Addicts

Some people are addicts.  Not just drug addicts or sex addicts, but just plain old addicts.  They live for the kairos moments of life without any concern for the routine.  Everyday is a holiday.  I am sitting here one week away from Christmas and my life now is full of carols, trees and cookies.  It is fine for now, but this can't be my existence.  At some point, my life has got to go back to the same.  Addicts live in a constant state of Mardi Gras.  The lights are always beaming and the music is always playing.  They are happy but unproductive and have nothing but good feelings in the end.  Drug addicts are some of the worst people because, the drug of choice makes them grin like Cheshire cats, but their kids are in foster homes, they are in the county jail and they haven't held a job since they were old enough to get one.  They are failures with a smile.  Nothing should make you feel that good.  I have even seen ex-addicts want a hand clap for not being an addict anymore.  How about not being an addict in the first place.  One of the saddest things to see is someone who went from a constant carnival to the doldrums of the life they failed to live.  They lose that special glow and routine drives them back to the pipe.  I am glad for Christmas but, I will be happy on December 26, when my world returns to normal again.

Takers

Takers
You cannot tell "takers" that they are entitled to take.  I hear all the time that you should give back.  I believe in giving, but you have to be careful with "takers".  They take until there is nothing else left.  they take until you are in the same position as they are.  When they are done taking, you become nothing, because you have nothing else to give.  I can remember a time when someone blessed me.  They gave, but I had the sense to make sure that they did not give again.  I did not want to be in that position again.  Another person in my life was a taker.  She took what you had and when you had nothing else to give, she still took.  She died as a "taker".  Sometimes, the taker does not realize that they are a taker because they  gave away their opportunities.  These folks weren't handed a hard knock life, they volunteered for one.  You can't tell me that we don't know crack cocaine is not addictive, or that having a baby without a job or husband is risky business.  We know, but those who volunteered for the position now want givers to help them out.  You can't tell these people that they are entitled to take.  Givers must understand who they are giving to.  You have the right to give where you want to give.  Give to those who fell in the ditch not jumped in the ditch.  Give to those who are victims and not volunteers.  Give to those who are hopeless, not to those who gave up their hope.  At any cost, avoid Takers.

The Promised Land

Sometimes, I marvel at how immature my mind was or how much I learn after I thought I had learned enough.  I so desperately want to leave.  Leaving is something that is always on my mind.  It is the impending sense that something else is waiting for me at the end of the rainbow.  If I just can make some steps to place myself in the land of my dreams, then my dreams will come true.  I feel inhibited by the constraints of an ordinary life, and I have nothing but contempt for those who just go to work and come home.  I also understand that all I ever wanted was ordinary.  I dreamed of living in a normal home with a normal husband and normal children.  It is actually the first dream I had.  In reality, I had a sick mother, an absent father, a sea of pedophiles for relatives and everyone I knew was broke.  When I got old enough to ask, I asked about the existence of this place in my dreams.  Many wanted same thing but, they weren't there either.  We all were sojourners on the way to the promised land.  I learned that even " The Promised Land" will have giants and Hittites.  No place is coming without it's issues.  No church will be perfect.  No school will be perfect.  No one will have a carefree life.  Somehow, I think that when I get up the road a piece, I will see the sun shining right where I am and realize that I was there the whole time. 

I need me

Today, I am in my classroom and I am thinking about children and adults alike, who don't know how to love themselves.  They get into relationships that aren't healthy where they are used to make others feel good, but they themselves come out suicidal.  They hurt themselves, they cut themselves, they torture themselves because they have no self esteem and no self worth.  Their relationships with people mean more to them than they do themselves.  I liken this person to the person for which everyone has value accept them.  I pray for their strength.  I am acutely aware that, at the end of the day, I am the only person I have left.  I need me.  I need me to be whole and healthy and well.  I can't let you destroy me because I may be all I have left.  When you get through destroying me, you still have you.  You can repent, get yourself together and live another whole life after you destroy me, but not I.  I have to survive.  I will survive. I ...................survived.

Love again

It is that time of the year.  I am back at work facing another bunch of students and we have just prayed.  Paint has been on the walls and I am wearing my teacher clothes.  For some, this is just a job in the midst of a lot of jobs they have had.  It is a paycheck.  For me, there is so much more.  I feel like I am their mother.  I spend five hours a day making sure they are safe and that they are educated.  Their parents trust me to love their children like they love their children or better.  I have never been able to be selfish enough to refuse to love someone.  I have loved many who now don't love me back.  When I think back on it.  I didn't lose anything by loving.  When you truly love someone, you don't lose, you gain.  Well, it's time to go love again.

Won by a landslide

Sitting here at the end of my summer session, I am a teacher, I have had some time to reflect on my mother.  I have written before that she was not the best mother.  My mother had internal struggles that led to her mothering skills being a tad bit compromised.  Where I work, there are some strange examples of mothers all of which were affected by something in their lives that made them bad mothers.  As a matter of fact, some were horrible mothers.  That is when I had a Eureka moment.  I have always compared my mother to good mothers.  When I did, she did not even compare.  She was a bad mother.  When I compared her to bad mothers, she won by a landslide.  If you are comparing apples to apples, a bad apple is really bad.  An apple doesn't stand a chance being compared to oranges.  My mother should have never been compared to women who weren't abused, weren't abandoned and weren't neglected.  My mother often said that she was a poor "throwed away" child.  If you compare her to Claire Huxtable, she was a miserable failure.  When I compared her to the woman who was sexually abused who then molested her children, abandoned her children and suffocated them in hot ovens, my mother won, like I said, by a landslide.  Now, I know what the old folks always told me.  She did the best she could.  She wasn't an apple, she was an orange and if compared to oranges, she did pretty darn good.

