The process of it

"Lately, I've been, I've been losing sleep, dreaming about the things that we could be." -OneRepublic

A. Impact
---------------------------------------------
Writers are interesting.
They judge things and capture things that people think but can't express in every day conversations. I often find that the mind and the physical person are, at least in my case, at odds with one another.
The mind is filled with so many things but how many people live is rather routine-- seems like we're not exercising our brains. The conversations we have are  dull and the words we say are aimed to create comfort and not go too deep.
One of the thousands of reasons why, I guess, I'm quiet.
That, and the unrelenting shyness. 

B. I am working on how to get young children to listen to me.
I am working on saying what I want to say in a manner they can hear, understand, respect, but also feel like they have a stake or a voice in the conversation.
Children are like adults in that they will express what they need to but, other things they need to express but can't, manifests itself in other actions that are hard for me to manuver.
No one can make anyone else do something they won't do.

It is, by far, the most challenging part of teaching. I am getting better but I am not good at it.
The fact that children don't accept bullshit and they make you earn your place in their life.  If anyone could relate to that philosophy, it would be me.

But getting people to listen and to make an impact, while not going outside of myself, just getting people to listen and HEAR, and in return, talk... by their own choosing, organically... that is why I am in this profession as a young woman, that is why this life is chosen for me, and that is why I need to write.
I either don't speak enough or people don't listen and respect enough or both. And it's problematic that I accept that sometimes because I should not. So I'm working to stop accepting. Positive, meaningful, change and relationships aren't created through silence.
--

Being me, everything I do takes a little longer. Everything I learn takes a little longer. Every lesson takes longer, every feeling takes a little longer to heal from. Even education and work success is taking longer

I have always had the insecurity that I don't know enough and that I am not smart enough. I've always compensated for that with extra time and extra work. And that insecurity is actually fact, because no one does (know enough) and no one is (nearly smart enough). I could never get into Harvard or be an Architect. What I lack in IQ, I probably make up in perseverance.

I am always amazed every time I learn a new word, and I see how someone pulls off a style of poetry that is unfamiliar. I am amazed at the stage presence people have. I am amazed every time I learn of a new historical figure who has shaped my life in ways I never knew. I am amazed how little I know about world politics.

But beyond that, what I seek is universal. I seek a voice, a stake, a presence, and an ability to make the impact that I want to make. And like everything else, it is taking longer.


Learning
-----------------------------------------------------

A friend encouraged me to start reading again earlier this year. It provides a diversion from free time to dwell on the uncontrollable. I've missed reading what people actually think, their passions, what lies beneath their surface. How conniving they are. How imaginary they are.The Junot Diaz's of the world... the cussing, sarcastic intellectual, who at the same time is empathic and here's the kicker... real.

What people show (what others see) versus the 95 percent that they don't know how to, their imaginations, their potential, their judgement, their pain, their hopes, writers confirm that those things are there. Knowing that one is not alone in her journey to pull herself out there. THAT is hope.
--

With school, Maine will offer me the ability to be knee deep in writing, reading, and analyzing again. To study my human relationships with children. To study how language makes impact. Of being educated and of sharing what I can with others. I need that distraction and knowledge before I can conceive what place in the world I belong to. It'll also buy me time to replenish-- time to make things better than what they are currently, time to ready myself.
--
The scary thing about being a grown-up is not so much the responsibility. The most scary thing about being a grown-up is the idea that one feels complacent with showing the stagnant 5 percent and ignoring the other 95 percent. People meet their civil responsibilities at home and at work, and they forget about reading articles, getting lost in books, trying new things, having challenging conversations, fighting injustice, and studying theories.They forget that even though they are a citizen of the world, they are also an individual who can change it.

I am grateful for the rough patches of "life experience" after college. It helps me see who I am in the world and how or if people see me. But like a lot of 20-somethings, I waste a lot of what I have.
I am robust, healthy, energetic, youthful, beautiful, curious, and yet, I work, I drink occasionally, I have dinners with folks when I feel like I'm being to introverted...

Fear is a part of the process that leads to progress.

My fears are:
-Maine feels desperately small for dreams. What if I get stuck here? What if I don't find a family outside of my family?
-I'm afraid of not finding my place and not finding a community of color that I can be a part of, relate to, and share my struggles and passions with. Being in all white spaces makes me uncomfortable.
-After leaving my hometown after high school, and seeing the hundreds of things there are to see, and getting to travel, and seeing firsthand what having allies feels like, and what impact can be made elsewhere, going back to it creates anxiety.
-I'm also afraid because although it's my journey, I don't want to do it alone-- and for the first time in 4 years, that journey has lost its companion. How will I find another that feels suitable for my heart, my head, my soul?

But every year, the fear lessens a little bit, that is the truth. And incremental steps are taken that may feel small or late, but they add up. I eventually figure my shit out a little more. And I'm a little closer to saying I'm the person I aspire to be, but more importantly, that I'm proud of the woman who is working to get there.

This post is about me. It has ME written all over it. But like all pieces, this is for everyone is going into a new day (a new year), trying to figure their shit out.

Week 1

Week 3 11/22/13 8:37 p.m.

My friend, Lan, sent me this poem.

'There is you and you
This a relationship
It is the most important relationship'

Something to keep in mind.

And music, the healer of all things.

Kanye West "Bad News"
Sade "No Ordinary Love"
Wale "Diary"
No Doubt "Don't Speak"
Rihanna "Stay"
NaS "Roses"

"You were always where I needed you to be whether you were there or not there." - J. Cole "Born Sinner"

Still,
with the music,
the wine,
the books,
the treadmills,
I miss him. It doesn't sting so much as it lingers while it lingers on stinging.

I've decided though that this will be the last week... and back to other things, maybe more distracting things, like the trend of condescension from white rappers/singers about hip hop culture that masks itself as anti-materialism. Ha, well, at least that part of me remains.

