Barnyard

"Closer to Love" by Matt Kearney

...oh, it's your light / oh, it's your way / pull me out of the dark / just to show me the way...

In the third grade, Ms. Miriello assigned us a project that required us to look at the moon every evening at the same time. We were supposed to record our findings in order to incorporate it into our lessons about weather, climate, weather and climate patterns, etc.

I always forgot to look at the moon at the same time each night and some nights I would just forget totally. I basically had to forge the information because I had no clue what the moon looked like that night. I forgot to look! I was 8 years old in 1995. The internet had not debuted in my life so I could not look it up and write it in on the calendar we were provided.

I cannot remember if my parents knew about my project and my delinquent reporting. I do remember, however, one night, my mother waking me out of my sleep to show me the moon. She gently held my hand and dragged my sleepy body to our back porch in our house in Raleigh, NC.

I could barely open my eyes and I was paranoid that I was in some kind of trouble so I was very disoriented. She stood behind me, held my shoulders, and rested her chin on the spot where my neck and shoulder met. She whispered in my ear while pointing up, "Look at the moon."

I looked up to a huge, blue glowing full moon, the only one of the cycle we were recording in school. I remember thinking how gorgeous it looked, that light cobalt blue against that almost black sky with sprinklings of small white stars.

I cannot remember if I recorded it or what, but that memory has always stuck with me. It was my little moment with my mom. I didn't have to share her with Sheikh or Lima. It was our little moment where my mother paid attention to the details of my life, woke her daughter up to look at the spectacle that was the moon.

I remember what she smelled like, the light pink pajama outfit she wore, the brand of her whisper. That is the woman I remember. I am angry with her. I am frustrated with her. But I remember that moment and I remember the woman that I love, the woman that I want to learn from, the woman I want to be like.

Since then, full moons have always meant my mother is watching, thinking of her daughter somewhere, with her hands on my shoulder and her whisper in my hair.

Goodnight Mommy.

I'm Nothing, but I'm Big

"I'ma Put it On Her" by Day 26

...she got that swagger / the way she move it like a pro...

I know that Day 26 is a manufactured music team put together by the most pompous, sambo idiot ever, but I love this song. Whatever is going on in my life, play that song and see if I don't put a pep in that step.

Dinner is being served rather late today. The Mister and I were out all day, shopping for items for the house. Moving is a complicated business.

I made a hodge podgey soup about a week ago or so that Brittany and I t-t-t-tore up. It was chicken, onions, bacon, potatoes, avocados, mushrooms, and eaten with plain Basmati rice (which Brittany's fatness can't get enough of).

I am going to make a similar hodge podge without the bacon or potatoes and with cous cous instead of Basmati rice. The Mister is making pasta too. And yes, I'm going to eat it all.

When is the War?

"Come to Me" by Mary J. Blige

...that was love / that was then / that was us / miracles / I changed you / you changed me / this is how these things go...

I had to go buy a journal. I write an enormous amount of something. I don't know if it's literature or crap or idleness. But whatever God would categorize it as, I produce a lot of it. Of late, I have been slipping into peculiar, random, and seemingly unprovoked episodes of melancholy that no catharsis can affect.

The thought occurred to me one day, while watching Grey's Anatomy, that maybe I need to revert to my more private, candid, and crazy form of writing. Meredith (on Grey's Anatomy) gave her best friend Christina her late mother's journal to read for her, I guess to screen it for any unbearable content. I saw the journal and understood the concept of having multiple journals, systematically documenting your person.

So I rushed to Barnes & Nobles one morning when I should have been on the way to the library and bought this beautiful, cobalt, leather bound journal with an intricate design on the front centered by a quote that reads: Like all great travelers, I have seen more than I remember and I remember more than I have seen.

That is some truth for that...this is exactly how my mind works. The thin line, the intersecting gates, the meshed fabric of fantasy and reality make me the fruit basket I am.

I write in this magic cobalt book so as to make my blues cobalt too.

Never Wanna Give It Up

"If This is Love" by Jazmine Sullivan

...if this is real / it's funny how it makes you feel...I can't see a life without love...

