Tomorrow Afternoon at 3:30

Tomorrow afternoon at 3:30, I'll be doing one of the following:

A) Going to see the Dark Knight
B) Flopping around on a "Slip and Slide".
C) Cutting my hair off
D) Going home to Los Angeles

Which one do you think I'm doing?

As much as I'd like to do all four of those things tomorrow afternoon, and buy a winning lottery ticket on top of it all, alas, only ONE of those fabulous choices will actually be going down.

If you guessed "D" -- One more week, folks. One more week and I'll be back in my beloved El-Ay.

If you guessed "A" -- Nope, because I haven't stooped to going by myself yet. I'm waiting for my sister to stop saying, "It looks too "dark" and scary." Um, yeah, because it's called the "Dark Knight", m'dear.

If you guessed "B" -- Nope, that was yesterday. Or rather, I was trying to flop onto the Slip and Slide, but I found I just could not throw my body to the ground like you're supposed to. I'm sorry, but a bit of plastic with some water running on it doesn't scream to me, "Flop onto me, please!"

So that leaves, cough, option "C" on the table.

I still can't believe it myself, but I do indeed have an appointment to get my hair cut off tomorrow. Courage is needed because as I type, I'm sort of I'm in the midst of a freak out over it. I need to relax and try to convince myself that it's just hair. It'll grow back.

How much hair am I getting cut off?

I'm not really sure. But after a year of growing out my relaxed-to-within-an-inch-of-it's-life hair, all the scraggly, bone-straight ends have got to go. My natural hair is like four times thicker and healthier. I also keep getting these really bad tangles where my kinky/curly natural hair meets the straight hair, and I can't stand it anymore.

My hair when it's not curly comes halfway down my back. But my natural hair is maybe only six inches long. Maybe longer. I'm not sure. But who knows what I'll be left with at 4:30 tomorrow.

Wow, this time tomorrow night, for the first time in my entire adult life, I'm going to have short hair.

Short
NAPPY
hair.

Short + Nappy.
Nappy + Short.

It's a combo that our culture teaches black women to hate and despise from the time that we're small. We're taught to run from Short + Nappy, not towards it. What I'm undertaking tomorrow is the beauty equivalent of me trying to throw my body onto a Slip and Slide.

I have no idea what I'm going to look like when I come out of the salon. EEK!

Wondering what brought this decision on?. Well, I've been thinking about cutting the relaxed ends for several months now, and I never summoned up the courage. Plus there is always someone there to say, "Don't cut your hair. You won't look good with short hair." Or folks wanna know what I'm going to do with it after I cut it off. "You're not going to just wear it out in public like that, are you?"

Sigh.

This morning when I decided to get it cut, there was so much going on, so much reminding me that I really have to seize the day. I have to be fearless and just take the plunge. And besides, my sister tells me that if it looks totally crazy, she'll get someone she knows to hook me up with a weave.

Gosh, me plus a weave? Then I'd really be ready for my return to LA!

Wish me luck!

Prejudice on the El Platform

Guess what I'm wearing on Saint Patrick's Day next year?

Uh huh. And since I don't always believe in delayed gratification, (it is a long way till March 17th) I wore this shirt yesterday. Thanks to my eldest son, a budding photographer if there ever was one, you get a glimpse of my "Thinking Deep Thoughts" stance.

Or at least, I think that's what that is.

It could just as easily be my, "Wow, there's a whole lot of black ants down there!" look.

Can you tell it's Friday night and I'm bored? I can't believe it's come to this! Really, if I'm writing about black ants crawling around, I might as well chew on a piece of cardboard and call it a night.

Speaking of "night", let's do a little homophone paradigm shift because I'm jealously picturing everybody else out drooling over Christian Bale's performance as Batman in "The Dark Knight". I really wanted to see it but alas, it was not meant to be.

I guess I shouldn't overexaggerate by saying "everybody" wants to see the film. I got to experience some Chicago Transit Authority delays today and before you knew it, five or six of us random strangers were discussing Batman while waiting for a red line train at the Fullerton stop. One guy who was sort of hovering on the fringes of our newly formed El social club said he had no intention of seeing the film because, "That guy playin' him (Batman)... he's a f***ing ____!" (Insert most popular and offensive gay slur in the space where you see_____).

I'm pretty sure that guy now knows that when you say such things when there's a CTA delay, and everyone is cranky and late, you could end up getting tossed off the platform. Seriously, it was such ignorance.

Sigh.