Victims

So often, we expect God to prove who he is by doing something for us.  The thief on the cross said, "If you are God, then save yourself and save us".  Jesus did not save himself though he could have.  Jesus did not save them, though he could have.  At the end of the day, he still was Jesus.  We have to watch asking God to do things for us to prove that he can do it.  He is a healer who does not have to heal.  He is a savior that does not have to save.  He is a rewarder who does not have to reward.  When you base what a person is on what they do for you, you minimize them.  Some people only have friends who do something for them.  They only open the door for love if there is something in it for them.  What ever happened to love for the sake of love and giving for the sake of giving.  When you can only give to those who give something back, you open yourself up to be used.  You will go places where the food is free and not consider that the food is a trap.  People who continuously look to gain from giving are called one thing.  Victims.

The Help

Some people always cry for help. Everytime I see them, they have a :-( and the sad song. When you ask them what is wrong, they say I need help. Well, I have seen God answer that prayer. I have seen God go into other systems where people are perfectly fine being there, and send them to the people who need help. Now something interesting happens when folks come to help you.  All of a sudden you start feeling like they are coming to take your place and do a better job. Well you asked for help and help came.  Now you are offended by the help. So often we get offended by someone coming to help us do what God said to do. We get territorial about what God told you to do when you can't do what God told you to do because you need help. So did you push everyone away who came to help you and your job did not get done properly?  God please help us not to get offended by the help. God help us when he decides that he's going to send the help somewhere else. Maybe he will send the help somewhere where they will appreciate it. Maybe he will send the help somewhere where they understand how to treat people. They understand how not to hurt your feelings because they do something better than you. Pharaoh said to Joseph except for the crown you are higher than I. Pharoe did not feel threatened by Joseph and Joseph did not feel like he was being abused by Pharoe. It was a beautiful relationship and all of Egypt and all of Israel was blessed by it.  Sometimes an angel of light really comes as an angel of light. Let us not be offended by the help.

That which pertains to a woman

We have not always had the luxury of being feminine.  In the history of great women, we often have been placed in the position of being the man. 72% of all of the black babies in the United States are born to single parent families. Those families are headed by black women. Those black women have had to get jobs to take care of those children in factories and on farms. They competed with their brethren for their brothers jobs. They were trying to do what they were trying to do. They were trying to raise their families. Somewhere in the whole scheme of things, we lost that which pertains to a woman. Our femininity became this independent woman that we had to become. We lost all vulnerability.  We lost our ability to fall and expect to be caught. We lost the expectation that someone would open the door to let us pass through. We lost the sweet scent of everything that pertains to a woman. My prayer today is that we would not lose that that pertains to a woman.  No matter how life treats you or what is handed to you, let us not forget how to wear a red lipstick and a pair of high heels shoes. Let us set aside a day to wander through the streets with a gardenia in our hair. Let us stop at the door and wait for it to be opened. Let us wait at the puddle for someone to come and help us across. It is not only my right it is my inheritance as a woman. Sojourner Truth said, "Ain't a woman?". I am a woman. I will live like a woman. I will love like a woman. No matter what happens in my life I will always embrace that which pertain to a woman.

Love is a Giving Thing

Today, I am thinking about love and how much it cost to love someone.  I am thoroughly convinced that people fall in love just for the feeling of being loved back.  Let's be real.  People get divorced at alarming rates because the significant other is not significant anymore.  People fall in love and they fall out of love.  I don't necessarily agree that it is about love.  I think it is about not being able to receive what they think they deserve.  When you are doing all of the giving and the other person is doing all of the taking you get tired of serving yourself on a platter.  It is truly sad when you realize that a person in your life will never be able to return the love you have given to them.  Sometimes, emotionally, they just can't.  They are mentally ill or emotionally dysfunctional.  You will always be sending cards and flowers that are met with indifference.  I am in a place like that.  Most of the people in it, don't know how to love.  They take and don't say "Thank You".  They reap where they don't sow.  Somehow, it is in their minds that they are entitled to get what you have without being grateful.  Well, I realized that love is a giving thing.  You can't really give something away if you expect something in return.  Jesus healed all of the lepers but only one returned with gratitude.  That did not stop him from healing all of them.  You do this knowing that most will not be grateful and many will not return.  You ask, then why love.  You love because in the end, God will make everything right.  He will reward you.  He will place a crown on your head and he will validate you by saying, "Well Done".  The old folks said that you are sending up your timber for your mansion in the sky.  Love is a giving thing.

Say what you need to say ...........and mean it.

Growing up with a emotionally dysfunctional mother, I had to learn not to take her games personally.  One of the games she played, was that she would only praise me in the absence of me.  In my presence she resented every trophy I had.  As a logical kid, I was not hurt by that.  The numbers told me of my greatness and not her lips.  My GPA, my net worth my accolades told me that I was really something.  Her words, though nice, were not necessary for me to know my worth.  Actually, the whole of the African- American community was like that.  Within it's walls, you were shunned as an Uncle Tom, but you could be praised in front of white folk.  Not until recently did I understand funerals.  People get up and give speeches about people whom they really did not like and if living, would say nothing about them.  I saw tears fall for the dead that did not fall when they were living.  I wondered why those words were said in the first place.  I realized that those words are just said to all to make the living feel better.  They are selfish words that don't mean life.  They are words to help them get through the night.  They are not for the dead because the dead cannot hear, the dead can't respond and the dead can't refuse them.  I know of one person whom I don't like.  When they die, I won't attend a funeral, I won't send no flowers and I won't give a eulogy.  I had nothing to say in life and then I will not have anything to say in death.  Let all your words be spoken where they can be heard and appreciated.  My mother's words were to make her look better in the company of superior peers.  She needed something to grab onto.  She needed something  because she was uneducated, sickly and broke.  She had nothing else in her basket, so she borrowed a bit from mine.  Funny how you grow up to figure things out like that.

