EVERYTHING YOU DO ...

... IS A BALLOON


March is going to be a long month ... maybe no matter how State or Carolina plays in the tournament. It just is. It has been already. And that was BEFORE this past weekend!

Mind you, I think that I am going to be just fine ... a lot of that will depend on my appointment tomorrow at the M.D. The mental stuff is just that ... mental. Though on the surface, I let Pee Wee Herman's pubescent 'I know you are but what am I' attitude act as my defense, deep and not so deeply, there are a lot of things churning and going on.


Not an academic student on the study of behavior or anything ... would like to figure out why I have chosen so poorly and how I can avoid repeating the mistakes that I have made, in their slightly altered forms, and not have to re-learn what I should already know. As it is, I am hoping this isn't fueling what is (for me, at least), a small campfire that needs to be doused with water and covered with dirt. Would hate for this to turn into a huge blaze.

May have 'violated someone airspace'. That was something that was definitely unintentional. People are active out here for different reasons, and that is well and good. You don't need to explain yourself (though my compulsions often lead me to doing just that!), and because you are what you are, is always validation enough, how you present yourself is not dependent on being understood by someone.


If I don't 'get' you, it is MY problem, not anyone else's.


Me, I don't know how you get anything if you don't offer up something to get it. Life, I don't think, likes bargains and I have to believe that it catches up to those who try to find shortcuts to their goals. Now, have I tried to take short cuts, in getting from 'here to there'? Umm, the results speak for themselves, I think.

But I am here now. So what am I going to do?


On of the rarely visited subjects, at least in here, is how I felt while I was with Mookie v. how I feel without her. I felt alone, even though I was in a engagement with her. Now, that I am single again, I don't have that same 'cloud of aloneness' over me. Which started me to thinking ... what if I DON'T seek an intimate relationship with anyone ... how about just being that friendly guy on the block? The only reason I want to know your name, is so that we can be friends and to say 'hey', every once in awhile.

I first thought that I may not find that special someone, when I was living in my apartment in the Palmer Park area, and I was sitting around, chilling. And I do mean exactly that. Had a decent job making decent enough money (of course, I wonder if I would still be there now, considering the state of the Auto industry ... my BFF did mention that there were layoffs), and I was happy.


That's deep ... I mean, I was that. Could have been better ... but I would take what I was getting.



The other option to this 'Ex List', was to be single. If I wanted to go out and have company, there was AKA and SD for that. Was still hangin' around Butzel-Adams and 'talking shop' with other boxing people. Honestly, I was 'full'. Had my routine down, and I liked running on the wheel in my cage! But I wanted to take one more swipe at finding a relationship. Tee Jay, though she had long since moved on, was on my mind. But in a 'step backward to go forward' decision, that makes even less sense to me now than it did then, I reconnected with Mookie.


And that has led me here.

One of the big attractions to moving to Nebraska, is the opportunity to be single and making a different kind of life for me. A less complicated life, where I am not faced with the complexities that I face in engaging someone else biases, and having to wonder and consider what makes them be that way.

STORIES THAT MY MOTHER NEVER TOLD ME


Maybe if she had, they would have made a difference. But I didn't ask her when I had the chance ... because I didn't think that it would be worth the 'blowback' had I bothered her. As it was, you could say that there was blowback by NOT asking her these things, things that indirectly had an impact on my life.


Because I don't know what answers she would have given me, I have never let the unasked questions grow to the level of concern. Yet, every now and then, I wonder about what I could have learned had I asked them. Questions that I have never asked ANYONE opinion on. Not going to go there now.

Hopefully, I am getting around to what I believe ... again, if I don't, that's fine too.

Many of us have things that would complicate us as a person. These various things are buried deep within our id, making us what we are. The struggle is to overcome them and live our lives with meaning.

I wonder what it would be like to be free to respond, to lash out and like that cat in 'Lethal Weapon 2' (or 3!), throw up my hands and wail, "Diplomatic
Immunity!" But I never found the way to say something like that. Could say and have a case built on what my childhood was like, what I have endured, but what is it worth to me now? Stuff which could be the rubble of my hopes, and of possible destinies, leaving me buried. But I haven't.

ME & MY BROTHER

Have the biggest hearts in our family for others. Not that we were all 'save the whales' or anything, but for friends and family, if we could do it, we did. Again, if you asked for our help, we were there.

I think that 'luck of the draw' had me be the oldest, otherwise I would have been overshadowed by the 'Single Mother Matriarchal Complex'. And the specific 'You Go Girl, He Ain't Sh*t' wing occupied by black women, continues to mutate and replicate in its various forms. No matter how hard I tried to get my brother to strike out with me, he wouldn't. He wanted to stay by Mom's side, no matter what.

Growing up, I could see that Jan wasn't appreciative of too much of anything. When we were a trio, my brother and I played all the 'girl games', because we ... well, that is how we were cut. It was less fun if all of us weren't involved, and Jan didn't like to play the way young boys are want to play. Didn't matter that much to me and him, so we played all the frilly games, and did all the things we could with her.

Where Jan's bitterness came from, I have no idea. I remember every effort made to put her in parochial schools, private education. I want to say she went to Immaculate Hearts of Mary ... across the street from the public school that I went to with my brother. When High School came, she went to another catholic school, I stayed with the DPS, getting into one of the elite public high schools (I was a smart cat!).

By now, the twins are around and things begin to shift. Now, if you want exact details, I can't tell you. But were you my Best Sister, who was there, she understood the temper of the times I described to her. She didn't try to refute what I was saying.

The only time I felt that black men weren't welcomed in the 48219, was when Jan reached high school age. Before, it was just a murmur. Around that time, an Aunt moved in with us, and she brought some of the 'bitter black woman' in the home. This is not to say that there was a shortage of love in that house. Yet at the same time, during my pre- and teen time, I began to feel like I was being pushed out of the picture. And Jan was doing the pushing.

I don't think that the 'internal cannibalism' that happens within a specific group of people is unique. That said, I am about to generalize!

Don't know if y'all are familiar with the Willie Lynch letter: The Making of a Slave, and how it explains how the social system set up for slaves creates a mentality that continues into perpetuity. One of the items mentioned is about the shading of the skin, the favouring of one shade over the other. Well, to some, I am considered light skinned. Big whoop. Jan on the other hand, is clearly a dark skinned sister.

NOW, IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT THIS ALL MEANS ...

... you don't ask. If you read this far, then I have to tell you. And I will, promise.