And now, while you you're wondering whether or not that idiot really got pitched onto the el tracks, I'm going to say goodnight because I think I may keel over into my laptop.

Night-night!

13 Ways I Know I'm Getting Older

Two or three days of being a blog ghost has me missing y'all. I've been being touristy, doing things like going to the top of the Sears Tower and window shopping downtown on Michigan Avenue. It's been really good but only 12 days till I head home to LA.

Sooo... Today is Thursday and since I've been roaming around and reminiscing about all my old Chi-town haunts, today's Thursday Thirteen topic is:


13 Ways I Know I'm Getting "Older"!


1) No More Booty Shorts and Mini Skirts: Ok, I never ever wore booty shorts, but I look at women currently wearing booty shorts and super short mini-skirts and say to myself, "I could never get away with wearing that." Sometimes they shouldn't be getting away with wearing it either, but whatever. Hoochie at all ages is "in", right? Ten years ago, I was actively buying short skirts to show off my hot legs (no modesty, my legs are hot!) Now, just above the knee seems short.

2) College Kids Seem Like Kids: The other day I took my sons to my undergrad alma mater, Northwestern University, and while we were walking around campus, I felt like a granny. I was totally one of those older alums that I used to see roaming around campus mumbling, "Hmm... this wasn't here when I went to school!" And you know how college kids do fun stuff like dye their hair pink and wear edgy clothes that don't match? I saw some of those kids and found myself cynically thinking, "You'll do that crap till you decide to sell out and go to law school."

3) I'm actually considering going to an '80s show: It features Animotion, Missing Persons and When in Rome. For those of you not familiar, When in Rome did the "Promise" song that everyone thinks is Depeche Mode.


I love the song but thank God Depeche Mode doesn't sound or look half as dorky and they still make records. Tickets are only $10 though.

4) I remember the TV movie, "The Day After": I talk to people born past 1979/1980 and they have no idea about that film and how scary it was to constantly be thinking a nuclear attack was gonna happen. In 1983 when it came on TV, that was a real concern. It probably still is but we're too worried about whether or not Lindsay Lohan is now a lesbian to care.

5) I remember super bad pollution in Gary: When I was little we used to drive through Gary, Indiana and the air would turn yellow and it would smell like a combination of what I imagined rotting corpses and sewage would smell like. It was because all the steel mills were operating at full blast. Now there's just a few puffs of smoke here and there even though the shells of the factories are still there.

6) I miss Dance Fever: I mentioned Deney Terrio the other day to someone and they were like, "Who? What?" Yeah, that person was born in 1985 and so they have no idea. Gosh, I used to love the dancer's outfits and all their moves!

7) For me, "Good Life" is by Inner City not Kanye West: But I guess I can't complain. Either way, Chi-town is in the house!

Watching that brings back memories of how I totally wanted to be Paris Grey back in the day. I wonder what she's up to these days. She had such a great voice.

8) Chicago's Belmont Avenue is really clean: Back in the day, right when you got off the El at Belmont, there were scores of tatted up alternative folks, male teen prostitutes... and a little diner called the "Belmont" that I used to frequent all the time. I used to stay in there till three or four in the morning, drinking coffee, watching people and writing. It's all gone. The street looks like it's from a suburb. There are moms with baby carriages and they look like they have their cell phones speed dialed to 911.

9) The Belly I Can't Lose: I should just give it a name. Hours of exercise every week and it hangs around like roaches camped out in the projects. This level of exercise a dozen years ago would've had me looking like a damn bikini model. And before you suggest that I cut out all sugar, flour, dairy and heaven knows what else, yes, I know. I know, if I totally stop eating I might not have a belly anymore.

10) I am in the house by 8 or 9 PM: When I was younger, what possible reason did I have for being home? Hanging out was just so much more fun. Besides, who knew what hotness might walk by, right? And, it's no fun wearing mini-skirts at home.

11) I reminisce about Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Loved those shows. Nothing has filled the Buffy void, not even Dr. Horrible.

12) Kids I knew as 9 or 10 year olds are now lawyers: Kids I remember as being my friend's cute but slightly annoying little brothers are now wearing power suits and are about to get married. Sigh.

13) My kids: The older they get, the older I get. And the older they get, the more their math skills improve. Yesterday I had to hear, "Did you come here when you were a teenager? Wasn't that like 20 years ago?"



And now it's your turn! What sort of things, other than your birthday happening every year, let you know you're getting older?