Be blessed.

Let the race....................end.

My mother's life long obsession was her sister Valerie.  There were eight years between the two of them.  The only reason why my mother decided to go back to school when she was twenty eight is because Valerie was in college.  I remembered that.  She went to Ohio State University and was applauded for being one of the ones who did.  My aunt Queen celebrated her and she had the support of her family.  My mother was happy working in diners and living on aid until Valerie went to college.  Some say, change is good no matter the impetus, but that is wrong.  My mother changed because she was in competition.  She disrespected my aunt something fierce because she secretly wanted to be my aunt.  When I came along, I was smart like Valerie.  Her insecurities came back up and she started competing again with me.  My mother entered into races that she never could win.  Someone is always better than you at something.  You will never measure up to humanity and my mother never did.  When she realized that, she became nasty.  She treated other women like plagues and had few friends.  Her self-esteem did not exist.  I can remember a time when I had to have my college transcripts.  There was the semester that I dealt with my mothers death.  I can remember this person remarking that their grade point average never fell below an "A".  I told her that I lost my mother, but for one second she thought she had finally beaten me.  I had a bad semester because I lost my mother.  She failed in life on her own accord and somehow she compared that to me.  She was competing against me like we in a race to the place called, "Arrived".  How pathetic she was.  That was energy wasted.  I pray that we as sisters can stop using each other as measuring sticks, and stop competing with each other.

Only equals can be friends.

I have come to the conclusion that only equals can walk together as friends.  Inequality, not in the same form, but yet still equal helps people to appreciate themselves while they appreciate other people.  It is difficult for any person to hear the virgins dancing in the street over the accomplishments of someone who hails as a hero.  I see it so often in relationships of my own.  I count myself as an accomplished person.  Ordained as a Reverend  at the tender age of 25, in the same year, I completed my Master of Science in Education.  Two years later, I moved into my own home.  Six months after moving into my own home, I bought a car.  I secured employment that I have held for eighteen years.  I sing, I preach, I write poetry and I am writing a book.  With all that is going on in my life, I can't diminish who I am to make you feel better standing beside me.  That breeds resentment.  Some of my friends actually rejoice when they see my flaws because it makes them feel better.  They lay in wait, hoping to see the humanity that is in everyone because they can't stand to see another gift or talent.  This weekend, I hooked up with an old college buddy.  A woman, just as accomplished and just as talented.  We laughed like we were twenty two again.  I cried when we parted ways.  I have been missing that.  Compatriots.  People who came up with me.  People who grew up with me.  Many of the people in my life now, met me at a time when I was already a made woman.  They are coming along, and I have not arrived, but we are not equal.  It was nice to have a conversation with an equal.

The Squeaky wheel

Once upon a time, there was a man who had a wagon.
He only oiled the wheel, when the wheel squeaked.
Later on he found that all the wheels squeaked.

Once upon a time, there was a man who had a wagon.
He oiled the wheels every two weeks.
He found that the regular oiling of the wheels still left him
with one wheel that squeaked.

He replaced the wheel.

If all you are doing in your family system is putting out fires, you will always be putting out fires.  If you spend time to really invest in your family, your problems will truly be problems and they will be few.

An Ugly truth

I hate to talk about the past.  If I had my way, I would make it all up.  I suffered many years because I did not have something wonderful to say about my family.  I wanted to say that my mother did what the other mothers did.  I wanted to say that she baked cookies and made my birthdays memorable.  I wanted to say that my father made me a "daddy's girl".  Alas, I could not paint the picture of the lovely home with the white picket fence and a dog named "Spot".  It did not exist.  I hated that fact.  More than that, I hated the fact that the only words I could use to describe my family were the words no one wanted to use to describe their family.  I don't remember how long I suffered because of that.  One day, I decided that it would be what it would be.  I am going to let it stay wrong and not worry about it.  I am not going to try to explain it with finesse.  I have found that the truth should always be acknowledged even if it is an ugly truth.  I know it is a sad story, but it is the only story I have to tell.

Go through while you are going through

I have never had the luxury of being able to relax and just simply change seasons.  I have always had to burn the candle and both ends.  I am going through a trial at the same time that I am transitioning.  This winter taught me this.  I had to go through a hard winter that was long and full of snow.  I did not have the opportunity to wait until the snow was shoveled or the ice melts before I had to just get in my car and go to the store.  I learned that you have to take some precautions, but the main thing to do is just start doing it.  Even taking the trash to the trash bin was a twenty minute chore.  I did not like it.  I tried to wait out the storm.  I tried to wait until it got warmer.  I tried to wait until I was leaving to go somewhere else.  I tried to place it in a room and shut the door.  I tried and I tried, but then, I simply gathered my coat and gloves.  I warmed up the car.  I shoveled the drive.  I made sure that I had my medications and then I opened the door.  It took me five times as long to do this than when the sun was shining, but I did have to do it.  I did not have the luxury of waiting until the snow went away.  Sometimes, you have to go through while you are going through.  You have to move at the worst time in your life to move.  You have to move when the winds are blowing against you.  You have to cross the sea when the billows are raging.  Half the battle is in the opening the door.  It is in the battle that you learn how to swing for all you know.  Don't be afraid to move when the waters are flooding.  Go through while you are going through.

