Meltdown

(Originally Posted 2/18/08) I've had a hole in my heart for as long as I can remember. I've never been able to really find it or fill it despite my best (and worst) efforts. I have always felt this inexplicable sadness. It feels like I've had a hole in my heart for as long as I can remember. I've never been able to account for it. I still don't know what it is or why, but I know that now I have found it and must embrace it. I am the only one who can fill that space. I can do it. I just didn't know until now how to unlock my heart and let myself in.

I moved this weekend. Physically I only moved around the corner. Psychologically, however, I moved forward twenty years. Due to weather and other miscellaneous circumstances beyond my control, I made the entire move alone, along with two guys I found on Craig's list Thursday morning. (Shout out to Jason and Brandon--You guys rock!) I started moving Friday and am still moving today. It's tough doing this alone.

Physically, I'm in great shape, so the packing, picking up, toting, pushing, pulling and stairs (I went from a large, comfy, house-like garden apartment to a loft-like townhouse with two flights of stairs!) weren't that bad. I kind of enjoyed that aspect of it. Enough good Merlot makes most things more enjoyable in my book.

The "Three Mile Island" moment came yesterday. I decided to make a clean sweep of it. I got rid of stuff I'd been packing around for twenty years through several intense relationships gone wrong and the deaths of the three people who probably had the most significant impact on my life besides my mother. (She is still alive, albeit with Alzheimer's, bless her misguided heart. But I digress. That's another post in itself--maybe a series.)

I'm the self-sufficient, independent type. Most people can't even imagine that underneath this (apparently) intimidating, "all that and a bag of chips," confident exterior lies an utterly vulnerable, romantic to a fault, sentimental and sensitive woman-child. I knew that, but somehow, I was compelled to and managed until now to submerge that part of me. The intensity and depth of pain I was holding in my heart surprised and overwhelmed me. I was my usual focused and in control self, until I started physically purging my possessions--my life made manifest in things.

The tears started early Sunday morning and came in waves all day. I'd be in the middle of unpacking a box or deciding what artwork would go where and somehow, I'd end up on my couch, on the floor or in the bathroom mirror, literally wailing and sobbing for no apparent reason except that my heart hurt. That's the only way I can describe it. My heart hurt. It was a visceral pain that rose from a place I have no recollection of visiting. I didn't know it was in me. I didn't think it was me.

However, now that I've found it, I don't plan to ever lose touch with it--with me again. I need myself more than everyone else does. That is the life lesson here.

I was raised to believe that it was my role--no, my job to give, put my desires on hold and take care of everyone else. To do otherwise was just being selfish. (Can I get a witness!) So, the obedient child I was, I internalized the lesson and have lived it for the last several decades. I've given so much of myself to other people, to the community, to the job, to my family there was just never enough time, never enough of me for me.

But now, I am away from all of that and them. Who knew I'd find my true self by myself in Dallas? It is the place where the "me" I've been searching for resides for now--physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually? I guess I'm finally down with that.

I've got to get going now--go move out more "things" and make more space for "me."

Peace.

Yvonne

Reflections on Black History Month: Getting Up Wearing Black Every Day

(Originally posted 2/13/08) Black History Month. Wow! Just think, black people allowed Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine and those other "founding fathers" to spend all that time in Philadelphia writing the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and still maintaining their livelihoods and growing rich. In contrast, we (black people) took care of their families, worked their land, built their homes and constituted the economic engine of the United States of America. How generous of them to give us a whole month to celebrate our history!

It's Black History Month. It hadn't occurred to me until last week when quite by chance, I happened upon Henry Louis Gates doing what he does best--discovering and exposing the remarkable history, anthropology--pain and triumph of Black Americans. Thanks, Henry. I cried.

It did this week as it did last week, and as it always has, it took me aback--when I saw our true selves uncovered. Finally, this one month a year when the spotlight shines--at least on public television, on us.

What I saw on the faces of those Black people who I and most of us, regardless of race or culture, are accustomed to seeing only on the silver screen on television, hearing on the radio or learning about in the context of academia or cheering in the arena of sport--the surprise, the tears the abject, crushing pain--crumpled faces--at learning what their ancestors had endured. But, perhaps what may have been even more moving, more powerful was their learning about who their ancestors actually were--a name, a place, a written record of their having been bought, sold, or captured from a specific place in Africa.

With modern genetic technology, learning about their African roots is almost unbelievable. It's not been possible before. Imagine that. Most of us have no idea from where--what part of Africa--our Black forefathers and mothers originated. Now we can know. If not with absolute certainty, we can understand from whence we come with some level of comfort.

I know my white ancestors on my mother's side were German. Volprechts, i.e., Fullbrights, as in Senator Fullbright of Arkansas. They owned us. However, as far as the Black side goes, I have no earthly idea. That's sad. That's what white people don't understand. The inability to know who you are--to honestly know--undermines your very humanity and sense of self. That's what it means to get up wearing black every day in America.

In this culture, the very concept of black represents what is harmful, dangerous and sad. That's how I have felt for most of my life. More later. 

Peace.

ME 5.0

I have been aware of  my shifting consciousness for some time.  It started slowly but now has momentum.

As I look back over what I used to call  my "past lives," I realize that referring to my past in this way was not constructive.  The term "past" implies closure or ending.  It means somehow "it's over."  I think I used it as a device to protect myself from painful times.  I used it to try to forget failures.

1.0
I was raised to hide my feelings and that any failure was an indictment of my parent. After all, I was the oldest so I should be the strongest and most self-sacrificing.  In my mother's mind she was doing her job--feeding and clothing us.  For me, though it was not enough. I needed advice, nurturing and love--never heard the words I love you--ever.  No hugs either.  There was just an unrelenting expectation to handle it. raise myself and my siblings and make sure our house was well kept and there was no trouble.  In our small town, in our house, anything that might reflect badly on my mother was forbidden.  I was not a child.  I was the fixer, the caretaker, the keeper of the image.

2.0 Empty
After I left home I experienced this intense compulsion.  I was looking for something that I knew I was missing.  I think losing those childhood demands left me without any sense of purpose.  No one cared about my grades, how clean the house was.  I had no one and no image to protect and Iwas not  equipped to do these things for myself.  I learned and intellectually embraced the concepts of personal growth and enlightenment.  I knew that I should have been embracing, learning from and using the experiences  of  my life to fuel my growth, development and to help me avoid making the same mistakes again but I simply did not know how.  Knowing something intellectually is much

Sylvester Brown, Jr.: In Defense of Demeaned, Dismissed and Denied Young People

Sylvester Brown, Jr.: In Defense of Demeaned, Dismissed and Denied Young People

'12 Years a Slave' Highlights America’s Shocking Record of Female Subjugation | Alternet

'12 Years a Slave' Highlights America’s Shocking Record of Female Subjugation | Alternet