announcements of “Sexshul Chaklit” as they walked off the stage. I laughed at that. Then Latifah, Jill and Erykah came out and did a set together just to get the audience going. I was VERY impressed with Miss Dana Owens. She represented for us thick sisters. Her voice is pretty, her presence on stage is empowering and her words were uplifting… as they’ve always been. She had to throw in some old rap stuff from when I was in High School and that was fun to remember along with the audience. Then… JILL! Oh man… how excited was I? Can you imagine chills for 40 minutes straight? Yes. At the end of one song, she started setting the stage to sing “Petition” and I was TOO amped. It’s the one song I haven’t heard her sing in performance. And I waited, and waited and waited for it… and she started singing “He Loves Me”… Y’all…. I POUTED. Like… seriously… crossed my arms against my chest and pouted. JB poked me in the arm after a little while and was like… “C’mon… you can’t be mad at THIS song.” He was right… I was already starting to sing along (again). All her songs make me think of when my baby and I first started out… and how amazing that felt, then. I wished she could have gone for longer. She had 5 minutes left (we had a GREAT view of the timer). But… better on time than late, I suppose. Erykah’s line between genius and insanity is sufficiently blurred in her sight now. Her music is whimsical, amazing, exciting, intelligent and masterful. But SHE… is crazy, y’all. LMAO! Gotta love her, though. Her set felt more like a medley than a collection of her best songs. I can really only describe the whole thing as being weird. But I indulged in as much music as I could (when she wasn’t playing this weird beat machine that she was making UFO sounds out of). At the end of her time on stage (she actually ran over)… she sang “Bag Lady” (complete with So Addictive guitar in the bg). She kept repeating the line… “pack light…” and encouraged all the women in the audience to sing along. I’ve never sang two words with so much heart and feeling before. This was the message that I was there to receive. I’ve given, in the last few years, too many things and people WAY more importance than they could have EVER deserved. And maybe that’s unfair to them. It’s a LOT for them to live up to in my eyes. And maybe… light and airy is the way to go. The more importance something carries, the more potential it has to stress you out and possibly hurt you. And maybe I haven’t been packing so light lately. I must do some cleaning. This heaviness is on my heart.

The car ride home was quiet and reflective and for the first time in 4 weeks… I slept and really was rested when I woke up this morning.

*