Everything Rhymes With Alcohol

I’ve written another post about my nerdery. I love “The Fades”. Its an amazing supernatural drama that will reel you in before you know it. Find out how you can see the first episode for free:

British TV That PWNS: The Fades.

I was upset by the initial tweet as I had just finished reading this article on Jezebel. A transgender woman was beaten near to death after two cisgender women (one was a girl of 14) “found her out” while in the McDonald’s women’s restroom.

One of the employees filmed the attack (while laughing) and the video went viral. This woman was beaten for 15 minutes.

According to WBALTV, Brown also asked for forgivness today and said she wanted to apologize to the victim. Polis wasn’t in court, but her victim impact statement made it clear that she isn’t ready to make amends. She said:

“While being beaten, I felt like I was going to die that day. I was kicked in the chest, crotch and head. Chunks of my hair were pulled out. They were all over me, and I couldn’t get them to stop … My private life has been exposed to the world. I lost my job. I can’t go anywhere without the fear of getting hurt again. I want to go into a hole and hide. I do not forgive them for what they did to me.”

Vicky Thoms, a woman who was hit while trying to break up the assault, was in court and said, “I never dreamed I would see anything like that in my life — never. It’s like you were watching someone being murdered almost.”

I asked her the usual emo, navel gazing questions.

“Why not me? What’s so wrong? Why am I not enough? Have I done wrong? Why am I treated like just another worthless, untrustable stranger?”

She was completely done with my interrogation and refused to engage my mood. Whipping around, short hair in sharp angles, finger poked deep into my chest she seared these words,

“Because this way lies agony. ‘Glow’ will not cover up your perfume of sadness and no one wants to get entangled with that.”

That was it.

It’s a–um, what do they say?  Watershed moment? I’d never seen water shed..But this was more than just the splitting of a stream.

Time seemed to slow, but my thoughts swirled and sunk with the ferocity of a whirlpool. When I finally beached, I was in Oz. It was more like that. The moment Dorothy opens the door and the world goes from dull grays to brilliant saturated multi-colored wonder. That’s what this was.

A complete shift in time & space via F5 tornado.

It was only because I could now see the brilliance of the world before me that I could now turn around and see the drab that had been. There was furniture in there. Dust on table tops, refuse in the bin, and imprints on the sofa.  Undoubtedly lived-in.

You can only live in a place you feel comfortable. No one ever makes a hotel room into a home.

Even now I could feel the pull. The grays where comforting against the brilliance before me, almost lulling.

I will never grow if I don’t get out, if I don’t let go.

I actually wrote this back in 2006, but a post I recently read at Womanist Musings.

Lost Ancestry: I am a descendant of slaves

And I felt so connected to the sentiment expressed, I thought I’d republish that long ago written blog here.

POSTED BY “Mohamid al Goldberg”—African slaves were sold to europeans by other africans. who cairs about relatives in crumby old africa? find out who yours are, go see them and puch them in they nose.

I CARE!!!!
Do you have any idea how painful it is to sit around during Multi-culti month and have absoluetly nothing?

I have no langague
I have no music or song
I have no myths or stories to tell
I have no rituals to explain
I have no dance to dance
I have no knowledge of my people that I can depart or even take part in.

I have nothing. I do not know where my people come from. The majority of Americans (whether they care to or not) can point to at least one place on the world map and know where they came from. They can learn all about that place and take joy in it.

I have none of that.
And what makes it worse is that IT WAS PLANNED TO BE THIS WAY! It wasn’t planned by the Africans this way. The actions of men long dead and unknown have the power to this very day to make me long, make me feel worthless, lost, make my eyes burn with tears, and fill my throat with screams. I have been willfully deprived.

I am so very intensely JEALOUS.

This is the article that sparked these comments.
http://www.topix.net/content/kri/0937326822208824041312895466912884173061

In highschool I began to read Morgan Llwelyn who writes books about ancient Irish legends and historical Irish events. She’s absolutely an excellen author. Anyway, I began to realize how much I did not have. I had no cultural heros, sayings, songs, dances, holidays, rituals…nothing that really reflected me.

Remembering that we do have Chickasaw Indian on my dad’s side, I began to search the internet for Chickasaw websites…I found one that had some language. I learned how to say “Hello, How are you?” (Halito! Chi chukma?)

They wanted me to pay $100 for some kind of package and my internet search ended there. But for a little while I was happy with these little words I knew, because I knew that others knew them too and that somewhere they knew me.

I have held in my hands the papers that state my ancestors as “Chattel”. I have seen it and I have read the names, the ages, the prices. On my father’s side Big Quali and his wife and children where first sold in Lousianna…but it does not state where they came from.

After that, I don’t know….except that at one point, a family member killed a white man, had to flee and changed his name.

But what I *DO* know is that we have white relatives in LA. My cousin, who has tried so hard to discovery our past, found them out. She wanted to meet and invited them to the family reunion. They were game. They wanted to come! That is until they found out we are black. Then they declined all offers and stopped taking phone calls.

For years I dreamed of going there. Walking up to their door, asking for something…maybe to use the phone or directions or a drink of water. I would gaze at them all in the face and try to see if I saw me and then I would tell them. I would tell them who I am, who my father has become, and who they are to us.

It burns me up.

One day, I found Morgan Llwelyn’s e-mail address and not thinking it was her direct e-mail, I wrote her. I told her about how I loved her books. I told her about a classmate of mine, Mark who I had spanish class with. I had told him about her books and how great I thought they where. I asked him if he would be interested, cause Mark’s is (clearly) of Irish descent. He said he didn’t care about the past.

It broke my heart and made me angry. I couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t comprehend how anyone who could know anything about their ancestors simply by going to the library didn’t care. The things I would give to be able to do that.

Now, it’s not Mark’s fault. I don’t blame him for anything, but I envied him intensely..and anyone else who had/has this opportunity.

Anyway, I told Miss Llwelyn all of this and how I felt I had no place that was mine, that no place was for me.

SHE WROTE ME BACK!

She told me not to feel so bad. That even though I cannot be sure where on the map I came from, that Africa has such a rich history. She talked about Ghana and Egypt and how one day I would find my soul’s home. It’s not like I didn’t know about Egypt and Ghana (and Shaka Zulu. I used to try to explain to my elementary schoolmates about Shaka Zulu, but they would just laugh at his name and not listen to anything I had to say), but to know that someone could, sympathize, understand and acknowledge my pain and tried to cheer me up (especially my favorite author!) did a world of good for me.

Although it could not (and did not) qwell my jealousy and anger, it pushes me to keep looking. And I will keep looking and I will cry alot.