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Reconnecting With Slavery

Yesterday I took my sons to Chicago's Field Museum. They loved every moment of the experience, from the mummies to the meteorites. Or rather, they loved almost every moment. They totally freaked out over the simulated slave ship in the Africa exhibit.

Actually, I should also include myself in the freak out. I just wasn't mentally or emotionally prepared to go into a simulated slave ship hold and neither were they.

There we were, innocently walking through the exhibit, checking out various cultural artifacts from lots of different countries: drums, spears, knives, walking sticks, hairpins and religious iconography -- and then all of the sudden there on one of the walls was this paragraph detailing how slavery stole away so much from the civilizations that had created such beauty. Then, before I knew it, we were at the entrance to what looked like a dark tunnel. Except, it wasn't a tunnel. It was the entrance to the hold of the simulated slave ship.

My four year-old began crying and screaming in terror. My seven year-old clutched my hand and said, "I don't think we should go in there. It looks evil in there."

I tried to take a step forward but neither one would budge. More tears and them crying, "No, no! Don't make us go in there, mommy!"

The fear in their voices made me think about the fear that millions of African children must have experienced as they were forced onto slave ships. I couldn't ask my sons, "What are you afraid of?" because how could they not be afraid? They have not hardened their hearts to the complete blood-soaked and immoral horror that lays claim to our past. In their minds is neither the blase intellectualization of slavery nor an attitude that it all happened years ago so there's no reason to still talk about it.

As I listened to my sons beg me not to take them onto the slave ship, their comments and questions made me realize they'd forgotten that we were merely in a museum. They were really worried that they were really about to be sold into slavery and if they got onto the "ship" they'd never see our families again.

I reassured them that this was not the case and after a few minutes, we proceeded to step through the "hold" of the ship. We moved quickly through. Even though it was simulated it did make me feel like some sort of door was going to clang shut. This photo is my eldest after going through the ship. He'd been crying:I asked him what he was thinking about and he said, "I don't wanna be a slave. Ever." I think he sees himself in those pictures, sees his ancestor's faces reflected back to him.

I am glad he wasn't born 150 years ago. I'm glad we can walk through a simulated slave ship and come out the other side, not as property to be sold, but as ourselves.

Considering Adoption

I saw this postcard "ad" on a park bench the other day. I snapped a photo of it, but little did I know that my brain would be watching "Juno" a few days later. Seeing the photo reminded me again about how much the movie "Juno" annoyed me. I know, I know, it came out last year sometime so I'm waay behind the times. But there's no way I would've paid $13 to see it at a theater. Actually, I probably wouldn't have even rented it. But, my sister had it through her Netflix subscription so I sucked it up and settled myself on the floor.

Everything that I thought would annoy me, did. First of all, if Juno was black or Latina, would we think she's so damn smart and witty? Knowing the names of obscure punk bands does not mean someone's frickin' smart. The movie tries so hard to prove to us that Juno's a super cool teenager, but, uh, her hamburger phone and dialogue were all a little too witty for me. If she's so witty, she sh0uld've paid attention to condom-putting-on lessons in health class. Or, better yet, kept the panties on and decided play Scrabble. Just think, Juno could've wowed us by putting "forshiz" down on the board.

Then there's the whole scene where she tells her folks she's preggo -- maybe almost everyone I know just has a buckwild abusive family, but Juno's parents took it a little too well.

No cussing her out.
No telling her she's a whore.
No telling her what an embarrassment she is.
No telling her that she has no choice, she's getting an abortion.
No beating her or throwing things at her.

Not only that, ask yourself, would Jennifer Garner's character who was "born to be a mommy" be sooo excited to be a mommy to a little black girl with nappy hair?

I don't think so.

Anyway, I'll spare you all the details about why I don't care for "Juno". I'm just not feeling it. I didn't even care about her character at all. Burn me at the stake, but I actually kept wanting bad things to happen to her.

As for the adoption flyer, I found it on a bench in Millennium Park in Chicago. What do you think? Would you call?

Double

As elder brothers and sisters are inclined to do, my brother and sister would tell me that I wasn't really their sibling. According to them, one day the doorbell rang, our mom went to answer it and, lo and behold, a baby was on the porch in a shoebox!

Alas, it wasn't Moses chillin' in a box that used to contain Air Force One's. Nope, supposedly, it was moi.

Even though I didn't really believe this "shoebox on the porch tale," when I was maybe seven or eight, I began to wonder if I was not only a shoebox baby, but also if, maybe, just maybe I'd been separated from a twin. I wondered if that twin was left on some other doorstep with some other family.