With all I have.

This morning, I was thinking about the parable of the ten servants.  Each servant received the same amount of pounds, ten pounds.  The only instruction they were left with was to occupy until the master came back.  The unprofitable servant made up a "nifty excuse" as to why he did not prosper with what he had.  I think African-Americans have been conditioned to always explain failure by what you don't have.  We also diminish the works of those who seemed to find prosperity despite not having all that they needed.  I think there is a valuable lesson that is missed in this passage.  Despite not having everything you need, he still expects you to multiply what you have.  If it is inferior, work with what you have.  If it is all you have, work with what you have.

Do you hear what I hear?

This afternoon, my mind is on a lighter note than they heavy stuff of this morning.  When I was young, I really thought that I was mature.  At the age of twenty one, I felt like I had died a thousand times.  I felt old, but what  I was, was different.  I was a different immature, but I was truly immature.  I was nosy, I was mysterious and there was a whole lot I did not know.  Now, that I look back at my college years, it was like I had emerged from hibernated in a cave.  I listened to The Winans and Take 6 and Ben Tankard because they were pushing the envelope in gospel music.  I also chose choirs that black people thought too conservative because that sounded like me.  I was outside of the box.  In my twenties, I kept listening, but I favored gospel music that was vaguely R and B.  I chose music that you could sing to God and man.  I took songs that you normally sing to man and sung them to God.  I was longing for relationship of some sort and the music gave my feelings somewhere to go.  As I continued to mature, I listened to music of the refined person.  I had nothing else left to prove, but I did not want to be seen as "ghetto" and loud.  I listened to Jonathon Butler and Earl Klugh.  I favored Peter White and The Ahn Trio.  As I headed down into the stretch of my life where people say you become settled in your ways, I did not need to prove a point to anyone.  Somewhere at forty, I fell in love with country and classical music.  I like the fact that country music is not trying to be something that it is not.  At least I did not think so.  I embraced the part of me that others would hide.  I embraced being hopelessly country.  I embraced my hatred for anything loud.  I resurrected the part of my life that is a Church of God in Christ Missionary and married it to the part of me that is a Reverend.  I kept wearing the skirts but I put it on with red lipstick.  I was uber loyal to the church, but I also learned to take a vacation.  My music now reflects the fact that I have more to offer life than comparing myself to others. I listen to music with no words and sometimes I even listen to artist no one knows but me and God. It is good to know that I changed and that it was a change for the better.  You can see it in my music choice.  I am laughing now.  I'll end this with a smile.  It really has been a wonderful life.

The reason why I left you.

Your fear was the reason I left you.

You stifled my feet
So that I was hen peck
chained my thighs
and put your foot on my neck

You took my money
and stole my time
and defaced my work
while I was in my prime

You minimized my gift
pushed me in the background
and when you needed a jewel
you wanted me around

You left me to myself
you ignored my cries
and everything you said you would do
were just lies

I got tired of all of the theft too
That's the reason why I left you.

Whose Kingdom are you building anyway?

When Joseph was in Egypt he gained the favor of Pharoe.  Not only he, but his descendents after him.  They grew to be a strong nation with many people.  After this, a Pharoe who did not know Joseph saw the multitude of Hebrews in Goshen and he made them slaves.  My thought today is on Kingdom builders.  When someone is building God's Kingdom, movement is not restricted.  God's Kingdom is not just in one place.  God's Kingdom is so vast that you cannot restrict him to the four walls of your choice, but many people make the Kingdom of God whereever they are in the Kingdom.  Out of fear and not faith, people choose to bless those who stay in that place and curse those who leave.  It was fear that drove Pharoe to become restrictive.  Some people fear that their positions are in jeopardy.  Some people fear new people will displace the old.  Some people fear that their way of live is going to change.  Some people have a natural dislike for talented people because of their own insecurities.  It is because of these reasons and many more that one person seeks to build their kingdom on the backs of others instead of on the principles of God.  There are some places that don't suffer from this and you can freely move in and out as God's will dictates.  Then, there are other places where you just have to divorce the place.  Your name is mud when you leave the place because of how they think.  The brainwashing did not work.  You did not buy in.  You did not invest in the place.  Just the thought that someone can think that way says how much they have usurped the will of God to pertain only to things that pertain to them.  In a dark way, that is the begining of a cult.  It is the need to feel superior to other churches and organizations.  Cults build by fear and insecurity.  Let's not offend a righteous God by making him the God of a fishbowl.

I'll Get It Myself

When I was a neglected child, I learned that my parents were incompetent in their parenting.  Their needs came before meeting the needs of their children.  At the age I am now, I can accept that without anger.  My response to that as a child, was that I would have to take care of myself.  The problem with that ideology was that there was no way in the world I could take care of myself.  I was a child and that fact alone said that I would need some help.  I needed money.  I needed resources.  I needed mentoring.  I could not have become what I am today if someone did not just stop and give me what I needed.  I confess that my own attempts to supply my needs were inferior.  The clothes, that I could afford, were no match for my mentors who could afford to give me clothes far more expensive than I could buy.  I needed someone to invite me over for meals that I could not cook.  I can even remember a sorority sister who taught me how to put on my makeup.  I had no experience doing such things.  She also taught me how to really do Christmas.  I could not do that myself.  The bottom line is that my life would be severely inferior if I tried to do everything all by myself.  This is why mentoring is such a wonderful thing.  I get to do the giving now.  I get to makeup the plain Jane's and I get to supply the leather shoes.  I know that you just can't get everything by yourself.  No man is an island.  Everyone needs somebody.  I a smiling now and about to cry.  I think I will................