Week 2
10:13 November 16, 2013

It amazes me how durable the human heart is.
It amazes me that even when, and perhaps most when, I find myself in a place of uncertainty, I am still capable of producing love and empathy.
When the anger passes, those feelings remain the foundation and the driver  of all things. I am not alone in this. It is not unique to me. I find this amongst most women.
When I am angry, I elude to the fact that women love, and they are often drained of love, hurt by their love, but they continue to choose love rather than any alternative.
It is my opinion that a woman is capable of feeling the scars that her brother and her partner feels. It is my opinion that she is capable of feeling his loneliness, his uncertainty, his fears.
It is my opinion that it is a burden, but it is good, because it makes women capable of understanding and vulnerability and of effortlessly producing support... which produces love.
I would be nothing if I could not see and feel from another perspective. Take a step back and think from the mind of a man. I would be angry. I would not forgive. I am allowed to be. But anger is poisonous.
 ---
I am well aware of my womanhood.
I am a little mad at it, not so much for the sexism, or gender hierarchy, or ignorance, or inequality-- those are just battles to advocate against-- to make better for future generations of girls.

No, I'm mad at womenhood because of the additional burdensssss we place upon ourselves, the additional sacrificessss we make even when we know better.

J. Cole wrote "Women's curse is birth" and, it's probably true. Would the world spin around if we didn't give up of ourselves what a man needs to survive and thrive?
Do we ask of the same in return? No... not really, we have that capacity within us. Would it be nice and considerate and fair? Sure, but I don't think they have that strength and We like the burdens. We like to push them to success, they too, maybe, perhaps, would like to see us climb... but they are afraid to spend the time and energy to boost for
what if that takes away from them?

And I think, I know, that's why I'm so fucking mad at him.  I am allowed to be. And maybe at me for expecting different.

--

I used to cut up my rambling free-writes into segments and call it "writing." I don't edit. You can't edit something that your soul vomits out. Ugly or good, the practice proves to oxgenate me the way running always has.

11/8/13 11:14 p.m.

The soul is strong.
After heartbreak, it is able to replenish itself.
The soul is especially strong for womenkind
For She
is the one who sacrifices herself for men
Like a well, drained of water, emptied and
drained again.

What a beauty a full well
would be untampered with
A fat watery well__ even fed with clear,
vital
vibrant water?
But like Mother Earth, her well is emptied and recharged, emptied and recharged.

The feeders are fat, and growing, and selfish.
She is unconditionally exhuasted.
They never give back. 

Taylor Swift

A few days ago, I couldn't wrap my mind around what I could possibly write about on my next post.

But when I couldn't stop screaming 4-hours ago, I knew. I knew that there would be use for this blog again. I tend to write when I'm in distress, when I'm angry about something.
And what was there to be angry with? I had gotten a job that pleases my soul and allows me to Grow. I had bought my own car. Gotten a new I-Phone. My mother cooks for me. And in a few months, I would be going to school to get my Masters. 

And the part that made up the beautiful final piece was being in love with my best friend. So I held it in until the skype hung up, and screamed.

See, frugality affords me a few things. After the bills, there was the Save to do the right thing and protect the future category, save for school category, AND, most importantly, save to fly or bus here in there, explore this and that, with HIM, category. For which, I'd become exceptionally frugal.

I don't know where that stash is going now.
I screamed thinking about it. Thinking about 2 months without Starbucks, I love Starbucks.
The next trip would have been somewhere to Asia, I'm sure of it.
And every dollar spent had always come back 10 fold. When the laugh would crawl from the beer-filled belly and emanate through his whole face. If it was a real laugh, he'd laugh with his entire torso and sort of bounce up when something was really funny. The dimples dug deep... I think I was, I am, in even deeper.

I could withstand this long distance and marry him for that laugh alone. Unbeknownst to him, winter trips had already been planned out in my head.

Isn't it strange that I can miss a laugh as though a person had died but he's still alive and kicking right there? Or I could scream as though I were in a war, or I had killed someone? But in fact, it was just an ordinary breakup that happens thousands of times each day? And he didn't even cheat on me, he wasn't even mean, he just... was scared, wasn't ready, was questioning, was ... still in boy mode. 

But break-ups are rarely about losing sex, or romance, it's about losing the dorkiness that two best friends share. It's about losing THE person to spill the secrets to, to show the vulnerability to... when  in the world, I'm a go-getter, a buy your own shit kind of female, a feminist, an... almost indestructible force when it comes to emotions and leaving, things and people, behind. I was secure, sort of, but I'd fuck a short ugly douche-bag in college, just to anger him, just to make him notice what he wasn't paying attention to, create an OK-Cupid, never check it, flirt with other guys when he was too independent... I was insecure. And it worked. It's about a person who makes me feel beautiful without saying it, without me having to do a thing, with nothing on, just by looking at me. When I'm thick, when I'm thin, when my skin was flawless, when I had pimples, braces, or none, when I wore red pants hipster that annoyed him... I still felt beautiful.

The money maybe came back 20-fold, the anticipation made it better, made each moment more cherished. In the drab of Maine, and the heartlessness of D.C., it provided air.

Maybe, because I have never experienced loss, I don't know what fear is. I think Eddie, and people like him, who know what fear is, who are cautious of it, agitate me. I can't wrap my mind around them. Because all the what-ifs steals from the moments of love. I couldn't love him more, but his fear was stronger. His doubts. His youth. And because he should be allowed to feel what he feels, he is right. His feelings are right.

But all of that shit, steals away from the reality that I had crafted. I had always dreamed of getting a Masters. And he was born to get one, if not a Ph D, smartass that he is. We'd take trips back and forth. And I'd drive down on weekends, when he finally returns Stateside to get it. And I'd be exhausted and want to see but one person. And when I'd be done with my degree, I'd plant myself annoyingly all over his presence. And we'd grow up and the world would lead us where it leads us... whichever continent, whichever country, however long, there would be a light by the end of the tunnel, My Eddie stash on hand.
Trilingual, Tri-cultural, Triracial, smartass babies with knowledge of different religions and beliefs in our 30's. Can you imagine? No Fear.

