For our Educators 

Warriors

One by one,

taking hands and leading

comforting and calming

enlightening and informing

protecting and advocating

Warriors

One by one,

fighting systems

So our children can rise

 

 The window is open on a breezy night

The air fills my lungs, reminding me of the blessing of breath

The wind catches the sound of a train’s distant whistle and I wonder where it is going

A lifetime of wanderlust and wanting to enjoy both the ride and the destination.

Through the Looking Glass

It's hard to believe all that has changed in the 16 years since we started this blog. We have been through the looking glass and back again.

Gains and losses, life gone sideways, starting out on a smooth, newly paved street and ending up in the ditch. But...we pull together, climb out of the ditch, brush the dust from our skirts and keep moving forward.

That we do it together is the key. That we hold each others' heads above water is what's important. That we hold each other back from the abyss...

And live to laugh another day.

 

 

What calls me to the ocean?

Is it the peace borne of rhythmic waves,

Or the gems that appear as the sun meets the water?

Perhaps it's the way I am made buoyant,

able to feel my body held by the surface of greatness.

For under the ocean lie two million ancestors

Who never completed the passage.

They call to me.

They hold me.

 

Mother's Love

I drape your spirit around my shoulders to keep me warm

I button you around my heart to keep me from hurt

I feel your back to my front as you take the arrows life launches toward me

When I can't reach, I feel your levitation, lifting me as you rise

When someone speaks unreasonable bullshit, you seal my lips until I can respond

  with balance and kindness

When I run out of steam and enthusiasm, you remind me 

  that a commitment made is a commitment kept

I wait for your wisdom to grow in me, and pray that it does

I would rather laugh than hurt, even knowing there is growth in the pain

Your words are my vocabulary

I will always rest in your arms and you in mine

My dearest, dearest mother.

Forgetful Men

Forgetful Men

I am not less than you because I am a woman.

I am not less than you because I am viewed as Black, Cherokee, poor, Asian, gay, crippled or old.

I am not less than you.

You can not see all of me because I can not be contained, captured or experienced in the framework lenses of limitation, fear or bewilderment.

I am what God made me.

I am a rejoicing part of God’s plan.

I soar through hatred, fear, anger, disgrace and lies.

God made me to live surrounded by freedom, love and grace.

I float like a butterfly.

On my  journey from flower to flower

My soul invented call and response.

My soul hears and answers the call of God.

Therefore, I am accountable to God.

Therefore, I humbly and gratefully bow to God.

Men have been spewing this same make believe crap since the start;
the land of the free and home of the brave.

I am not less than you because I am a woman.

God and a Woman made a pact and carried forth Jesus to this world.

As Sojourner Truth stated,“ Man had nothing to do with him. “

Blissfully ignorant;
Ignorantly blissful.
To, with words,
make insignificant
an entire race, ethnicity, gender.
How enormous the privilege;
the capacity to simply
not
give
a
fuck.

Summer Morn in New Hampshire

 - Claude McKay, 1922

All yesterday it poured, and all night long
    I could not sleep; the rain unceasing beat
Upon the shingled roof like a weird song,
    Upon the grass like running children’s feet.
And down the mountains by the dark cloud kissed,
    Like a strange shape in filmy veiling dressed,
Slid slowly, silently, the wraith-like mist,
    And nestled soft against the earth’s wet breast.
But lo, there was a miracle at dawn!
    The still air stirred at touch of the faint breeze,
The sun a sheet of gold bequeathed the lawn,
    The songsters twittered in the rustling trees.
And all things were transfigured in the day,
    But me whom radiant beauty could not move;
For you, more wonderful, were far away,
    And I was blind with hunger for your love.

Screw the Wrapper: the Inside's Still Rotten

Once again I find myself in a room full of professional peers smugly blowing smoke about their accomplishments.   As we discuss the absence of black males in the entering medical school class, my boss says "So, I saw that the black males in the class are largely first generation.  Are they from the Caribbean?" I responded, "And Nigeria and Ghana."  Why is that, he asks?  I say that it's cultural and that their parents tend to keep a tighter rein on the kids, making them a bit less susceptible to the distractions that capture our domestic kids.  I followed by saying that the community notices when meeting our students en masse, and invariably someone will ask, "where is the kid from Homewood?"

 

What does my boss say to me?  What does he say aloud in front of the group?   "The kid from Homewood is in jail."