If I haven't mentioned this song already, this song is the meaning of life. Straight like that.

After this, I will leave it alone. I promise.

It is just that to dismiss a person as "crazy" is...is to dismiss a person. It is to categorize them in such a fashion that ignores the struggles, the pesonal vulnerabilities, the biological susceptibilities, etc. that brings a person to "crazy". No one is just born "crazy". There are environmental factors, personal coping mechanism (or lack thereof), and genetic variances that all contribute to what you see as crazy.

It is akin to the days when people with anxiety were categorized as cowards and those with mental retardation as "possessed". There are fundamental and explanatory concepts missing from both categorizations.

And that is what upsets me, I think. That he knew/knows all that has contributed the condition I was/am in (am I out of that condition?). There were things that happened, decisions I made, a disastrous social infrastructure, an innate vulnerability and some more things that I am probably not aware of but I am simply dismissed as crazy.

I don't think that's accurate and I don't think it's fair, but it's okay. Yesterday, I smoked a black and I missed him. Never felt that before.

It ain't easy and it gets hard, but I can't see a life without love...But, this song, "If This is Love," is the meaning of life, because Love, In Fact, Exists (LIFE).

The Remedial Arts

"Break My Little Heart" by Jazmine Sullivan

...boy don't lead...lead me on / you don't know how I feel / please promise me...

I know this girl, beautiful girl. Funny, smart and wise far beyond her years. Loyal and honest, generous and considerate. Wide-eyed and ready. Dreams big and feels big.

If humans could even be perfect, she would almost be there.

But this girl doesn't know any of this about herself. She isn't humble. She is insecure.

And we're all insecure. However, her insecurities outweigh her knowledge of her grandiosity almost completely. She sees very little of what the rest of the world loves about her.

It sabotages her in so many ways, like insecurities typically do. She is paranoid about how she is perceived, anxious about who she is, and hyperbolic in the examination of her flaws. She sees very little of what the rest of the world loves about her.

She thinks his actions are whispers about her. His steps are sonar rebukes against the person she is. He isn't just unresponsive to a text, but he is ignoring her soul altogether, as if he is out to break her heart just by living his life. She doesn't see his attentiveness, his sensitivity to her feelings, and his willingness to talk and explain. She sees very little of the what the rest of the world loves about her.

Although my efforts in combating my own insecurities have been quite remedial, I have assumed the task of teaching her how to rebuild herself, love herself.

So I stopped by the computer lab in the library before my 2 o'clock class and typed up a syllabus for her. I described the course in self discovery she would be taking, listed the textbooks, and gave her a rudimentary outline of the assignments in personal growth she would have to complete.

And while I have her do all this, I, the professor, too will read. And we will repair ourselves together.

We will perfect the original projection of the image of perfection the world can already see.

Should I Go

"Portrait of Love" by Cheri Dennis
...I see you out the corner / Corner of my eye...

I think I might be standing at the edge of my life, literally. I feel as though my life is this distance I have to walk. But it's made complicated by the directions I choose to go. There is no one walking with me. Everyone walks on his or her own. There are "meeting places." These are places that we all have to come to at certain times and that's where we discuss, criticize, argue, consult, inform, advise, form teams, etc.

I skipped several meeting places. I walked slowly and by the time I arrived, there wasn't anyone of interest to me to meet.

That was my mistake. So now, the sumtotal of my wrong turns and skipped meeting places is this edge here. I can turn around anytime and continue walking and make more left turns and less righteous turns.

Or I can take another step, a gamble. I could fall to my death or I could spend the rest of my time falling in love with my life. Should I go or should I stay? I'm in control either way.

Forwarding Address

There is terror here. That is the story here. The truth is terrorizing. There is no rest or solace or plainness. There is just terror and scandal.

Scandal. Yes there is much scandal. And the scandal is borne of boredom. Because honestly, cruelty is not a crime. Boredom is. Not quiet. Quiet is not boring. Also, not quiet all the time. But simple sound, compartmenalized and labelled, color coded and all.

Ultimately, this is code for picking up the pieces and shipping them off to another address to be put back together in another location. The original location has become a pollutant. The environment itself is a pollutant, maybe carcinogenic even, to the elements of this person.