So the screaming, I couldn't stop for an hour. The sobbing, then the screaming, then the sobbing. That now, I had been infected with the grossness that was fear and precaution.
It disgusts me. The fear that, I cannot text stupid stuff to a person I want to annoy most. Or, no "I love you" texts. No, "when are you free, asshole?" text. No talking about how ordinary our looks are... while pretending that we are hot... None of that.
Fear of seeing the day he replaces me with another best friend. 

How many times had we broken up before? But this one bears finality. There would be more screaming. It's ordinary, but overwhelming.  And I apologize to Eddie, as I apologize to the unambitious people I used to be attracted to in high school, for being entangled with a self-proclaimed writer. Either write or scream. Either whine or scream.

Scream for my stash, because it can't go anywhere now, that reaps rewards the way it had just this morning.
My dork is gone.
And I don't want Starbucks.
That money was for him only.

My Response to "Why Generation Y Yuppies Are Unhappy"

The night before I had started this post, I was considering writing a scathing yet detailed letter to my former supervisor about the microagressions that took place in that work environment. I wanted to let go of those feelings and finally pull her into the loop.

A core value that kept appearing in Naïka Apeakorang's blog, which I follow, is that all people should be able to feel what they feel. If you don't have anything else in the world, you have your feelings.

And the primary source of "growing" pains, I felt in D.C. and in that position, was that I allowed being in that position to suppress my feelings. I didn't feel comfortable voicing myself in a way that wasn't overly exuberant but was true to me, and because I wasn't feeling or able to challenge, I was in a numb and stagnant place.

I had started jotting in my journal about June 14. It was my last day in D.C., my last day teaching, and most importantly 2 days before my 25th birthday. But when I came to class that morning, there were no decorations on my door, no birthday cards, no recognition as there had been for Lead teachers and one ultra special Assistant Teacher. I didn't realize it then but, I was hurt.

Four hours later at 5 in the morning, 11 his time, my partner ironically sends me a link to a trending article about why educated young professionals "yuppies" are unhappy because our reality doesn't even come close to our expectations for ourselves (link below).

The article went on to say that yuppies (who came up what that terrible sounding word?) are unhappy because we have a lot of ambition but unrealistic expectations about the amount of hard work and time it takes to achieve success.
We're not all special because that erases the definition of the word.
Our sense of entitlement is unhealthy because nothing should be given to us, we should earn it.
We're delusional because we live in an age of social media where we're bombarded with images of successful people, while we don't take into account that successful people will, of course, show their success while unsuccessful people won't... so we're only comparing our failures to those who've made it.
And lastly that our parents era was relatively stable so most were able to achieve their dreams through hard work, and they instilled in us that we can do even better.
Yuppies Article

All fair points, if they weren't so poorly thought out. I don't know the race of the author but the article itself was written from a naive and (middle to upperclass) White perspective. Success almost always disproportionately benefits those with privilege, especially in 2013. The majority of Black kids, immigrant kids, Latino kids who saw their parents thrive is not nearly as high as White Americans. And even if it were, the messages that society sends to our minority boys and girls is most definitely not that they can be what ever they want and that they're entitled to things.

We're, and now I'm talking from a P.O.C. perspective, taught to work our asses off for everything we have because for a lot of us, our parents didn't have shit. Most immigrant kids grew up in housing projects, not white houses with picket fences. Working as hard and as many hours as they do for as many years as they have, my folks will never see affluence.

That's probably where the disappointment in not succeeding in the workforce for educated young people of color and for educated white kids who stem from poverty comes in.

The idea that folks thought the article was honest and refreshing and worth putting in the Huffington is troubling. We can't agree with just what anyone writes, we have to challenge things. And the article's author is reinforcing an American myth about equal playing fields and hard work that is, to use her language, delusional.

So... what does one thing have to do with another?

I'll give this example: My workday ended at 4, I was paid until 4, there was rarely a day I left before 4:30 or 5, rarely a day I didn't come at least 15 minutes early, rarely a day I took a full lunch, to make sure things were done for my teammates and my kids. And I never brought this up to her, because it was my own ideas about principle. Even though, I knew fair well that this woman, who was only 3 years my senior, and who had attended a college that was sub-par to mine, held my fate in her hands.

In addition, I didn't always smile when she came along to observe or when she told me her 'feedback' of me after those awkward, short, and invasive observations. I just chose to take from them the valuable pieces of advice. I wasn't enthused to go watch baseball with the team because I don't like baseball and I like crowds even less, and I wasn't always praising people because I would be speaking out of my ass and that is ungenuine and insulting. I wasn't going to go outside of myself to comfort her in her own White space of managing students and staff of color and thinking that she knew best for us.
But I loved my kiddos and I did all the menial tasks that a college kid would never imagine she would have to do, along with tasks that other Assistants weren't asked to do because of my education.

But throughout all of that, I felt. I felt questioned for not kissing ass. I felt silenced for ONLY being seen and evaluated for those menial tasks. I felt like a shadow in the classroom because of how the hierarchy in the classroom was set up and enforced within that system. I felt exploited for the of sake the classroom to "sacrifice" a year of my life when the opportunity wasn't there for me to show what I had to give intellectually and managerially yet those factors were considered when a decision was made on whether or not I should move up to the next rung there.
And mostly, I felt alone and isolated in the journey of my own growth.

I knew from beginning to end that is was unjust. Of sacrificing what you have,
to do the best you can,
for a cause that you care for,
yet you're being silenced and told not to feel or question
or explore your other options for the sake of prolonging people's comfort
and up-keeping their system
in which, you, as a woman of color, are just a player in.

That's privilege.

THIS wasn't a typical Ivy league kid who came from a family that made six figures and knew that they had a CHOICE to either do a year of service after college or work at the bottom of a company so they can steadily climb up the way their parents had. Most likely, if they don't skip from one career to another, they'll get there. Wealth stays at the top.

(Those are choices only a select few can AFFORD to pursue. If you've forced yourself to learn your hard work this way, fine, but it's your choice and you'll eventually get rewarded for your guilt down the line. That probability is not as high when you're either a minority or a first generation college kid. Fact.)

