Getting Back on the Horse

So as some of you may know, I have recently accepted a new position and have had little to no time to write. In the future, I am going to try my best to post at least once a week. The best way to ensure me posting is to ask me for advice or make comments regarding something you have read. The comments don’t have to be about something I have written. If you read an interesting article or have a lively debate with friends and want to hear my take on it, feel from to email me at jeremy.s.crawford@gmail.com or facebook. Without feed back I lose inspiration....

Thinking Ahead

So last night a girl friend of mine told me that her boyfriend (or as I have come to know him, Mr. on-again-off-again, Mr. I wish he would ask me to marry him again because this time I am desperate enough to say yes or my favorite, Mr. I want to have his babies but since he is not that cute, I hope they look like me) told her that he has over 250,000 dollars in student loans debt, AND HE IS NOT A DOCTOR........She then proceeds to ask me what she should do if he asks her to marry him. “Isn’t it obvious?” I say, more with my eyes and lips than with my voice, but her blank stare and dilated pupils reminded me that my simple truths are far from universal.

There are only 2 reasons to get married, one is what I call “Come-upings” and the other is Overwhelming religious conviction.

Come-Upings: Is when your financial situation, living conditions or the life of your children drastically improve because you married someone in a better situation than your current one (i.e. you married up). That means the person you married is an asset as opposed to a fucking liability (i.e. good credit, their own home, high income WITH good spending habits, great healthcare). For those of you who ain’t got shit, the world is your oyster. For those of you who got degrees or make good money, sorry the pickings can be slim. In choosing , beware of the MC Hammer syndrome which equals high income earners who spend every damn dime that ain’t nailed down.

Religious Conviction: RC is only a justification to get married when when one feels that they cannot have sex, cohabit or have children outside the covenants of marriage AND you also don’t believe in DIVORCE. I got so f’ing tired of people saying they had to get married because it was the Will of God and before I can even take the “save the date” off the refrigerator, they are getting a divorce. You can’t have it both ways. The Bible only allows for divorce for cheating.....nothing else.......there is no irreconcilable differences for a Christian. So if Jesus don’t mind you getting a divorce, he also don’t mind you shacking up.

Please take note of the reasons not on this list:
1. He said he loves me and I love him.
2. No man will ever treat me like he does (even though he gets on my last nerve).
3. We got kids.
4. I’m pregnant with his kid.
5. To keep him or her from dating others.
6. I want a wedding.
7. All my friends are getting married.
8. We been dating to long not to get married.
9. Family expectations.10. So I don’t have to testify.

Jesus leave the wheel and take the car

some of my favorite youtube clips

If black people going to college was the hope and the dream of the slaves.......this was their nightmare. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_q_uUW7MV6A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KaClIF1ehQ keep her in your prayers.

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/3a4e6478a6/jojo-of-kc-and-jojo-passes-out-on-stage-from-that-happened no love like a brothers love

How to be a Cheat

Someone sent this to me anonousmly asking adivce. Thought I would share with you.

His Question (ladies don't get mad):
My wife and I have been together for a while, and she knows that I'm a lot more sexual than she is. We have always been very open about things and she knows that I have a lot of fantasies that aren't necessarily shared. She has hinted that if I want to persue them, just do it and don't tell her about it.Well I never really have. But, I've barely been able to contain myself. I have an old friend of my family who I haven't talked to in years and is now close to where I live in college and I want to head down there and just have a wild time.Do you have any experience like this, do you think she's just saying that.Am I risking anything bringing it back up and making sure she doesn't want to hear about it?I just want to have a good time but I want to do it the right way.

My advice to him:
To begin, when dealing with emotions and relationships there are seldom win-win situations. I say that to say, whatever course of action you choose to take will have consequences. One of these unexpected consequences is often the fact that once an individual gets a taste of the “fantasy world,” often one’s sexual appetite does not dissipate but grows louder and stronger. There is an excitement and freedom that surrounds “no strings attached sex” that can often prove very addictive.

The other side of the coin is that if you don’t find a way to sexually express yourself, these thoughts can often become all-consuming and cause you to view your spouse as a barrier or obstacle to your happiness as opposed to a helpmate.

In order to determine the best course of action, you must first have a 99.9% understanding of who you are. The first question you must ask yourself is are you someone that is able to live by your own moral code or do you live by the moral code of others. For example, in the past have you been someone who felt guilty for weeks regarding lying to your wife and/or keeping secrets, or do you live by the notion of “what she don’t know won’t hurt her?” Also, are you someone who cannot keep a secret? Do you and your spouse have the type of relationship where you talk about everything? If this is your type of relationship, it is very dangerous to assume that this one particular situation would be different. If you normally tell her everything, then it is likely that, good or bad, you will also have a strong, almost uncontrollable desire, to share this indiscretion.

