BlackLove is Beautiville

Gotta tell this one straight. I want to go into a romantic diatribe about what I thought, what I did, and what I learned, but it's not that kind of thing. This is more about acceptance and obedience, submission and surrender. This is about looking at what is in front of you and seeing it and yourself for what and where you are, then allowing life to pull you out off the mess you created. 

Many of us walk around with deluded visions of who we are and what we are doing. As I think about how I am typing, I wonder how many eyes I won't capture based on the things I am about to admit. But, press on I must, as I am charged in my heart and soul to tell my truth and liberate those around me to look within and determine their own. For the past year it seemed as though I was walking through fog. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with me or why. I just knew my soul was struggling and I was on edge-suspicious and somewhat defeated.  Initially I thought it was money, then I thought it was love, then I thought it was the lack of spiritual fulfillment I was experiencing. It wasn't any of these things. This I know because I was given opportunities to increase my money-which I did, men began to fall from the ceiling, and grace had given me somewhat of a Midas touch, nothing I did wasn't a success. Still, I felt awful. Why?

I was not being honest about who I was, or where I was. As it stands, I am a black woman. Single female head-of-household, 3 kids with 3 different baby daddies and not making a six figure salary. I love to laugh. I love to eat. I love to watch television and I love to talk, read and write. The writing is difficult because it forces me to be still and internal, honest and free. I have to touch those parts that no one sees and that is when the emptiness creeps up on me and I have to acknowledge, "the Pain of Night." I love being pretty and I love that I still fit a size 8 without difficulty and have to get my pants taken in. I carried a lot of guilt about being pretty, because of the attention I received. I didn't see myself as different from my friends or associates but other people did. It embarrassed me. If I was so pretty, so smart, so desirable and sexy, why did I crawl into bed- a tall bed with pillow-top mattress- alone (unless my daughter was home) every night? 

I raced through my memory, sometimes rifling others pausing, a la Octavia Butler Patternmasteresque, and saw. I'd had many, many admirers, and many, many suitors. Most of them good men, most of them ambitious and successful. More of them able to provide me or at a minimum assist me with having an "improved" quality of life. For one reason or another, I had rejected them. My rejections came from a variety of places and reasons but they all boiled down to one thing, ultimately; I didn't feel or, at some point, stopped feeling safe. Rather than be with someone who helped me feel awkward in my own skin, I preferred to suffer. That is the kind of person I've always been, willing to suffer the consequences of my convictions. I'd heard Bro. Minister Rasoul Muhammad-an "illegitimate son" of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad-say that we should not become a "prisoner of our convictions" and thereafter tried to live a structured, though not rigid life, but I found that each of us has basic components of both conscience and personality. For me, "if it ain't right, I ain't rockin'."  And I'd finally learned to trust my IWS (internal warning system), it was never wrong the way a GPS could be. There were things, some people call them red flags, others call them warnings but for me, they were like little nudges where I could almost see my spirits and ancestors arching their eyebrows, sometimes even hearing voices say, "No Baby, you can't live here. Just watch and wait." Inevitably, something would be revealed, and in a Big way. Once I thought back and realized I was not willing to be caged, or to simply be a trophy, nights were easier to endure. I got comfortable being the Champion and Guardian of my Soul, Keeper of my Spirit. And while it may sound romantic, I understood that the sacrifice and trade-off would leave me extremely wanting.  My Creator has promised that I would be denied no good and righteous desire of my heart. This being the case, I wrote across my mind, the gateway to the heart, the words I read from Zora Neale Hurston, "just as I am, I am a Precious Gift."