THIS, is the continuation of a history where more people of color are asked to be invisible and asked to fill the voids in society, that society cannot function without, yet society fails to value. And we're just supposed to swallow it because we're not entitled. THIS is saying that when a woman of color has the credentials to grow and to be an example to other women and people of color that... to dismiss it is and to perpetuate a system where society is thriving through exploitation but only a select few are allowed to succeed.

It's not about entitlement. I write about entitlement A LOT because I feel entitled to justice and an ability to grow myself as a citizen in this country. Kids who grow up in poor neighborhoods should be entitled to access good schools but they're not. Children should be entitled to safe neighborhoods but they aren't. All children should have food security and nutritious meals consistently but they don't. Children should grow up in a world where racism doesn't exist, where their education includes examples of how people who look like them have shaped their history, they should see successful examples of people like themselves in their world, but they don't. Young boys of color should be judged fairly by the judicial system, and there's no way that's the case. That's the reality of it. So when kids of color work their asses off they should be allowed to want all of those things.

But here are more facts:
I've seen more homeless people than I ever remembered seeing 10 years ago in my hometown.
This world is revolving because people are working harder than ever, spending more hours at the office than ever, being more innovative than ever.
Work related stress is high. People bust their ass.
Study after study show that the majority of people today are poorer than they've ever been. There's no such thing as trickle down.
College is expensive.
Cost of living is high.
Opportunities are scarce. I've seen how difficult it is to look for opportunities that are rewarding and allows room for professional  growth-- and those are so scarce that they're fought over to the nail. There are so many talented, ambitious, people who want to grow themselves.

And it's not feasible for most young people who have just graduated from a $200,000 education (with loans and grants $40,00- 100,000 if you're lucky, nevermind interest) to work for $10- $12 an hour or $25,000 a year, and wait for our turn. It's not.

What's delusional is to call people delusional for not loving the idea of being stepped on and being in poverty after college.
I forget that I used to work as Opinion Editor in College until I read articles like this and they piss me off.

25 thoughts

25 Thoughts
because I'm 25 and I feel like maturity is settling in and a sense of self is emerging.

1. I have an ego, healthy-sized, maybe even a little big... verging on cockiness, it is genetic. And the fact that I start this blog acknowledging it, is proof. But I don't show it off like a cute puppy.

2. Because I learned from an early age to respect myself enough to set my own standards, and never let them falter. People have always wanted me to be more talkative than I am, more gregarious than I am, and to act like I like them more than I do. I'm courteous and pleasant but I don't act. I focus on tasks and goals and... it upsets folks.. all the time. To which, I say, "eh." This blog is evident that I'm not understated at all times, I can rant as well as the next one, but it is my practice to let my heart and work speak louder than my mouth or anything physical on my body.
I'll pay the price for it, and I do, a lot, but that's better than the alternative.

3.  "The difference between the pretenders and the Kendrick Lamars" J. Cole.  There were always students in Anthropology class who spoke for the sake of being heard, paraphrased and regurgitated someone else's ideas with fancy wording and claimed intelligence. And there were people who were always so generous with their ideas. And people who always acknowledged other people. So that they can hear their own voices, and hope, in their acknowledgment of others that they'll be acknowledged too. It's a natural human yearning, or insecurity, to belong, to be liked, to be seen, to be heard. I understand it and it doesn't bother me...

4. but, it takes away the organic, and purest, and best part of relationships. Be yourself. Be real. Be effortless.

5. On that same note, I hate people who try to impress others. I'll make up my mind what impresses me.

6. My relationships with men are sometimes shaky but my relationships with women, are more difficult. The problems are rooted in the way women, especially women of color, understand privilege. Women (of color) who make it want to feel power. I go through that myself. But that drug can strip away a lot of the humility for others that got them there. The need to have constant power over others to make oneself feel validated is in itself, insecurity. It recreates its own system of privilege among women... and women of color.

7. "But I'm different, I can't base what I'm gonna be off of what everybody isn't." - Jay-Z.  I am not patient when it comes to ambition. So I couldn't live in D.C. I reside in an imagined world where as a woman of color, I can do anything. And in D.C., I was told to "wait"a lot... by people of color... sometimes educated people of color... which makes me question the P.O.C. mentality. You broke the barriers but you're mentally shackled and it's upsetting, the segregation and disparity in D.C. was front and center. And folks were resigned to it, I didn't understand it.

8. I've turned down offers this year that I would have taken in the past because of nothing more than fear and insecurity. But those falls and those settlements made me realize my worth. It made me realize the value of holding out when people try to put my value in a box.

9. Not everyone is fortunate enough to have a family and home that welcomes her back and gives her a place to find her footing so she can reach her potential. It is not ideal to feel a greater level of surveillance than one is used nor to should it be long lasting but it is something to be grateful for and something to take advantage of at this moment.

10. Understanding systems of power is one thing. Finding your own power to maneuver around them is another. No labels, whether immigrant, or minority, or refugee, or woman trumps your label as an equal human being who has power to grow and move. I'm empathetic to the liberal mindset but I'm becoming more moderate, the more I see people's content(demoralization/rationalization/fear/perceived reality... call it what you may). I wish I grew up in a time where people were angry and did something to better themselves and their community. Today, not so much. We have mouths, we have brains, we have voices, those are the most powerful weapons against injustice. Just because you are struggling now, you don't need to accept that that will always be the case.

And some small personal reminders for me and my women.

11. Be selfish and unapologetic about it. No matter how imperfect you are, loving yourself is a must.

12. That includes your body, your curves or lack there of, your muscles or lack there of, your skin, your skin tone, your hair, your hair texture, your eyes, your voice, your brain, your height, your taste buds, your teeth, your lungs, your heart, your bones, your organs, your self-esteem... it all needs love.