 

I managed to reply, "Perhaps we can work to help stem the tide." I almost burst into tears right there.  At that moment I felt so sad and so deflated by how quickly and casually that sentiment was conveyed, and overwhelmed by the enormity of what we're trying to do.  We're trying to nurture a generation of young people so they don't end up as incarceration statistics.   To so flippantly toss off that "the kid from Homewood is in jail,"  was so insensitive, so damaging.  My FAMILY is in Homewood.  When the majority folk get done using me, at the end of the day, I know that there are people in Homewood who would go to the mat for me and mine.  They may not be educated, they may not always play by the rules and they may not always make good decisions (traumatized people rarely do), but they don't pretend to be what they are not.  They don't pretend to care about what happens to our community, only to throw the community under the bus when it looks like there's a dollar to be made.

 

I can't get anyone to invest time and effort in a Nursing Exploring post that might give the kid from Homewood an idea of what else s/he might do in life, but our faculty are running back and forth to and from China like they're going to Shadyside.  They'll bring students here from the country with the worst human rights record on the planet...because it pays.

 

Believe me, if it would put a dime in the pocket of any of these people, the kid from Homewood would get a stellar education, a mentor and a chance at a career through which s/he could cure individuals and our communities.  Until then, the kid from Homewood is a punchline.

 

Thanks...thanks a lot.

The Wreck of the Modern Woman

She sailed, proud and true
The horizon her goal
Those who built her said there was
No Limit
A working vessel, she toiled
Head held high.
Knowing no boundaries,
She took on passengers and was surprised to find them needy.
Never able to balance, she listed; she sank.
All the while believing
She had it under control.

Freedom Song

Sometimes I wonder who you are

I just can't grasp your perspective

You scream and yell at me all night

Your memories are all selective

I'm so tired of trying to find out

What is your reality

Just what planet are you on

Why is it you torture me?

In your mind I'm all that's wrong here

Burden to your paradise

Place the blame upon my shoulders

That must feel so fucking nice

I'm so tired of trying to find out

What is your reality?

Just which ship did you arrive on?

Cut the rope and set me free.

Logic has no place in your world

Everything is bound by fear

I can't fight the paranoia

I'm immune to all your tears

Now you have your armor on

It's you against the universe

What you never stop to see

Is that you always slay me first

Find some fucking gravity

Find some fucking sanity

I can't take this trip again

I'm floating away from me.

Blacks and Rock Music

An article in "The Root" http://www.theroot.com/views/rock-black-music-too?Gt1=38002, sounds the death knell for hip-hop, saying that the genre has run out of ideas.  It uses as evidence the fact that rap star Lil Wayne is at work on a rock album.  Author Rob Fields applauds the presence of blacks in rock music.  I'm not sure where he's been, since we've never been absent; just present in small numbers.  At the end of the day, music is music and different types move different people. Though sometimes I do want to scream when I hear a classic under a rap.  Lots of rappers (Diddy, Jay-Z) are hardcore rock fans.  Jay-Z did a mash-up with Linkin Park that KILLS.  If the beat moves you, it doesn't matter who plays it.  Though I have to say I'm so happy to see folks like TV On the Radio and remember Corey Glover and Living Colour from back in the day?  More metal bands have black lead singers (check out Lajon Witherspoon from Sevendust - the man could crack walnuts with his thighs... http://www.zimbio.com/Lajon+Witherspoon, or Howard Jones from Killswitch Engage http://static.playdo.com/1016/megadef/tabimages/killswitch_20engage_202%5B1%5D.jpg.  It’s really nice to no longer be the only brown spot in the crowd at rock shows, though I still find myself counting…

I don’t think black folks have run out of imagination.  It’s a trend and rap will turn into something else as time goes on, just like all music evolves.  The music industry has to be ready and willing to market what musicians produce.  If all they’ll push from black artists is rap, that’s what folks will produce.

Holidays

So, the holidays are here. Time for running around like a chicken on crack, spending money we'd rather not spend and otherwise working ourselves up into a guilt-induced frenzy. I'm not sure why we, as a society, can't seem to put the brakes on this lunacy. The celebration of something good, miraculous and eternal has degenerated into a series of trips to overpriced stores to purchase things that we're not sure recipients want, but hope they'll appreciate. I'd rather stick to the family gathering and enjoy each others' company, in the spirit of thanksgiving, hope and peace. But, like every other rat in the race, I'll buy, buy buy, wrap, wrap, wrap and mail, mail, mail.

Hell, hell, hell...

Cancer

Given the recent passing of a friend who had metastatic breast cancer, and the seeming epidemic of new diagnoses, the following poem sprouted from my head while noodling on WriteorDie:

Cancer
overgrowth of cells
invasive, opportunistic
life-altering
life-ending
all encompassing
masses that remove
those whom we hold dear
incomprehensible
soul-leeching
someone knows the point
they must be forced to share
why the internal kudzu
why the slow depletion of life
why is it we cannot find a way
to end that which kills.

So, here we are...

