Think the thoughts, feel the feels...write it down

Today (technically yesterday) marks the 15th day of my turning 27. Normally, I don't care about that kind of thing and it's really not a big deal, but I was reflecting a lot today on the past two weeks. Really, nothing that I hoped would happen has happened and random shit that I would've never imagined happened (is that cryptic enough?). >My actual birthday didn't go as originally planned, but it ended up being perfect. I spent the day with family and Mexican food and day drinking; and spent the evening with a group of people who gave (give) me so much joy. I probably had a giddy grin on my face the whole night. I woke up the next day and was pleasantly not hungover; I woke up feeling intensely satisfied and loved and accepted. >I had hoped that I would soon hear back from this one particular job that I want really badly, but that hasn't happened (yet). The job hunt is disappointing and discouraging. I hate finding a job that you've been waiting...

I've heard this twice in the past week and I've angrily cringed each time. It's an expression I struggle to understand, yet always leaves a bad taste in my mouth. The other night I was having dinner with someone; he said that he needed to get out more, he was feeling lonely. I suggested that he try a Charlotte Meet-Up group to meet some others who have similar interests to him. He said he was on Black People Meet , which is a dating site for, you guessed it, Black people. (This did not thrill me for a number of reasons, but the biggest one is that he claimed to want friends but he's looking for girlfriends, but that's another post for another day.) Then he expressed how disappointing the pickings/results were for him. He winced as he showed me the first page of a lady who'd contacted him, her profile picture/age/city/profile name. Nothing about who she was, just the precursors. She was appropriately aged, appeared to take pride in her appearance (she had c...

I was the only child for the first 7 years of my life; so if one or both of my parents were around I believed it necessary to be the center of their attention.  One day my dad came home early from work. My mom was clearly surprised and they were chatting behind my back, not paying me any mind. Well I wasn’t having that so I began histrionically laughing to draw their attention to me. The gusto I put into this display made me slip into the little, clear creek I was fishing in with a stick. The water was a bit chilled and only went to my ankles, but the worst part was that my shoes and socks were soaked. I panicked and began wailing once all the sensations were absorbed, I was drowning . I quickly realized I could just step back onto dry land, but it was my parents’ fault for not including me in their grown-up conversation so their punishment was me, their only begotten child, drowning and being swept away by the barely bubbling current. I was quickly rescued and taken inside. S...

It's great that people are mindful of others' feelings because that means that they are at the very least a decent human being. But while it's important to be considerate of others' feelings it's also equally important to be honest and respectful of one's own feelings. A few weeks ago a friend of mine admitted that she didn't feel like she could be honest about herself and her feelings with me because she felt like she was responsible for my feelings. That could seem like a nice sentiment to some, but I didn't like it at all. I've spent a majority of my life doing that: trying to manage other people's feelings and stifling my own. It made me really unhappy and unhealthy and out of touch with myself and it made me feel like the people I called my friends didn't really know me because I didn't know myself/make myself known. I was always getting lost in others feelings, their world. Now if I'm being honest, people do have a huge inf...

Like that time when I watched my dad get all dressed and ready for his bachelor party and his friends never came, so he sat on the back patio and contemplated suicide for the umpteenth time. People suck. But we crave them. Like that time when I found out that my visa request had been denied and I was devastated and my best friend said I couldn’t call her because 10pm was too late, her and husband had to get up early. People suck. But I need them. Like that time in elementary school when some shitty little kid made fun of me because my ancestors were slaves, so he or she was better because their ancestors owned slaves. People suck. But I trust they can change. Like all those times when I was made fun of by teachers and peers for having kinky/curly/black people hair and I cried to my mom, begged my mom, to do something about the affliction. People suck. But my hair is fucking on point. Like all those times when I was reminded by that aunt that I don’t fi...

I'm not an astronomer, but I do have basic knowledge about planets, how they orbit (I mostly just know that they orbit), and that they don't all orbit in a perfectly centered circle around the sun. Stay with me here on this metaphor: we're each our own solar system, so that would make each of us a sun. People are the different planets and moons in our solar system/life. There are times when the planets/people are closer to us and there are times when the planets retrograde from us. Some people are merely space trash, some people only stay in our gravitational pull for a designated amount of time, some people orbit in our lives forever. There's a beautiful synchronicity to this solar system, to each of our solar systems. Lately, I've been thinking a lot about who I want in my 'solar system'; the kind of people I want to be surrounded by and the kind of people I want to orbit around. I think to a certain extent you can choose who's in your system and...

For future reference, Colea, you don't have to do, or be, everything they say. And boy do they have a lot to say. When they tell you what to eat, you unearth alternatives. When they set out to make you feel inferior because you're not white, not skinny, you walk around naked in your blackness and curves. When they reveal their lengthy list of only "do nots" for you female body, you wildly dance in the celebration that is autonomy. When they box you into gender roles, you take your wrecking ball and smash the fucking patriarchy. When they remind you that you are not a man and should therefore be subservient, you catapult fiery, feminist boulders at them. When they tell you in whom and how to believe, you carefully piece together your own spirituality. When they decide for you what to do with your life, you wander down every path that calls your name. When they gaslight you, you dig your heels in deeper into every one of your emotions. When they call y...

So when I was in university I had to take some english class as a gen-ed. I liked it enough, but the biggest take away was what the professor said about writing, about creating. She said that writing, creating something with words, was supposed to be messy. Yes it was a process, but it should be messy every step of the way. This was news to me, I had always been taught that writing of any sorts was cut and dry; there’s a process, a formula, you must follow when writing anything; there’s always a wrong and a right and this is how you avoid the wrong. Learning this and taking what this professor said to heart temporarily freed me and I expanded this concept to other art forms like music, my major, and to how I perceived art which is a reflection of life. I think life is art…I really do. And I’ve been cheating at it. I’ve been struggling to adhere to these rigid guidelines of what life should look like, and what it should feel like…and that’s cheating. That’s cheating myself of what ac...