No matter what your wife told you, most, and I MEAN ALMOST ALL, women don’t want you having sex without them. When a woman says, “go ahead, just make sure I don’t find out”....she is NOT GIVING YOU PERMISSION...she is just re-enforcing to you that like in any situation with infidelity she will leave you when she finds out...SHE IS JUST RESTATING THE OBVIOUS.

Which brings me to “her finding out”...... Women are 10 times more in tune with their men then they are with themselves or you are in tune with yourself. In my personal view, you are more likely to be caught cheating than you are likely to get away with it. If you go through with this, you must come home the exact same, any changes will alert her that something has happened. Some women require evidence, some will just go with their own intuition. Ironically, must men, like most criminals, just confess. If you do go through with it, make sure you erase all emails, text messages, phone calls and put a lock on your phone....I wouldn’t even use my name...

So to answer your question, if by not participating in these desires, you are becoming overly consumed and a distance is forming between you and your wife and you are someone who can keep a secret and will not have a moral internal conflict resulting in endless guilt and you believe that you can limit these sexual encounters to once a year......then go for it.....but please have the good sense to use protection...I should also warn you not to set your expectations to high, setting up these encounters take a lot of work. Finding the right person or persons for a random encounter is often very difficult. (which is why most people set the encounters up online using various websites on their home computers; which is also why most people get caught). Just go on the weekend trip with the thought that if something happens cool, if not cool.

However, if you have a happy marriage and this is the only portion that needs work and you are not overly consumed and you and your wife are building something beautiful. DON’T FUCK IT UP.....statistically speaking, you will likely be found out.....if you are, you will have destroyed the trust, your wife will NEVER EVER EVER look at you in the same way again. She will never forgive you and will always feel inadequate and use this against you for every wrong ever done to her and every wrong that will be done in the future. She will likely divorce you and cause you severe financial hardship.

In the blink of an eye

OMG, I may have finally found the one....NO JOKE.... I know those of you I call friends have heard me say this a million times over, but this time is the first time I wasn’t “guesstimating” how “love” should feel. Yes, I said LOVE. Mind you, it has only been two weeks and for four of the fourteen days, I was out of town, but I’m trying to be one of those “glass half full people”..(which is harder than it sounds being that I was raised by a “glass damn near empty, got a crack and was dirty before you even poured water in it” kind of mother).

He is everything I have ever wanted in partner, at least his “representative” is and that is enough for me (my mother’s sarcastic voice in the back of my head, “for now”). My aunt once told me that the representative can last for 20 years, which turned out to be a negative for her since she was married for 50 years. But I’m not my aunt; I figure, if I can get 20 years of the last “two weeks”, Imma count myself among the blessed.

The best part about it was that for the first time in my life, I wasn’t even looking (hard). I saw him in a club, gave him OBVIOUS eye contact and of course, like all gay men do in the club, he ignored me. So like the crazy psychotic bitch you know me to be, I walked up to him and said, “I know you saw me looking at you and I know I am looking 10 times better then any of these moongoose up in this club, so STOP trippin.” My expectation was for him to say “Fuck U” (by this point I was in my man-hating, club-hating, “don’t give a damn say what’s on my mind” mood). Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised, he just started laughing uncontrollably. Go figure.

I love a man who can laugh at himself and who does not take himself too seriously. We chit chatted for a while and exchanged numbers. My normal self would have stayed at the club until it closed watching him from a corner to see who else he was trying to holla at while he thought I wasn’t looking (which would have been NEVER, another trait I got from my mama, “eyes in the front, back and sides of my head”. As a child we thought mama’s wigs were an extra set of eyes). The new me(at least the “new me” that week, or maybe it was the me that can no longer spend longer than an hour and a half in a crowded club) said goodnight and left early.

Before leaving, we agreed to meet up on Sunday for our 1st date. Of course you know the fool didn’t call and I ended up going out with another beau on Sunday instead. Nevertheless, to my complete surprise, he called on Monday to apologize and offer an “alleged” good excuse for missing our date and to beg my pardon and request my presence for dinner, “his treat.”...Needless to say, he had me at free food. (I think when I am 40, Imma stop dating food).

The rest is xoxo.

Epilogue: It didn't work out; we are over; still “alleged” friends. I am back on the market.

As only sistas can Part 3 or 3 short story

“I would still love them all the same, Jac-kie, no matter how they chose to live their lives.” Rea said in a very matter-of-fact tone.