This was, of course, totally ridiculous. I knew I didn't come in a shoebox, and knew I had no twin. But I pictured the fun we'd have tricking people and getting all Parent Trap on them. And let's not forget how cool and popular the Sweet Valley High twins were back in the day.

Fast forward almost 30 years and my nephew took this photo of me down at that Bean thing in Downtown Chicago. When my four year-old saw it, he remarked, "Look! You have a twin!"

"It's a reflection," I said.

"No, it's a twin! It has your hair!" said my son.

I went along with it so he'd hush up, but goodness, I couldn't help but realize, that my twin would have taken the plunge and already chopped her hair off.

So why haven't I done this too?

*******

PS: The twin can also write Diablo Cody a letter telling her how much Juno sucked.

Thursday Thirteen: Don't Say or Do In Public

I am brain dead today so I decided to make my blogging life easier and dive into the Thursday Thirteen world. Plus, Claudia always inspires me with her lists of 13 things, so I've combined admiration with my brain deadness, and I've decided to give this a go.

For my inaugural thirteen, I've decided to share thirteen things you should not do or say in public. I'll leave out the obvious like eating boogers and having sex. Instead, I'll share some things I've noted over the past couple weeks.

Thirteen Things You Should Not Do or Say in Public:

1) Whisper that you want to cut off Barack Obama's nuts. I'd say this is a no-brainer but any nut-cutting references should especially be avoided if you're:
1) a reverend
2) wearing a mic
3) on a national "news" station.


2) Eat pork rinds: Especially don't eat the extra large bag of pork rinds. Ugh, I can't even write more about this one. It's just nauseating.

3) Pull on a stranger's hair to check if it's real. Really, I beg you. And if you do it, don't make it worse by saying, "How'd you get that weave in there with no tracks at all? You got a lace front? I don't see no glue!"

4) Assume that the gang of kids with someone all belong to that person. Some of us do take our extended family or our own kid's friends out in public along with our own children. We don't really need to see your disapproving looks or hear, "Girl, that's a lotta kids! How many baby daddy's you got?"

5) Try to convince a Depeche Mode fan that Depeche Mode is not that great. Actually, don't do this in private either. There's no faster way to turn a relationship, whether it's work or personal, sour. Do this and you'll automatically be ejected from whatever circle of trust you were in or trying to get in. You're belief that Depeche Mode is either not musically worthy or is somehow a spiritually bankrupt form of artistic expression... yeah, just do the zip motion across your lips, turn the key and shh.

6) Talk about your STD. I really don't need to know the details of who you think you got it from and whether this bout of Chlamydia is worse than last year's Gonorrhea episode.

7) Sing Pussycat Dolls tunes. I know it's hard when you're listening to your iPod and you're all into it, but, um, the lyrics are inane. Plus, even though they use Autotune, their "singing" is still pretty unbearable. You, on the other hand, don't even have Autotune, so guess what? Your singing is the audio equivalent of idiocy raking it's nails on a chalkboard.

8) Equate slavery with anything else. Even if you think your oppressed experience is the modern day equivalent of slavery, read some slave narratives to school yourself. And I highly recommend you don't make this equation in a roomful of black folks, unless they all work for Fox News. Then you'll be their new best friends.

9) Walk around without flip flops in the gym locker room. This is just gross and sort of belongs in the "don't eat boogers" category, but when you do this while incessantly talking about what you did your dissertation on, you make folks start to wonder if street smarts might actually be better than book smarts.

10) Discuss how many carats are in your diamond enagagement ring. There's a good chance that someone on the crowded, rush-hour El train will follow you off the train and jack said ring from your finger. Then'll they'll take it over their cousin Chucky's house, 'cause he knows someone who knows someone who'll pay cash for it, no question's asked. Come to think of it, speaking of the El, you should also not...

11) Diss other passengers on the El while you are riding along with them. I know, buck wild gas prices are forcing you to abandon your SUV and ride with the unwashed masses, but that doesn't mean you should talk on your cell phone to your friend about how you're scared of us and we smell. Remember, not only do we smell, we're also crazy. So hush up till you get to the end of the line at Linden.

12) Talk about your drama with your period in a restaurant. Please spare me the imagery of your heavy and constant bleeding. I don't need to know how many pads you went through in an hour. I'm just trying to eat my soup and salad, not pretend I'm your OB/GYN.

And, last but certainly not least, please do not...