13. Exercise, eat junk food once in a while (or every day), let the sugar high make you laugh. 

14. Sing, dance, be a dork, be vulgar. Don't be scripted.

15. Wear what you want. 

16. Give rude drivers (and rude people) the middle finger once in a while, it's what they deserve.

17. It's ok to be a little cold. You're not meant to give away all of yourself to everyone. Save some of yourself for you and those who will put in the work to find you.

18. The addages were wrong. High school wasn't the best. College wasn't the prime. When you grow to love yourself in your mid 20's and 30's and you're no longer competing for acceptance by irrelevant people, that is the best. Wisdom in the 40s is more beautiful than beauty (and stupidity) as a teen.

And some things I always think about when I think about boys..

19. Give yourself a break once in a while and let yourself out. Stop being so hard. Be nice. Like girly things. Work on things other than your muscles, your game, your car..

20. Women give me shit about this, but I think it's extremely hard to be a boy... especially a Black or a Brown boy. Because sometimes when you turn your "masculinity" up too much, it scares the shit out of me and people like me. Walking down the street to the whack-ness that goes on, from the stupid cars, to the street harassment, to the fake slang, to the ridiculous outfits and pick-up lines, I hate it. It's not pleasant. It looks like you're trying to be cool, you're trying to impress people, which is tacky, and, at the same time, intimidating, stereotypical. But if you're not strong, if you don't show that you have something to prove, then... being a boy of color... in a world run by whiteness... is an extremely vulnerable and heartbreaking position to be in. How can you be "softer" when you're a target? And when does always having to please or appease or comfort white men and white women strip away your own power? How do you regain that power? Fake masculinity, which is tacky, how cyclical. Sometimes I give boys the hardest time... it's a gut reaction to the dumbness that goes on... but when I give them hugs, it's much warmer than ones I give women.

--

21. Writing from Rwanda, and from my few other experiences abroad, I can see how comfortable people are in their skin and their country. And, whether in the village or in the city, they seem to thrive personally. Whereas, in the U.S., where there are lots of immigrants, and immigrant children...  the poverty rate is lower, and, if they need it, there are services, but the sense of self, assimilation, belonging is not there.

I think as Americans, we view those who don't get acclimated, non-favorably. The sense of accepting what veers from the normal is difficult for both parties. Growing up in the U.S. from the time I could talk, with a standard non-accented accent, I didn't fight the battle of how much I should get acclimated. But, in the U.S., people must get acclimated to the language, to the cultural (typically white) norms, to thrive and to be known for more than just their dances, their clothing, their food. Culture that is a part of a person is not supposed to be looked at as exotic, as a display in a "museum", and with intrigue... it's someone's humanness. And to see someone primarily as his or her culture strips them of their personality, believes, mannerisms, likings that makes up the rest of them.
But people shouldn't necessarily lose culture, just to "be normal" either. In the years to come, there will be career choices and family choices and the sacrifices or tradeoffs of culture and progress is something my generation has to consider.

22. Twenty-five, what have I done? Traveled a few places, worked a few blah jobs, wrote a few things, fell in love a few times, graduated college. Many kids from Viet Nam, and the U.S., and Africa certainly don't make it to 25. But it's momentous because after all of these highly unimpressive things, I'm still given chances to outdo what I've done, to be disappointed in what I haven't done, and to take steps to make those things a reality.
And that is miraculous. I truly believe that those chances that kiddos who pass at 10 or 13 or 19 never will have are compiled into our lucky buckets for us to do something with, to open our hearts and minds, and to better the world around us.

"Blacks always broke cause we don't know money
Spend it before we get it and could never hold money
No wallets, nah, n***a, we'd rather fold money
Money control n****s, white man control money" -Kanye

23. About Excess. I bought my most expensive piece of clothing to-date after months of laboring as a sandwich maker at Wendy's in May 2007. A $230 Black Cache plunging ruffled dress for Deering High School's Senior prom. Maine didn't give girls the option of Forever 21's fake elegance back then, and even at 18, I had a tangible fear of everything flashy and tacky... so no Deb dresses, no colorful gowns flowing to the floor with silver opened toed shoes and hair bundled in the shape of flowers. Never that.

But to divert, at 25, I don't know why I view excess the way I do. Whatever money or assets people have, they should have the right to spend or waste as they please. Starbucks each morning, hair and facial products worth $1000 annually, impromptu trips to Rwanda (my quarter life gift to self), I know. But I guess, somewhere deep in my gut there lies some Buddhist (maybe universally religious) values, of not overtly showcasing to others what they don't have. Of being humble. Of being part of something rather than pointing out that you are more special. I have a mountain of shoes at home, depending on the day, they make me look tall/ tomboyish/ hippyish/ elegant/ athletic and that in-turn, makes me happy. So I believe in having things that makes you happy. I just don't believe in the showcase of things, jewelry, property, and money to place a higher value on oneself than another human when there are people who are just as smart as the next man who have nothing. That's one part of hip hop culture, that's been translated strongly to urban culture, in the U.S., in Africa, in Asia, that I wish people didn't aspire to as much. It has overshadowed the beats, poetry, story-telling, and music that can truly give people a voice of their own.

24. When you're cool, it means you have a preconceived notion of what “not cool” means. To take it back to my first few points, that's why I have a problem when people try to impress me. Coolness is an outer coating which continues to cause a lot of problems. It's hurt a lot of young girls and young boys, and grown-ass men and women who never outgrew it.

25. People tend to be very kind to me and people tend to treat me very well. There is not a day that goes by that I don't know this. My most difficult days haven't been hard. There have been people who have made investments in me that I can never pay back. So it's really hit me since before graduation that my life's work is to pay it forward.

Change

Recently, President Obama and Michelle Obama have been getting flack for spreading a message of personal responsibility in minority communities. And while his administration deserves criticism for a number of things that are currently going on, this shouldn't be one of them.
Liberal critics think the Obama's message of "personal responsibility" fails to take into account young people's social environment, poverty, discrimination, race, defective school systems and so on. They think Obama is blaming folks who have been dealt a bad card, and then turning it on them, and telling themselves to get themselves out similar to the way Republicans spread their "pull yourself up by your own bootstraps" rhethoric.