Better or Bigger

I have been seeing a trend in churches that I believe displeases the Lord.  I have always read in the scripture where God and His principles makes better people.  Those “better” people make “better” families and then those “better” families make better churches.  Out of meeting the need to make better people, churches expand and make better programs so that lives can simply be better.  Now, we are in the age where making better people can take a back seat to making bigger churches.  Everyone wants the mega church with big screens and smoke during praise and worship.  It is nice, but is it making better people.  There are churches where you can get a title if you stand in the middle aisle too long.  It makes the church look better, but it does not produce better people.  Sometimes, I look at pastors and I can see their own kingdom dancing in their eyes.  God's Kingdom is placed on the back burner as they build and seed their own fields.  When I look at the people, especially the leadership, I see some seriously inferior people in places where there should be excellence.  I see sin in places where I should see forgiveness and a fruitful life.  I see people who are not the best people, but they are in the best places.  You can't build a house out of inferior materials.  When the storm comes, the house will be in Kansas and the people will be running for the ditches.  A well constructed church is not about how many turkeys you hand out, but how many lives are changed.  In the book of Revelations, he did not come to judge the church on how many times it had a building program or how many Christmas contadas it had.  The church was judged because of the condition of it's members who had lost their first love, suffered evil to be taught in the midst of a righteous God and were lukewarm when they should have been hot or cold.  We often hear that the church is not bricks and mortor, then we get enchanted by trying to be bigger.  Bigger is not better, it is bigger.  God deliver us from just getting bigger and then we then can get better.

What I learned being poor

I was raised poor and had to unlearn the culture of poverty.  It did not take me long, since my mother's family was well off and my father's family I don't know.  I think there are some things we have to remember about the culture of poverty, if we are going to change things.

1.  In the culture of poverty, time means nothing. 
2.  They spend every dime, money is not saved.
3.  The standard of living is basic and not excellent.
4.  Luxuries are clothing, shoes and electronics, not homes.
5.  A mindset of learned helplessness keeps you thinking things will never change.
6.  Education is not encouraged.
7.  Promiscuity is overlooked.
8.  Teenagers can be viewed as adult once they have a baby.
9.  Frequent moves to look for cheap rent.
10.  Hypersensitive to violence.
11.  Petty crime overlooked.
12.  Aid is expected.

What I learned
1.  Don't waste time by always being late.
2.  Save a percentage of your paycheck as no touch money.
3.  Don't allow mediocre to be called excellent.
4.  Put your money under your feet and not on your feet.  Get a home.
5.  Get positive, stay positive
6. Get an education at all cost.
7.  Don't have sex until you can pay for the consequences.
8.  View your teenagers as big children because they are still children.
9.  Establish longevity somewhere.
10.  Establish that violence is not your answer.
11.  Stop talking about the law, but obey the law
12.  Expect nothing but be thankful for everything.

99 1/2

The Bible states that some me will stand before God and recite all the good things they have done.  God's answer is that He does not even know them.  Human beings can be a trip.  In the face of being wrong, they often want to recite all the things that they do right as if one can cancel out the other.  It does not work that way.  The place where you are obedient does not cancel out the place where you are disobedient.  The place where you are disobedient makes the places of obedience null and void.  In this sense, we can't pick and choose which law of God we obey and which we choose to ignore.  Uzzah disobeyed one law in the midst of them obeying laws.  They were bringing the ark of the covenant back to it's rightful place.  They were praising God at it's coming, but they put the ark on a cart.  After the death of Uzzah, David got the book of the law and found the correct way to bring the ark back to it's rightful place.  Imagine that.  No deaths that time.  I don't care about how many people you feed or how many turkeys you hand out or how much money you give in envelopes.  If you are doing that to make up for the fact that you treat people like crap, keep your money and your turkey.  Don't use your successes to cover the fact that their are issues you aren't going to deal with.  Sooner or later, you will find that the 1% that you ignore and borderline paleate will be the reason that no one will even remember the 99% you did good.  The old folks used to say 99 and a half won't do.

An Old Fool

She  was an old foolish woman
The kind plagued with the too's. 
Her weave too long, her shoes too high, her pants to tight.
You get it.

No degree from a univeristy could erase the ignorance
that flowed like sewage from her mouth
Her breath stank
You smell it

She always thought she looked good
But in reality she was rode hard and hung up wet.
She was a lady and a tramp.
You see it

And now she is old as the hills
Without the sense God gave a goat
to stop wearing, in July, her fur coat
You feel it

When she dies, we all will cry for fifteen minutes
and stuff our mouths with chicken.
Her legacy lay in the tacky way she lived, loved and died.
Your words are harsher than the storm of 62, but
You mean it.

Survival Mode

I teach damaged children.  For the most part, they are children who did not get their needs adequately met.  These are the babies who cried in the crib and stopped crying when they realized that no one was going to come.  In healthy relationships, the mother or the father tend to the child and the child realizes that all of their needs are going to be met.  In the damaged child, they realize that their parents will not meet their need and they begin to try to meet their own needs in primitive ways.  A child cannot earn money, so they steal.  A child does not have power, so they manipulate.  A child cannot create their own reality so they fantasize.  A child also tantrums.  They go into panic mode and if not attended to properly, can do things that are absolutely ridiculous because they panic.  I have met adults in the same cycle.  They spend their whole lives in survival mode.  Extreme poverty, unsafe environments and lack of parental support have left some people still trying to make a dollar out of fifteen cents.  Survival living is living on the most basic level in life.  The standard is not what is best for me or even what is good for me.  The standard is just what will keep me alive.  Unfortunately, these people then feel like they have the best on the most basic of levels because they are not starving.  They are in panic mode most of the time.  Most people are in their thinking brain and they move to the emotional stage for only a moment before they return to thinking.  The damaged person stays emotional and moves to panic when they think that they will have to live without their needs being met.  When the need is met, they don't come back to the "thinking" brain, they come back to the emotional brain.  That is the part of them that remains slightly "pissed" because they know they don't have paradise, but it sure ain't hell.  Heaven is called unrealistic and never achieved when you are in.............................survival mode.