Therefore, I have mailed my heart, soul, mind, hands, eyes, feet, gut, goals, dreams, voicebox, ears, sadness, joy, idiosyncracies, humanity, social security number, dignity, contradictions, flaws, hopes, fears, hair, nails, anger, desperation, obsessive compulsivity, stomach, laughter, tears, lies, shoes, crimes, humor, intellect, nail polish, and my name to:

2008 Welcome Street, Start.Over, VA, 03130, USA.

Kholi

The lady of this Title read my blog. I think so much of this lady because she it too amongst the chosen people, an artist.

Artists are the chosen people because to be an artist does not rest solely on what and how much one produces. It is more a state of mind manifested in the decisions one makes in life. Artists are 'strange' on the conventional spectrum of normalcy.

They see the beauteousness in what is commonly wretched or messy or inconsistent.

They are emotional beyond the line of absurdity. While he or she artist may not cry or blow up and such, the intensity of anything they feel is a symptom of their artistry. Because, the intensity felt may have nothing to do with art, but the artistry of tha human being is completely inseparable from everything in his or her life. Relationships, loves, hobbies, obligations, flaws, self esteem, favorite songs, favorite foods, and everything, everything, are somehow connected together to make the one big, ultimate art piece that is a human's artistry.

Artists are strange people. True artists are simply crazy. So my dearet Kholi, she too is torn between her electronic art (blogging) and her timeless, conventional, but contemporary art (writing with the hand). I almost said to her and myself (as I suffer this same torment) that blogging can replace writing in a tangible journal.

That triggered this blog. Then my purple Rubbermaid box full of all my old journals opened up and a few journals popped up. They clamored and cried and pretty much cussed me out. My journal from the fifth grade said, in a quivering voice, "You don't remember how you felt when you wrote? You don't remember that when no one else listened, we did? When you wanted to be really honest, you wrote in us. These blogs, these blogs are interesting, but they are inherently contrived. You have an audience for which your are writing. Your honesty is, by virtue, compromised. We will always be true."

Damn wise journals. So, Kholi, Zainab, other artists torn, remain torn. Remain in the two pieces, three pieces, four pieces and maintain all the venues of art. You must.

Cussing Without Warrant

It's dark early these days. The daylight is shorter, it seems. This is the time of the year people tend to become depressed. I believe it is called seasonal depression provoked by the decreased exposure to sunlight. Coupled with cold weather and boredom, I am sure the condition is far more than uncomfortable.

I want to be a connoisseur of words. I used to believe that the key was in having a large vocabulary and to an extent, that is important. But as I have grown, writing has become so much more than a hobby or an interest and more of a way to document my evolution as a human being, a way to balance and check myself. It has become one of the few times I am honest with myself about myself. It is one of the few times I even address myself. From that, I have learned that the only thing more important than the words themselves is the manner in which they are arranged. A beautiful arrangement of the simplest words is far more magnificent than the ordinary sentence seasoned with big words. That seasoning is not enough. Words are like ingredients for language and communication. The clever combination makes a good stew. I am not giving up on learning words, but I shall learn to better manage and manipulate the words with which I am already familiar.

READING is so important for this kind of thinking. One must read, a lot, in order to make sense of their world, in order to informed about other worlds, in order to become cultured, in order to be more accepting, and especially to be an artist. You must read. Whatever one chooses as an art form, reading, reading, reading is so important. There is so much information in the world about virtually everything, or an explanation for why much is not known about a particular thing, all documented in literature. Literature, words, words, words connect us. We all speak a language. We all talk to someone or something, somehow. Read everything you can and everything you are given. The talent of reading is amazing. To look and recognize letters that form words, words that have definitions that are automatically retrieved to make a context for what is being read (provided that the word is known to that particular mind). And even if one should not be familiar with a word, there are more words to explain that word and it never ends.

Read books, articles, fortunes, faces, sounds, music, essays, advertisements, criticisms, arguments, announcements, stories, labels, title pages, notes, emails, blogs, shirts, tattoos, secrets, minds and then write. Give someone else a chance to read.