A few short weeks away from our presidential election. Our choices are an elderly former prisoner of war who apparently has not one scruple or shred of dignity. He graduated 4th from the bottom of his academy class, having faced expulsion several times for multiple offenses. He was saved from that fate by being fortunate enough to be the son and grandson of four-star generals. When an illustrious career in the military didn't pan out (after crashing three planes), he married a rich man's daughter, applying for the wedding license before being divorced from his newly-disabled first wife. His running mate is a woman who cared more about firing her jerk of a brother-in-law than finding funding for rape kits for victims of sexual assault. Her conservative views apparently didn't soak down into her now-pregnant, about to be shotgun-weddinged teenage daughter.

Our other choice is Barack Obama, a man of dignity, principle and apparent morals, supported by a wife who worked as hard as he did to achieve positions still rare for African Americans. A man who turned down offers with prestigious law firms to see how he could contribute on the community level in Chicago. A man who knows that you get more with honey than with vinegar, who respects women and cares about restoring the faith of the world in the good inherent in America, as opposed to shoving America down it's throat sideways.

I can only hope that this country can see the flip-flopping, image-managing megalomaniac that John McCain is. Whatever the issue, if it doesn't benefit John McCain, it's off his radar. I can only imagine what that means for health care, education and any other rights afforded to those who do not have a wealthy spouse, influential parents and seven homes.

Not that I ever considered voting for him, but I was COMPLETELY through when I read that he called his wife a "cunt" in front of reporters. Yeah...this is the man who should decide who sits on the Supreme Court to consider matters like Roe vs. Wade.

Meds Are Our Friends

So, at age 48, after running like a gerbil on a hyperdrive wheel, I find that I don't bounce back from the rough stuff as easily as I used to. I'm tired, menopausal and depressed and would kill for 6 months (illness-free, let me stipulate - gotta be careful what you wish for!) to sit and figure out what to do next. Would it be wrong to just quit my job and go intern at the radio station? To spend all day around music would make me incredibly happy. I find that I really don't want to be responsible for more than my children and my home. Honestly. I'd find owning a dog overwhelming right now (though I would like a new cat). Sad, as I'm in the most high profile position that I've ever had. I think I'll give it 2 years. After that, I may go work in the campus bookstore...how bad could it be!??

Why Are We Here?

A quote from Rick Warren, author of the The Purpose Driven Life: "(God's) more interested in what I am than what I do. That's why we're called human beings, not human doings." We can spend a lifetime running from task to task without stopping to reflect on who we are and why we're here. I often find myself asking "Jesus, why am I here? What do you want me to do?" I've found that I'm a whole lot happier when I stay focused on being of service. I'd rather leave that as my legacy than material goods. Life is good!

How Life Keeps Us Grounded

We did a huge, huge publicity push for my premed information program. I had a spot on NPR radio, a mention in the Courier, a profile on PopCity and a two page spread in the Pitt Chronicle. The buzz was terrific. I bought a few new outfits over the weekend so I would look more like an executive staffer, but with a "feminine flair". Today I'm wearing a black and white patterned tulip skirt with a silk cardigan that has a near, but not quite total match of pattern on the button lining. Got my hair done on Friday; dropped a couple of pounds. I'm thinking I'm ON A ROLL!!

I started to feel a little squishy this morning - Mother Nature paying a visit after being MIA last month, leaving raging hot flashes in her place. So, I went to the bathroom to check my business. I pulled everything together expeditiously and left the ladies room feeling well put together.

I returned to my desk, swept my skirt under me as I prepared to sit. It was only then that I realized that one of the "petals" of my tulip skirt was firmly tucked into the rear of my pantyhose. I have no idea who in Nursing Education and Research was the recipient of the sight of my waning moon.

God has a way of bringing us back to reality, doesn't he...?

Sunny - Finally!

It is almost unbelievable how much difference it makes when the sun shines. The lift to my spirits is palpable. My step is lighter and the fact that I'm horribly behind in project seems to not weigh as heavily. I just wish the change could extend to my hot flashes. Hot flashes, my ass! This experience qualifies as a temporary elevation to solar temperature. That's the new term TEST - flash does nothing to convey the thought of what we're going through. Help us, Jesus!

Starting Again!

The Kalahari Honeybushes started up in 2005, only to die a slow and natural death because we bitches are all incredibly busy! Jordana's husband got sick, but we needled him back to health. Dayna switched jobs (and thank God, because the last one was just nuts), and Paula got a new job (I will try to make a success out of a near impossible task). Through it all, we're still here and I hope still able to write.

Many thoughts are swirling through my head; none fit for family consumption (they don't REALLY want to know what I'm thinking - not really). More to come, but right now I need more wine, I must finish folding the laundry, and I wish I could get my hands on a hot boy. Oh well...at least the laundry will be folded and I can have more wine.