13) Fight with your significant other at the Shedd Aquarium. Really, fighting in public is just not a good thing at all, but come on, do the thousands of kids that are just trying to check out the sharks and the giant sea turtle really need to hear, "Like you ever do the f***ing dishes!" and all the follow-up sniping? Plus you had two small children and a newborn with you? Methinks you need to go home and sleep off your anger.

Now that was fun. What would you add to this list?

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The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others' comments. It’s easy, and fun! Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
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Sweat

I keep sticking to my chair.

My chair, a wooden antique with no arms, creaks every time I merely breathe. I have positioned us both directly in front of a fan that is turned on "high". But the humidity is 85% and so, despite the best efforts of the fan, sweat helplessly pools on the backs of my legs.

It takes me back to the sultry summer nights of a long ago childhood. Then, as now, my parents did not have air conditioning. No one we knew had air conditioning.

Air conditioning was something we experienced only at stores or the library. So, we'd sweat at home and then, needing a change of pace, my parents would drive the seven or eight blocks to my grandmother's house.

Once there we could sweat with her in her kitchen as she cooked a hot dinner on the stove. She'd offer us a popsicle to cool us off and then would chase us back outside where we were supposed to be deaf to the family gossip being discussed. We'd eavesdrop under her open kitchen window, then go snatch switches out of her bushes and, perhaps made temporarily insane by the amplified smell of her abundant honeysuckle and phlox, we'd beat each other with those long, thin strips of wood.

The heat and humidity surely made us do things that we shouldn't have, like giving the impoverished boy down the street from my grandma a nickel if he'd eat an earthworm. He wanted that money so badly that he devoured the worm completely, licking his lips when he finished. Later on in high school, every time he liked a girl I'd tell her the story and ask, "Do you really want to kiss the same lips that ate a worm?" Little did I know that shows like "Survivor" or "Fear Factor" would be so popular 30 years later.

On the way back home from such escapades, I'd once again sweat in the back of my parent's silver Mercury Monarch, my legs stuck to the red leather seat. If I shifted too much, a thin river of moisture would escape from beneath my thighs. I'd watch it trail it's way back to the hidden recesses of the back seat, sliding carefully into the crease behind me.

Now I only sit in an old wooden chair that groans under my weight, it's bones aching and slightly swollen like a gouty old man. And just as I did as a child, I'm sweating and sticking to something.

Some things really don't ever change, do they?

Musically Inclined

One of my great regrets (that I'm determined to remedy one day in the future) is that, despite my great love of music, I've not yet learned how to play a musical instrument.

I do have vague memories of a couple of piano lessons with a teacher I absolutely hated. She was incredibly harsh and cruel with me and I found myself wishing I could die instead of having to go to those lessons.

Then there was my pathetic attempt during the summer between 5th and 6th grade to learn the flute, mainly because my friend Anna played the flute. Indeed, flute was the instrument that all the petite blond girls knew how to play, and I wanted to fit in.

Ultimately, just as my efforts to fit in failed miserably, which now I thank God for, I also failed at both flute and piano. Neither the flute nor that particular piano teacher inspired any sort of passion in me, so both were quickly abandoned. Alas, I never gave a recital while wearing a fancy dress, my parents anxiously wringing their hands and praying I didn't flub the whole thing. and there certainly were no medals from orchestra or band contests.

Clearly there are worse things than being in your mid-thirties and unable to read sheet music. But, in my inability to learn an instrument I am an anomaly in my family. My mother plays violin. My sister plays violin and my brother played cello. And my father? I'd say my father is one of the best jazz musicians living in the Midwest, if not the States as a whole. He plays multiple instruments and directs a major university jazz studies program.

I attended my dad's summer school class last Wednesday where he put on a concert for the students with two other local musicians. They played classic standards they all know, without rehearsal, without sheet music. It was, in essence a "jam session" where they went with the flow on the selected tunes, songs like Hoagy Carmichael's 1930's standard, "Georgia on My Mind" and Duke Ellington's 1942 classic, "C Jam Blues".

My dad told the class about the importance of being able to keep eye contact with and "read" the cues of your fellow musicians. They all know the basics of the tune but just improvise everything else, all by reading each other's body language.

It got me thinking about what an amazing skill it is to be able to do that. How many things do we each miss out on or not do as well as we could because we're unable to either improvise or read someone else's body language?

So, here's some footage (taken with my crappy digital camera) of my dad with his two colleagues, reading each other's cues and merrily jamming along. I can't count the number of times I've seen my dad perform. It's been a constant in my life since I was a small child. But I still get amazed every time I see him stand up from the piano and grab his trusty trombone.

Hope you enjoy: