Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Labels.

I hate labels.
I grew up of immigrant parents from a color-concerned 3rd world country in the Caribbean. They worked hard to send me to a catholic school where for the first three years of academia no one else looked like me; luckily I didn't notice until the third grade. That was when the comments about my hair were made. They were cute, I suppose.. "What beautiful bows, how does your hair stay like that?" I probably had an innocent accent from saying words I thought were English only to be received with confused laughter. It was that moment where I realized I cannot fit in physically because I was not meant to.

"Don't hang out with those black Americans! They are the people that don't go to school and never work!" which was the narrative of the old man, often met with eye rolls. I used to believe him, not because there was any fact but because it was fun to not have actually earned a status and feel entitled to it. Because daddy said so obviously, but I digress. So I was told to forever speak proper (I knew no other way?) appear neat and clean, polite, never talk back and be above the cut academically. My grandfather would lecture "Girls should be like beautiful flowers, always look and smell good". Well OK then.

Time goes on and I sprout my mothers hips and ass to my classmates slender frames with breast. A few more brown classmates have joined and together we faced (and conquered!) the tired politics of the old world. Sr. Francine may you rest in the peace that you denied us. Questioning my fathers reasoning about black Americans as it so clearly was ignorant; we were treated the same no matter what our GPA was. As a "flower" I was boxed long before as something else. Defined before allowing definition, when my entity was still unknown even to myself. However these strangers knew me? My friends knew me? Or what they expected because of complexion and/or grades? Goal of my teen years 1) Break the glass ceiling, 2) Get to college. 

"Girls should be like flowers, always look good and smell good". No denying the proximal affect of a beautiful bouquet. In a week those flowers and stems have wilted but still pretty, nothing more attractive than a downward spiral. And in another week they are trashed and maybe replaced. Maybe not.

Beauty gets old and boring and surely replaceable. But a beautiful spirit never expires. It's full of love, adventure, compassion, and wanton jubilee. I've never strived to be simply beautiful, a facade of good genes and makeup. I hope my spirit never dies, even when my "Beauty" does. Grandpa will understand.
I hate Labels.

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Whoever

I don't need light to view you.
The glimmer of your effortless aura gives me the right amount of shine to smile in your direction.
I can feel you in every sense of emotion that I'm allowing myself to currently succumb to. To finally feel you the way I am meant to.
I'm so stubborn. The walls around me, placed undeniably by me, have cheated me of knowing how completely infected by you I've become...
So I guess I'll just continue to deny it.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Bitterness

Bitterness is a reaction. And when that reaction bears it's ugly head it is met with equally scathing sentiment. Bitterness has many causes but without asking the right questions or any questions at all, how would bitterness be resolved? Judgment is so last year, I'd rather we as a people become just *that* much more engaging with each other.
I am so sorry.
I'm so many things but the last thing I am is sad.
I could give a name to my sorrow but I refuse because she does not exsist. Tommorw will come and I will be. Just. Fine

Sunday, January 12, 2014

2014

In some form of defense against my perpetual possibilities I would ALWAYS downplay certain compliments. Now my friends, as honest and powerful as they are (and I'm lucky to have them), they never shy from teasing me about my physical vanity. However, personality compliments always enacted the "Be Humble" alarm and I end up playing off the kind dialogue with some humor (my defence mechanism). I fooled myself into thinking that my comfort zone in empathic-mediocrity/automatic humility meant for me to never accept genuine accolade and instead laugh it off like some potty trained puppy. What the hell was I thinking? A little pride in who I am would have probably gone a long way in life. Hm. "New Year New Me" or nah?