Obama is urging people of color to use our creativity and our assets.

While I'm a crazy liberal myself, there is a problem with liberal education. We discuss issues instead of solutions. We give aid without providing sustainable methods of empowerment. We promote empathy without promoting independence and entrepreneurship. And we can discuss issues ALL DAY but when the President encourages young people from poor neighborhoods to focus on their dreams, to be resourceful, to know that they can do anything a rich white student can as long as they stay focused, then there are issues... primarily from white liberals, stemming from white guilt, I guess. But it doesn't help. It's enabling. It gives this vague concept of "society" much too much credit.

I age myself when I say there can't be excuses for why people can't do something, why they can't aspire to do the right things, to be bigger, to be successful. Hard is not a reason to give in.
People believing what society tells them they should believe about themselves and what they can do with themselves is the greatest setback to equality. If you turn on the TV, what are black men supposed to be besides misogynistic, egomaniacs rappers and ballers? It looks glorious to have that much money and power if you're poor. So we blame the media for encouraging that mindset and behavior. Men talking to women as though they were a rapper spitting game, and getting women is that game, it's not ok but we justify it.

There's so much potential and intelligence that is being wasted because people give away their personal power by listening to what a White created "society" says.

Racism is more powerful today, in 2013, then ever because it's more internal. Generations past were more externally discriminated against but they held on to their personal power and personal voices. And they fought. That's what's missing. The outrageous amount of street harassment I deal with from men of color, particularly in the slowly gentrifying areas where I've lived in the District, makes me feel that that's what gives them power. Mainly because it strips away a lot of my own power to wear what I want to wear and walk where I want to walk and still feel safe. I've faced some of that in Maine too with Somali and Cambodian men.

Men with money, a college education, and White privilege have things that they chase that give them a greater power; and I think that's the issue.There has to be a more important hustle, the hustle for opportunity.

When I was my younger liberal self, I valued potential a lot. And I gave a lot of credit to people who don't have a lot because my family and I didn't have a lot. I understood why friends dropped out of high school, why kids act out, how terrible the system can be, I justified it to my family members, who were wiser than me at that point. But I struggle with realizing that empathy can be an enabler. It doesn't give people a kick in the ass to make them fight the odds. It just says, "I'm sorry for your odds. I feel your pain."

And with no fight, there is no change.Sometimes it's a hard line to walk between tough love and feeling a little intolerant, judgmental, distant, and condescending. I feel that all the time, so I can imagine how the President feels.
The President said what he said, not to be an out-of-touch old man who doesn't realize his privilege, but because he sees potential in people who may not see potential in themselves and regardless of neighborhoods, or a lack of money, or sometimes fathers, the brain is more powerful than all of that combined.
---
J. Cole: If I were 16 or 18 or 20 or even 22, I think I would be attracted to a real homegrown version of J. Cole, talented, college educated, and sensitive yet still feels the pressure to live up to certain corrupt and juvenile ideas of manhood that includes elements of misogyny. And that swagger, for some reason, can't be independent of misogyny. Again with the intolerance, right?

He can move on from what he was to what he is but he chooses not to, maybe it's just the rap culture to speak directly to the neighborhood you grew up in... maybe it's even greater than rap culture. NaS didn't move on until his mid 30's, it's interesting. And it's probably because people still bang his early 90s stuff like it's the best, and rawest, and most relate-able. They can't move on. Similar to the way many immigrant families can move away from their native country and be at least comfortable in the newness but they think about their old selves and relating to the people they left behind first. And there's a guilt to any privilege that comes, any change that comes, so they hold themselves back without rectifying WHY they had to go. And people are very critical when people don't come back and give back and give back and give back. And people also think a certain way of speaking, a certain lifestyle, a certain mind-set is reserved in this unattainable universe for white people and white-washed folks who don't appreciate their upbringing, and those internalized barriers we put on ourselves, that is our fault.

So no, not attracted to the complicated J. Cole types, although his music does make me think as I walk home getting whistled at by men too old to loiter around whistling at a young woman.

"Up in first class, laugh even though it's not funny
See a white man wonder how the f--k I got money
While he sit at coach, hate to see me walk past him
Young black pants sag, headphones blastin'
Know what he askin', "how did he manage?"
With all the cards against him, he used them to his advantage!"
Slang we be speakin' probably sounding like Spanish
Then I f--k they heads up up when a n---a shows manners"  J. Cole

"Getting brain from a bitch and thinking, "god damn, what's her name?"
Sometimes I just shake my head and tell myself this is a shame
And then my other side kick in like, "bitch, don't be so fuckin' lame."J. Cole

"Heavy heart as I sit in this Range counting thousands out
Am I about dollars or about change?
Am I about knowledge or about brains?" - J. Cole

Resilience

One day I will make a salary of $100,000 or more. And so will my partner. We will raise offspring who go to M.I.T. or Harvard or Julliard... whatever tickles their fancy. They will have horses, guitars, and a piano. But they will be different because they will understand things that children of color who come from a line of refugees must understand; the odds, hard work, resilience, giving back. We will dress like everyone else, invest in things that matter, because flashiness is for the insecure. (There is an air of newness to flashiness, an air of being unaccustomed.) And we will be comfortable with ourselves yet still have enough for travels and my cosmetic surgery (ies) in my 50's... I already spend so much on beauty products.. and for my parents to retire young.

My children's generation will double our earnings and their children's generation will double theirs' while doing something pleasing to the soul. And in a few generations, new money becomes old money with our names etched on it. And so to, charities with those names.

That is the dream. It is glorious. It lingers in the back of this mind, popping up once in a while when I seem to defer it for something realistic and convenient.

 "I don't want to give you the wrong impression, I need love and affection." Rihanna ft. Future <3
--

This is the LAST blog I write about D.C.

My lifelong mentor Robin taught me a poignant lesson that has been invaluable to my growth. With few exceptions, most friends and acquaintances are made to fill a void during a specific period in one's lifetime. They have a purpose and once they no longer serve said purpose; they are no longer there.

People are fickle, people change, people move, people outgrow one another in the process of growing into themselves.

I had a few high school people. The majority didn't transfer into college. I had my college people. But most of them too, didn't transfer into my real life people. And then I had my work people, to pass time at work, until I would change occupations.

That conversation a few years back has made me more resilient and practical.  And DC itself has given me thick skin and perspective. Whenever people are unreliable, I realize they are not my parents, my family, my lifelong friends, my significant other, but that they serve a purpose in a moment. This moment will pass in less than two months, and mostly, so too will they. And I realize it doesn't hurt to the extent it once had. I love the hardest of anyone but only to the special people who transfer themselves into my life's phases.

And I'm old enough and smart enough to differentiate between momentary people and lifelong people. This is a city of momentary relationships.

--

I don't really understand what I am searching for each time I go home. I see the people in this world who love me most. My father is this sweet yet tough dude who went from a masculine and fit bro in his 20s and 30s to an affectionate fatherly dude in his late 40s. It is interesting and, well, adorable. I am getting accustomed to it but as I grow older, I feel more and more blessed for him each year.
My mother is quirky, beautiful, youthful, and a tomboy. She understands her worth and doesn't let the world put her down. She once quit a position because she felt disrespected. I admire that spunk. She must be where I inherited my core values of self worth, knowledge of right and wrong, and most importantly the belief in equality AND my love of sweatpants, sports, sneakers, my stupid bubbliness, intensely awkward sense of humor, and the inability to sense direction. The make-up, hair, and pretentiousness (of which I am proud of), that is from my grandmother.

They feed me as though I have never eaten. They worry about me as though I were a child. Yet I search when I am in Maine. My soul gets anxious. I look at the T.V. and there's nothing on it. I look outside and there is nothing beyond the beauty.

And I question sometimes if anything is will ever be enough. I have been in D.C. for a few years, and although I don't know what home is, D.C. doesn't fit the description. I know more. I see more. I've met more people. I've passed more communities. But I am not more myself in it. I am not so free in it.

They (the people) haven't attached at the heart like that. It (the city) is boxed in.

I question whether I need to travel to, as white people call it, "find myself." Find my calling so that it is true and genuine. Find people who see potential in me (ahhh). Find somewhere where I can believe in myself again. I question if I have the resources to do that. Where would I start? I'm in the first world, I can travel but is it right? Especially right now? And where would I go? Am I brave to do it or is running cowardly?

When I was a child, I wanted to be a clothing designer, an artist, an educator, an architect, a writer. I was good at drawing, not terrible at writing, could piece things together and most of all I LOVE KIDS. Three of my kiddos now remind me how I felt as a kid and exactly how  I would want my future babies to be: smart, beautiful, empathetic, happy, kind, curious, spunky, energetic, fearless. I give my all to them. They are the only light to my position. And I am working to believe in myself the same way I believe in them.

So, as can be imagined, the anxiety is many years old. It screams at me: "FIND THAT CHILD." After a few years of settling for jobs that are un-extraordinary while appeasing people who don't deserve appeasing, .... AND being about to turn the milestone of 25, I can finally reflect this June about what I am good at, what I really want and to go for it.

"And we're off to the races, places
Ready, set the gate is down and now we're goin' in
To Las Vegas chaos, Casino Oasis, honey it is time to spin
Boy you're so crazy, baby, I love you forever not maybe
You are my one true love, you are my one true love" -Lana Del Rey... she is messed up. 

My friend grabbed it. She's traveling. My love grabbed it. He is traveling. Someone saw a star and he accepted that they did. It's amazing. If I can't find the people to replicate the strength/bravery/intelligence/dedication/lovingness of the people I love SO much where I'm at... then I need to change the current.

The main factor has to be growth.
Finding things that wow and finding incremental steps to create whoa factors for myself.
Finding allies who believe I can achieve those whoa factors. I was privileged to feel able through most of my life and DC has been saying "no, you can't." I wrote most of this post even before I knew I would not return. My stomach got distended and ached for hours the day I came back from spring break, I ended up walking the cherry blossoms on my own, the school I where I am working hired yet another white woman to oversee and manage us colored staff and students, I wrote my blog about entitlement almost a month back...  I just knew. And I felt really good about it.

My youngest uncle reminds to believe in myself and, UNDERSTAND racial inequalities, but to never let race or white privilege bring me down. I find myself being so thankful for him too because it gives me courage not to settle.

PS- Big ups to those who transcend time: Brittany, Eddie, Lan, Ten, Xander, Casey, Miguel, and Robin.

Soundtrack

"And when the daylight comes I’ll have to go

But, tonight I’m ‘gonna hold you so close
‘Cuz in the daylight, we’ll be on our own
But, tonight I need to hold you so close" -Maroon 5

Recently, Amy Poehler and Tina Fey poked some fun at Taylor Swift for her endless carousel of boyfriends turned exes and the breakup songs that followed them. After all, Taylor is in her 20s now and she can't afford to be as obsessed with boys as she was in her teens. Or to be so open and unapologetic about it.

Taylor responded by saying women ought to support other women brave enough to share their feelings and personal life. Although my social media and blog are nowhere close to that magnitude, I struggle with how much to reveal versus how much to bite my tongue. At what point does the ridiculous outweigh the fact that my loved ones are informed about what's going on with me and some people out there can relate to what I post?

But I think in some sense, Taylor, or Coldplay's Chris Martin, or NaS do what they do for themselves first, and the fact that their stories become a soundtrack for regular people going through the same things is just an effect. Everything in this world today is about coolness, and escape, and instant gratification... that it's essential to clear your head, whether through running, or writing, or dreaming, and recognize what you're made for and want. Everything is so instant, that life can easily pass by before you have time to create your own big picture narrative. 

Taylor, Nas, and Chris Martin are not cool people but they strive to be in touch with themselves at each stage in their lives. In my teens and twenties, it's about lovers and relationships, finding a place of my own, education, travel, career anxiety, and the chase. It's normal. But in my 30's, I hope it'll be about family, parenthood, marriage, home and life long friends. To see that growth and sameness though the years of this blog has been astonishing and hopeful.

This moment, I realize I cultivated a friendship deeper and more meaningful than any I thought I could ever have. It's an ordinary/ extra-ordinary thing.  I'm growing into a woman I'm proud to be because of it. If I were still a writer, if I were an artist or songstress, my work would be an autobiography, because there's nothing more viscerally extraordinary than ordinary feelings, experiences, and vulnerability. It's a good thing to love.  The folks on IHP, who traveled the world with me, taught me that and that's why I still hold many of them close.

I've fought my words, the perspective of me that exists because of them, and at times it seems like weakness, and there's not a light in certain life situations that I blog not subtly about. But there is, because people talk to me about things that are on here that have meaning. I'm not as crazy as I feel because people are sad about the same things and happy about the same things, and go through the same struggles, as a woman, as a person of color, as single person being alone in an unwelcoming, selfish, and oddly apathetic city, as a young person, as person navigating through relationships, as a person who fights everyday to understand the meaning of her existence. I'm not alone and people who read my whinny blog aren't alone either.

I love ordinary bad Taylor Swift songs. 

Here's this month soundtrack, dedicated to love. 

Cupcakes

"Everything is Everything" -Lauryn Hill.

 

Chocolate Cupcakes with Miguel before he moved to San Francisco.

At first glance, they seemed to be a couple. The flight from Boston to Baltimore was experiencing turbulence and, with her hand shaking, she reached over and grabbed his. He held it tight. Quite romantic. Windowless back row of a rocky flight, hands clutched onto each other. After the five minute ordeal, their hands separated and she apologized. They started a hearty conversation about travels, and education, and careers, and lifestyles, and languages, and family. It was seem-less. It wasn't until 10 minutes before the flight was over that she asked his name. Whether it was her being genuinely scared, or incredibly smooth, it was nice to see some sparks on an otherwise banal trip back and forth to an otherwise banal routine. Things like that only happen in the movies or...

They surprise me. I am goal oriented. When I travel, I'm focused on getting from point A to point B, hopefully without having to sit next to strangers (I'd rather stand), or be pulled into small talk (awkward), or look at people (most awkward). 

I judge too quickly.

Cupcakes at Sticky Fingers, with Ten, who I hadn't seen since I graduated.

Bac (auntie) Hao and Bac My Le, two of my clients when I was an Americorps member used to take care of me as though I were their grandchild. I got an amazing puffy winter jacket (it's been a staple this year) and lots of lunches on days when I insisted on eating a shitty $2 microwaveable burrito infused with preservatives.

Full disclosure: I take less than $600 per week after taxes, which, sounds just about as shitty as those burritos. Yet I knew, down to the dollar, what resources my aunties had. That shitty week for me is their whole month's income (and more than a family of four in poverty takes in each week) yet they were in their 60s and 70s looking like 50-year-old's, taking care of this idealist NESCAC kid they don't know.

At the risk of sounding existential, that inexplicable humanness that certain people possess, that is magically reciprocated and, additionally, paid forward by recipients, is impractical to us cautious, calculated, questioning people--- but it's a beautifully enviable quality. It's innate. It's spiritual. I hope it comes from years of trial-and-error about how to take risks, how to avoid mistakes, and how to live life...

So many young people, want to be adventurous, want to love people, want to be charismatic, and go crazy, and be perfectly unscathed at the end of the day--- but we (I) end up scuffed up, sometimes a little bloody, and dirty... I don't know how to find the RIGHT people. If I didn't have to ask: “who and what am I to you?” my infinity for love would be a grand thing. None of us are, if he exists, God, so we have the fault of searching for belonging and self worth through our relationships... and defining our faults through an inability to gain comfort and acceptance. But when we stop trying, we lose that humanness and imperfection, that drives us to each other.

Homemade Vegan lasagna with the boy, Eddie.

I started this writing process over a month ago not knowing where it would go. I kept re-looking at it and it kept hiding what I wanted to say from me. My first real adult love with whom I created real adult connections has chosen to pursue his real adult career ambitions in Africa. I am growing as an educator in D.C. It wasn't quite a plane ride, it was a sequence of flights, and neither of us is in our 60's but this is a predecessor to that kind of wisdom.

When people reflect, they say “when I was (insert younger age here), I thought I was in love but it was just infatuation, it was just hormones, it was just naivety, it was just a rebound, it was just attraction, it was just loneliness, it wasn't real.” Hindsight and the pursuit of wisdom, devalues the growth and emotions one experienced when he or she was in the moment. One spends time as a person evolving from those moments, invested in those connections. The scruff, maybe bitterness, maybe realization of being naive, maybe dissatisfaction that comes from fuck-ups probably inform the current re-definition of things. Learning from past mistakes may instill fear; it's a fine line to walk.

I provided my aunties with direct services for an hour a week, and they spent time cooking for me, talking to me about their families, and that was it. Insignificant.

They didn't get a grandchild or a friendship despite divulging vulnerable information, despite the gifts but I think they got that moment in the short life hammered in-between the dust-to-dust reality of our human flesh (if you read my last blog, you realize my fascination with grasping that we are only in-tact flesh and particles) to create kindness and love out of that moment... and to place value on it. We are all dust in the end, from the richest to the poorest, most popular to least popular, so there isn't much to lose and a lot to gain from our short lives.

To piece the choppiness together, despite what I say 10 years from today about this three-year period, this three-year period (in its moment) is a blessing of love and mutual growth. Sort of like plane rides and interacting with a stranger... before one knows someone, he had to have been a stranger. And someone must've said hi and questions must have been asked. Three years is a big fraction in a short lifetime.

The beginning comes easy for some, especially the fearless, but we all share an existence and our actions, words, kindness, openness, affects people...who in-turn use the emotions they experience from us to inform their actions with others.

Again, everything is everything.

 

A link to the colorism blog.

http://huynhamerasian.blogspot.com/2013/01/colorism_4.html