Uzzah

I used to really feel bad when I read the story of Uzzah.  All he did was reach his hand to steady the cart, but lost his life.  I believe that we can be sincere, but sincerely wrong.  There is nothing wrong with simply saying, I want to help, I just don't know if this is the excellent way to do it.  Even in the way we go about things, there has to be a time when even your best has to be objectively evaluated and refused if it simplyis not good enough.  I have been taught all my life to accept it if it is the best that can be done.  If that is your standard then knock yourself out.  If the standard is that it has to be the best then keep it there, and refuse the lesser if it indeed is inferior.  I guess sometimes you don't want to hurt anyone's feelings.  The standard was not changed because Uzzah was sincere or because he was helpful or because he was ignorant or because he had "a good heart".  He died................end of story.

Vindicate me

Vindication is on my mind today.  I have found that people who want to know or people who need to know are the worst people to have around you.  They ask too many questions.  They cross lines.  They lay outside the boundary of good, healthy relationships and they lie.  When they don't know or when they can't find out, they invent an alternative truth that is plausible to them.  It makes sense even if it is unproven.  It keeps them in the know.  Now, what do you do when the grapevine is stronger than God.  When a lie quickly becomes a truth or when an assumption becomes law.  Now, you have to have someone come in and set the record straight. God said, that he would set every crooked place straight.  When God gets done, the mouth of the nay-sayer will be slapped shut.  Every word that rose up against me in judgement, I will condemn.  I will see it with my own eyes.  No weapon formed against me shall prosper.  That means, all that labor will be in vain. 
Vindicate me

Leaven

Today, my thoughts drifted to leaven.  All my life, I have told to honor men in authority, especially the church.  I can remember going to church and the lights were out because the pastor was taking his own sweet time.  I remember going to church with pastors who had illegitimate children running around the neighborhood and no one said a word.  You know, when it works, it works.  When a Pastor is on his game, the church is a reflection of that.  When he is a charlatan, the church is a reflection of that.  If I was the devil, the perfect place to hide leaven is in leadership.  No one will say anything.  Everyone will look the wrong way.  People will defend it and even encourage it.  Regardless of it, the folks will "Amen" him and give him an offering.  The problem is that leaven you allow has every right to saturate the whole lump.  "Piss po ghetto churches" come from somewhere.  Often times, I hear the blame being placed on the sheep.  Sheep are culled for disease and wellness.  Who culls the pastor.  No one.  God can, but even when he does, the sheep will follow the pastor regardless.  A troubled sheep becomes dinner.  A troubled pastor becomes a troubled sheepfold.

Oh to Marry a King

1 Samuel 8 entails what a king would require of the people.  The Shulamite woman, being a regular female, would have been prepared to be the wife of an ordinary man.  If she married the King, none of those skills would be relevant.  I was in a women's meeting and some of the women there shared the most useless knowledge I had ever heard.  They related the 21st century woman to a woman who can bake bread and make quilts.  In other words, you will marry men who will require you to learn to cook from scratch and make your own clothes.  What about marrying a King?  What will the 21st century woman do if she marries a man who does not need her to prepare him meals or wash his clothes?  What if he already exist in a place where all of his needs are met.  The Shulamite woman had a chance to be wooed by the King who had all his needs met or the shepherd boy who was living paycheck to paycheck.  All my life, I have been told that the only man I was going to marry would be a man living from paycheck to paycheck.  A man who was truly preoccupied with fulfilling his own needs .  He did not have time to fulfill the needs of anyone else.  The Shulamite woman must have understood one thing.  The only reason why the King wanted her is because he loved her.  There was no impediment to his love like money, or occupation or family.  He was the King.  Some say that love that comes without money is pure love.  I disagree.  That love can very well be attached to the fact that financially you are needed for an upgrade.  The love of a King is not dependent on you being able to do anything for them.  The Shulamite was not the daughter of some great king so there was no political advantage.  She had no money.  Her family was not great and her father was dead.  The only thing that attracted him to the Shulamite woman was her beauty.  Her beauty is the one thing she diminished.  She said she was black because her brothers made her keeper of the vineyard.  Nothing in her registered that the King loved her anyway.  That is the love of a King

Pursue Me

Some relationships are not compatible neither are they equal and that is just the way God planned it.  Lately, I have been thinking about the Songs of Solomon.  The Songs of Solomon are a musical of sorts about love and finding love.  There is no mention of God in the book despite pious Christians trying to place him there.  It is a simple story of a King in love with a Shulamite woman while she is hopelessly in love with a shepherd boy.  Today, I thought about the beginning of the story.  It seems that she is chasing the shepherd boy who is being a shepherd boy.  His occupation is that of wandering from pasture to pasture with his flock.  His companions are those whom he works with, with the exception of this Shulamite woman.  She complains that she has to wander to find him like a prostitute.  He  responds with flattery, but never addresses the wandering.  I don't know why human beings settle for trying to impress someone who is not as impressed with you as it seems.  His aloofness is seen in other places in the Canticles.  He grows serious to come and get her after she is taken into the Kings harem.  The art of love is the art of pursuit.  That pursuit is on the part of the male.  The woman has the art of refusal.  In today's time, the woman is pursuing and the man is waiting to see just what you would do to get him.  I believe that a woman who will do anything for a man will also do anything to keep a man.  As hard as she had to work to get him will be the level of work she will have to do to keep him.  It sets up the kind of relationship where you will always be giving more than you can take.  When the man pursues, he is a natural hunter and there is reward in getting the woman he wanted.  He does not mind hunting because he has the nature to do so.  My first lesson from this book is one of balance.  If you are a woman, allow yourself to be pursued.  If you are a man, get busy.  Don't allow the woman to become a gift horse.  You should be a gift to her and not the other way around.  She should be your prize and not your sugar mama.  In this age, many men are raised by single women in the black community and therefore, they are used to sucking off of women for their daily needs.  It is foreign to them that they are going to have to provide for their families.  I avoid these men because I have raised other folks children and it wasn't as glamorous as the church folk will tell you it was.  I want to be pursued.  I deserve to be pursued and I will be pursued.