“When that leukemia finally got the best of Cedric I thought I was going to die. A mother should never have to bury one of her own, it’s unnatural. But in my misery the Lord showed me how blessed I was. There are so many women who can’t have children, or children causing them a bunch of grief. But we all got good kids. No, we got great kids. Not one of us has ever had to go down to the jail house or morgue over something our kids done did. Not one of these kids has given us cause to hold our heads down in this community. So what if one of them happens to be different. Big Damn Deal, Sorry Ma”

My mother looked as if she had aged 10 years since the beginning of the conversation. Her hazel eyes, that normally looked as if she had a candle burning behind her iris, were unusually dim.

“What do you have to say about all of this Mae,” Lane asked compassionately.

“I don’t want to discuss it. Whether I or any of y’all will have to discuss it one day or not, I don’t want to discuss it today,” Mae said as she looked affirmatively into the eyes of each of her sistas, wondering why Jackie looked as if she were desperately trying to fight back tears.

“Well that is that, anybody hungry,” Big Mama said as she rose to her feet and headed to the kitchen, dragging Rea along with her like a disobedient child.

“Home cooked meals won’t cure everything”, Lane murmured as she walked toward the kitchen alongside Mae.

My mother, normally outspoken overly opinionated, still sat quietly, frozen, like Rea when Credic let go of her hand for the last time. Mae never decided to discuss “It” and neither did my mother.

As only sistas can Part 2 of 3...short story

“Mae knows I love her, and y’all know I love Ricki to death, but that boy is about to be 16 and this is something we need to talk about. Ain’t no need for us to have these family meetings if we can’t keep it real.”

“Ricki ain’t no faggot”, Mae murmured almost inaudibly. Mae looked as if she had just been pouched by E. Holified, all the color had washed out of her face and her mouth hung half way open, as if she were finding it difficult to breath.

“I knew this was a bad idea from the start”, shouted Big Mama rising to her feet headed in Mae’s direction to offer comfort as only a Big Mama can. “Family meetings, paying dues, sharing your feelings, who ever heard of such a thing! Y’all need to keep your feelings to yourself and your mouths closed and let God handle the rest.”

“Mama this is healthy,” Lane said.

Big Mama froze in mid stride as if someone yelled “stop or I’ll shot”, and everyone again felt that uncomfortable silence grip the room as Big Mama slowly turned in Lane’s direction. Ain’t nothing healthy about calling your sister’s child “different”, said Big Mama in a slow deliberate tone.

“Mama, I’m just saying what’s on my mind and what I know has crossed y’alls’ minds at one point or another.”

“Every since you came home from Spelman you think you gotta tell everrrrrrrrrrybody what’s on your mind,” snapped Big Mama. “Spelman may have thought you a lot but you still got a lot to learn. Now apologize to your sista and this is not a request.”

“Sorry Mae”, Lane said, with a touch of sincerity, a pinch of fear and a barrel-full of embarrassment. Although Lane was approaching her thirtieth birthday, her mother’s eyes and tone transformed her into a twelve year old.

“Mama, all I am saying is that we need to talk about this so we can be there for the boy and give him the support that only his family can. Or would y’all whether wait until you find the suicide note and discuss it at his funeral.”

“Oh, Lane please, that boy ain’t going nowhere”, said Rea

“I betca that’s what Nicholas’ family thought too, and we see what happen to him.”

“Y’all hear dat”, asked Big Mama in a suspicious tone.

“Hear what?” responded Lane.

“Sound like something at dat door.” replied Big Mama

“My heart dropped.” My feet became paralyzed. Big Mama was not the passive-overly affectionate kind of grandmother like the one cast in the movie Soul Food. In fact, her most often quoted scripture was spare the rod spoil the child. She had no qualms with beating the hell out of one of her grandbabies for being mouthy or meddling in grown folks business. And although I knew I was her favorite, not even Jesus Christ in the flesh could save me from her wrath if she caught me listening at the door.

“Mama that’s the wind,” said Lane

Ooo, saved.

“Who’s Nicholas?” questioned Aunt Rea.
“You remember, the boy who was in my English class that committed suicide in the locker room at Craigmont.”

“Ooo, that’s different, he was white,” said Rea nonchalantly.

“Rea, I am not even going to go there with you,” Lane snapped.

“Jackie, why you so quiet over there, don’t you have something to say,” asked Rea.

My mother looked up with a dazed look in her eyes with tension lines forming on her forehead.

“I am sorry, what did you say, Rea.”

“I saidddddddddddd why are you over there acting like the cat got your tongue.”

Even though she couldn’t see me listening and peeping under the door, I could tell by the distress in her voice that I was at the front of her mind.

“That’s Mae’s business,” mama said.

“Well, I for one wouldn’t care,” announced Rea.

“That’s because all your kids are married and got babies of their own,” my mother whispered, unfortunately not low enough to escape Rea’s hearing.