Can I take you out some time?

Hello world!

Last night was date night for DH(dear husband) and I. I chose the spot and *gasp* I even paid. SMH at the "role" reversal. My last post (and likely subsequent posts) was about being tired and increasingly unwilling to accept selfishness, just blatant inconsideration the older I get. That sentiment remains.

I will share with you as I told him. I think it a tad unfair to set an expectation without first ensuring that he (or anyone) has been made aware that the expectation exists even if only in my own mind and that he has the opportunity to ask any necessary clarifying questions. Sound like a business deal? A proposal of sorts? Like we are entering into a contract? We are.

Relationships of any sort evolve over time. Consider the relationship of this government to/with its citizens...broad stroking it, but follow me on this one. The founding principles of this country are well over 200 hundred years old. Circumstances that validated the original Constitution are repsectfully antiquated. The Bill of Rights and the liberties it guarantees goes without saying just how unremitting it is. The point is documents inked and signed in 1776 were the foundation the house that is the United States of America was built on. Likewise, the contract inked with my signature and that of my husband nine and a half years ago was only the genesis. The birth of our children brought a silent and sudden evolution. Our children are growing daily and quite before I am ready will be women carrying out their life's purpose on the strength of their own wings. So, at this juncture we must deepen the roots of our relationship as man and wife. Back to what I looked him in his eyes and said last night, "You know, I thought to myself 'how can I expect my husband to know how to date me if I haven't really shown him'." We awkwardly learned how to be husband and wife before we were ever boyfriend and girlfriend. Backward, I know but sorely accurate.

Last night was the initation of a new contract. An amendment so to speak. I am looking to what our relationship must be like in order to more than survive until death part us. I am looking to thrive post the onset of having an empty nest. I refuse to be one of those that "stayed together for the kids" or any other barren and fruitless excuse. I am out to benefit in and from this relationship. That is a completely guileless assertion.

I love(I prefer to use the word compassion...love is a limiting expression of an abysmal happening) my husband! This does not mean that I must, in whole or in part, love myself less or differently. "Love as an emotion, no matter how genuine, is incomplete without love as an action"

Like the sunset to this day...

*singing*
I don't wanna be what you want me to be
I'm sorry it's my fault
It's over


I love John Legend. His lips, um, speak to me. I digress. I love his lyrics. Lately, I have been listening to "It's Over" from his latest album, "Evolver". I have been listening to this song, you guessed it, over and over and...yes, over. His lyrics tend to find their way into my heart of hearts. The part where the brutal truth resides. The part that stares back at me when I look deeply into my own brown eyes when I spend just a little more time in the mirror.

I have come to grips with the fact, less eloquently as he sang it, that some shit is just over. Furthermore, when it is just let that *ish* be what it is. Unfortunately, I am not of the generation of my grandparents. People my age don't just stay together just because. We are far more evolved and realize that even mating has a season (smh at my own sarcasm). The era of concessions and deference, I feel, is coming to a close. I have grown tired of not listening to my gut, ignoring instinct to "trust" my DH.

The older I get I am less prone to deal with selfish bullshit from a man. I think it started when I turned 30. I have always been into zodiac traits especially my own. I was reading the other day some familiar descriptions of how intense, mysterious, jealous, stubborn and blah, blah, blah I should be as a person born under this sign. Then, I skimmed a sentence or two that gave me pause. "Scorpio has to be in a power position. Some actually prefer to live on their own that way there is never any issue of who controls what at home, they like to be in control." HUH?! Seriously?! Control? Power? I sat for a moment staring at the computer screen as if the words would change. Like my focus would remove the implication that I was incapable of playing number 2. Then, that brutal truth chimed in and reminded me of words typed to my BFF not too long ago, "I think about living as a semi-recluse..." The root of that thought could very well be an inner desire to no longer be in a position of willful deference. For more than nine years I have coalesced for the greater benefit of my family. I have been more than malleable. I don't think I can bend much further. In fact, I am to the point of refusing to do so. I am the palm tree, designed to withstand hurricane force winds, YET even the strongest of trees break. BEFORE that point comes I have made some decisions...the short of it...I refuse to allow any person place or thing to break me.

I posted on Twitter little more than a month ago (ironically) that "sometimes you should just let it end, even when confronted with it before you wanted it. even if it scares u shitless. *singing* let it be*"

Then, sometimes the end isn't really the end. It is the overture...

(Kanye's verse)
We had some good times didn't we
I know I won't forget that
But we had some bad times and
That's time I wish I could get back
We coulda had it all
But I guess we'll never know
You been around me long enough
To know that now it's over

....fade me out...

Fearfully Made ©

I fear rejection
disappointment and disappointing
I fear success
perceived expectations
I fear love
the completeness and fullness of it being condition-less
I fear trusting being vulnerable
I fear failing
too scared to let it end
I fear loss
everything I love leaves
I fear death
of passion, unfulfilled dreamsI fear not being who I was meant to be
I fear the intention of my existence
my life's purpose
I fear the war within, uncertain of who will emerge the victor
I fear being alone
would rather have it on my terms
I am fear-fully made in the image of perfect love
in need of perfected love--compassion
make me fear-less
©

Take Me To The River

There was always
A power I could feel
It was guidance to tell
me the way to go

But nowadays I feel
like can't hear that voice
I've been flying blind
I need you to come
and be my eyes. (be
my eyes)

River Rise
Carry me back home
(I cannot remember the way)
River rise
Carry me back home
(I surrender today)

I was always
A charmed flower child
I would sit for hours
And listen to the sky

But nowadays I feel
like I don't have
[ Find more Lyrics on www.mp3lyrics.org/jM4j ]
that choice
I've been looking down
in desperation
I need you to be my
inspiration yeah
(My inspiration)

River rise
Carry me back home
(I cannot remember the way)
River rise
Carry me back home
(I surrender today)

I bow down
And I humble myself
I can't do this
Lord I need your help
All the material things
They feel like chains
If you're not here beside me
you're the reason I see

(Help me to remember the way)
I surrender

Help me to remember
Only you can show me
(Only you can show me the way)
I surrender
(I surrender today)
You are the only way
Lord, I need you.

song on India.Arie's latest

Scared of Lonely

I saw this picture and was reminded of something my BFF said to me recently. Forgive the indulgence, but I had to post it.

More than words...

Pretty Wings

I love Maxwell and am anxiously awaiting his new project (a triple disc set Black Summer's Night the first disc drops July 7, 2009). I woke up this morning humming Pretty Wings. I decided I would find the lyrics:

Time will bring the real end of our trial
One day there'll be no remnants
No trace no residual feelings within ya
one day you won't remember me

Your face will be the reason I smile
But I will not see what I can not have forever
I'll always love ya I hope u feel the same

Oh you played me dirty your game was so bad
You toyed with my affliction had to fill out my prescription
Found the remedy I had to set u free

Away from me
To see clearly the way that love can be
When you are not with me
I had to leave, I have to live
I had to lead, I had to live

Chorus
If I cant have you let love set you free
To fly your pretty wings around
pretty wings your pretty wings
your pretty wings your pretty wings around

I came wrong You were right
Transformed your love into a lie
Baby believe me I'm sorry I told you lies
I turned day into night
Sleepless, I died a thousand times
I should've chose you
Better nights Better times Better Days
I miss you more and more

Repeat Chorus

Pretty Wings Pretty Wings
Pretty Wings Pretty Wings
Pretty Wings Pretty Wings
Pretty Wings Pretty Wings

When A Women's Fed Up

I wonder when we, as women, will become a little less self-sacrificing. Stop giving ourselves away regardless of the cost. Must we lose ourselves to avoid feeling lonely, lose ourselves for sporadic attention paid to us by some dude who really couldn't begin to love us genuinely...especially since he has his own unresolved issues. I must love me! I MUST love me. I MUST LOVE ME!!!!!! Whether or not anyone else choses to. I must love me. Respect and consider myself. Realize that their is nothing wrong with putting myself first.
How much am I willing to tolerate, let go, allow to roll off my back before I say enough is enough? We all watch Oprah and Dr. Robin and listen as they admonish us to "keep it real" (not in those words) but do we really hear them? Their words resonate in the moment. Give us solace in chaos for 45minutes, but what happens to the knowledge given when the credits roll and Oprah signs off thanking everbody for watching? What happens? We go back to our lives. We live broken and fractured lives numbing ourselves to the abnormality of our existence. We convince ourselves that living with the hope that things will be better and the fear that they won't is okay, our cross to bear. Is it? Faith and fear (doubt, uncertainty) can not co-exist. We can and usually do choose faith, but fail to realize that we are not absolved of reality...relieved of fact. Saddens me that we far too often focus on fiction, wishes and daydreams...hoping for the person we married without stopping to think, perhaps the person in front of me is the truth, what is actual and the person pre-marriage was the illusion, a facade, a mask. When people show you who they are believe them. Please, believe them. As ugly as the truth is. Refuse manipulation and coercion and misrepresentations and empty promises. Your heart echoes the truth, don't be afraid to listen...as frightening as it is, listen. God is in the whisper. Amid the thunderous rumblings, God is in the whisper. Listen.

If we are really believers, truly bearers of Christ, then His word is absolutely applicable to us. Did the Saviour come that we would have life and that more abundantly? Are we not heirs to the fulfillment of each of His promises simply because we believe?
My wish (even my prayer) is for every one of my sisters to see themselves as the invaluable children of God they are. To finally stand and say I will not be pawned, bartered and traded, disregarded and put aside. Say from your soul, "I am worth it! I am worthy." Really hear Oprah, pretend that you are Contessa (the former prostitute...admittedly, we have all prostituted ourselves, sold ourselves bartered ourselves maybe not for money but for companionship, attention even validation...to fill whatever void), and feel it when she looks in your eyes and says, "You are not used up. You are not used up. God has great plans for you. You are NOT used up!" Even go back to the days of Iyanla and lay hands on yourself and "save yourself". There's only so far you can walk with someone until you have to let them walk alone...led them to the water, encourage them to drink but it is not your responsibility to kneel down and scoop it in your hands, raise your hands to their mouth to drink. Are they thirsty enough to change? To reject the lies of the past in order to rework the present and future? Furthermore, we (women) are not the Savior of our men, so get down off the cross. That's been done. Be a helpmate not a Savior...definitely not his momma. That said recognize when enough is enough.
Lastly, I wish peace wholeness wellness prosperity truth honesty and even increased self-esteem. All these things I wish for all who read this...health in mind body and spirit, that you prosper even as your soul prospers.

Love.