Your sheaves bowed to mine

I have always heard this downright lie that God blessed Joseph because he wanted Joseph to bless his people.  What a sweet democratic dream.  God would place you in a position for the soul reason of you reaching in your pocket and giving it away.  Nice, but off.  When I read about Joseph's dream, which was the start of all of this, I see that the dream said nothing about him helping his brothers.  As a matter of fact, the dream said that he would rule over his brothers.  Out of this rulership would come the grain in the famine.  Joseph was not the salvation of his family, he was the salvation of Egypt.  It was in him saving Egypt that his family was included.  Joseph's mission in life was bigger than his family.  It is stupid to think that God lifted your family members so you can have someone to pay your rent.  Pay your own rent.  Stand on your own two feet.  God's purpose in my life is bigger than my family.  I was called to the world.  I like how his brothers had to submit to his rulership in order to get the blessing of Joseph.  You will not take my money and despise my authority.  You will not ask for my hand and refuse to come under my hand.  I will not help someone I cannot chasten anymore.

Not Equal and Not Fair

Ghetto theology always ends up looking like democratic rhetoric.  Everybody needs a hand.  Everybody needs the same rights.  Everybody needs a chicken.  I hate it.  All this talk about an even playing field when no one ever ask the all important question.  Who made the playing field uneven in the first place.  All over the bible, I see God handing out gifts severally as he will. He gives ten then five and then one.  I don't see where he is bound by this false rule of equality that says he must give everyone the same thing.  If this is true, than is it not God who made the playing field uneven.  Why should we then kick against the pricks.  God chose one nation of people.  God favored one tribe to be priest.  God chose one tribe to send the Messiah.  God is not equal.  Then I hear that God has to be fair.  What he does for one he must do for all.  God saved the Israelites.  God drowned Pharaoh.  God is not fair.  Now, I don't have a problem with God not being fair or equal.  It is his divine wisdom that understands and knows what we can handle and how we profit from his gifts.  He is all knowing.  He knows where he will gain and he knows where his time will be wasted.  Everything good comes from him and was made by him therefore, we must not be thieves, speaking over things we do not own.  The earth is the Lords and the fullness thereof.  His ownership gives him the divine right to do just as he pleases without apology or explanation.  We may not like it, but God is not bound to be equal or fair.  The best way to live is with your eyes on your own talent.

Push the Snooze button

Sometimes, I have dreams.  Sweet dreams.  Dreams so sweet that I don't want to wake up and smell the coffee.  In my dreams, I am in love and he is everything that God showed me he would be.  He is accomplished, proven and stable.  He is truly a great man in his greatness.   I awake and plunge into a sea of familial failures who have nothing to show for their lives but a bunch of abandoned children and good women who did not deserve what they got.  This is the gold at the end of the rainbow?  I'd rather stay asleep and dream.  I know that sounds funny, but hopelessness sets in when I look out the window and see most of the available black men unavailable.  I can't drift into hopelessness.  If the only way I can keep hope from being deferred is to dream, then I will dream. 

Insufficient things

Today was a different day.  I believe that when insufficient things in life, that are not supposed to function actually function, we have problems.  I thought back to my life as a young girl and how my mother was really an insufficient mother.  Our family functioned because of all of the extensions working overtime to make sure that the family had what it needed.  It was a stressor on us and all who came in contact with us, therefore, I don’t blame folks for ignoring the phone calls.  It was a mess.  The best thing for it was for it to be able to just do what it was supposed to do.  It was supposed to look bad, stank bad and feel bad.  It was the insufficiency of that family that led me to look for functioning elements of family and womanhood and that is how I became what I am today.  The natural consequences needed the space to occur so that the dysfunctional family could one day…………

Carver

I read a book about George Washington Carver.  He was so unique, raised by white parents and then plunged into a predominantly white university and allowed to get two degrees.  From there, he went into the deep south and from the start, he was despised.  It was his coming that showed them how insufficient their university was despite all that had been done.  Carver had a better education from a better institution and that made him better.  Better is not superior for even better submits to someone but better at times is simply better.  His receiving was cool and at times disrespectful, but other than Booker T, no one else is remembered as much as George Washington Carver.  You can’t despise better.  He made that place a better place.  He put it on the map.  He placed it in history.  We remember it because of him.  He made the place……………………better.

Headless, No more

Everyone needs to submit to something.  Headship is not a bad thing.  I think back to my headless life.  My father left and never returned.  My grandfather molested me.  My brother did not answer the phone.  That left me pretty headless and so I improvised and raised myself.  Now, at the age of 43, I can reflect that it was not fun.  I think that I am ready to turn the reigns over to the rightful position and learn to live as I was supposed to live.  I was never designed to mop up other people’s messes and raise other people’s children and pay other people’s bills and make sure other people survive.  That was never my problem.

Patches

There comes a time in the life of fashion that you cannot add any more patches.  I can remember young boys playing outside in their old jeans that had been patched beyond belief.  Both knees were replaced.  Patches were in the back and on the buttocks.  The hem had been let out as far as it could go.  At some point, the parent had to realize that it was  just time for a new pair of jeans.  That is how I have been feeling about my life lately.  I have added accommodations trying to make it to the next level of living and now I feel that it is just time to go to the next level.  That means that I am going to have to leave some people behind and some people aren’t that good at understanding .  Feelings will be hurt.  Tears will be shed. 

Nobody said that it would be a picnic.

That is life.

Only at the end

We often try to judge things at the beginning to get some perceived blessing or some sacred nod from an influential person.  If this person or that person would acknowledge that this relationship is valid and is going to make it, I would feel better about going into it.  Well, I hate to tell you, but no one can give you that information but God.  What I know about God, is that he is a perfect gentleman.  He knows when your mind is already made up despite the risk.  If you are willing to take the risk, he is willing to allow you to bite the forbidden fruit and let the juice run down your cheek.  All anyone can access in the beginning of a relationship is risk.  It is at the end that you evaluate if the relationship was a good one or not.  If you are not the same person you used to be.  If you are bitter and sensitive.  If all you have are memories that turn into nightmares, then the relationship was not a good one for you.  I always ask myself, what has my relationship with a person or place or institution done to me.  What kind of person did it create?  Do I like the person it created?  Only at the end of a thing, can we properly decide if it is a good thing. 

The Clean up man

My first introduction to God was through two very failed people.  They were my parents.  My mother would run into brick walls and was looking for God to rescue her.  My father expected God to take care of me when he went tip toeing through the tulips.  That left a jacked up view of God.  God was the cleanup man.  When you act a total fool in life, he was there to make all the wrongs right.  In reality, we all felt the impact of that brick wall and my father did not leave us in the hand of God, he just left.  I did not like the fact that all I had to give God was a bunch of broken pieces.  All I had was glass shattered on the roadway and refuge in bags.  How could I expect a great God to be the sanitation department of my life?  It seemed so unfair for him, yet, he did it.  He straightened things out and made everything all right.  You can't beat that with a stick.

Straighten my Life Out
http://youtu.be/48kRtw5PtCI

Love me

Love me while I am at the place of love. 
Don't pass by me while my eyes are longing for a word from you like you don't see me.
Don't keep me waiting on purpose because you like disrupting my schedules.
Don't pretend that it is me who chose you when it was you who pursued me.
Don't flirt with others to see the color in my face glow red.
Don't neglect to say goodbye, or call for no reason or buy me a rose from a gas station.
Don't treat this place of love like the temple will always be erected.
Like a foolish man, you will find, that you will run to the place of love,

and I won't live there anymore.

Failed men

Some women love failed men.
They need a man who needs a place to stay
Five dollars for a sandwich
Or a ride from the bus stop

Some women love failed men.
Those who have had one too many wives
More kids than a field got corn
Wild oats

Some women love failed men
They think love is authentic when he has jailtime tattoos
When he remembers his number 218456-45
When he takes pride in how many times he has been shot

A one woman man
with a good job
a place to live
planned children
and a clean record
are ridiculed and passed over
as being slightly feminine
or nerdy because they are not needy

Like I said, some women can only love failed me.

Crocodile style

I can remember seeing my mother cry like a common nine year old.  Tears were running crocodile style and she was heaving for breath.  Her wails were not like childbirth, painful, but full of expectation.  They were the tears of a foolish women who thought she had found a shortcut in the woods.  She perceived that maybe the time she wasted could be forgotten in the depths of the enchanted forest.  She heard the sound of laughter and the sound of joy and supposed the others had taken a similar path.  She longed to laugh like they laughed and be joyous like they were joyous.  Alas she found that they were not laughing, they were laughing at her.  They were not full of joy, but wine and they were drunk.  The only thing she found in the depths of the woods was the big bad wolf.  She cried not because he was going to consume her, but because she had no where to run to and options were fleeting.  Her back was against the wall and there was no ladder this time.  That is why she cried like a common nine year old.  Tears running down her cheeks crocodile style.

That

If someone would have told me

that the white picket fence would be a prison wall
that the 2.5 kids would fall sick and die young
that the little cottage house would be mortgaged thirty years
that the dog named Spot would bite me
that the blue skies would turn grey
that the sun would be covered by the clouds
that there was nothing at the end of the rainbow, but the end of the rainbow.

I would have given up. 

I am glad no one told me..............that.

Why look where He is not?

During a crowded holiday, the family of Jesus Christ loaded up the donkey and went to the city.  While there, they lost track of Jesus when they realized he was not in the caravan.  They turned around and searched for two days only to find him in the synagogue handling his business with lawyers and doctors.  My thought is this, Jesus was not born like this.  He grew like this.  They had to know that they had a spiritually deep son and the synagogue would have been the first place I looked.  How often do we look for God in places that he is not in.  Some look for Jesus in the bottom of a bottom or in a dope den or in a house of irrepute.  Why do we forsake going to church.  Jesus loved it so much, he spent two days there.  Has it become fashionable to seek God in movies, songs, poems and raps, but not in church.  I grew up in a society that had a church as the center of it.  It was the meeting place, the wedding spot, the bingo spot, the calendar tea spot and every other spot in between.  I spent more time in church than I did anywhere else and I did not die.  I think I did alright.  If you are looking for Jesus, try church.