One more thing about CCW1

As I said, whenever I think I am done, I remember something else. She also told me this week she is still trying to get pregnant.

D.O.N.E.

My Crazy Co-worker

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Facebook is a debil…

Maybe.  I don’t know.  All I know is that 6 days of no fb and I am in a whole lot more positive mood. *chuckle* Girl Scouts’ honor *holds up GS swear fingers* I woke up happy Friday morning.  I wasn’t even mad at the alarm clock for once in my life and I’ve been waking up to an alarm clock since I was 10 years old.  My first clock was a birthday gift from my mother who told me it was now my responsibility to get myself up in the morning.  I didn’t like that Big Bird clock nor any other since. *chuckle* But Friday morning I was way too tickled at the dream I had had the night before to be mad. *spoiled contented sigh*

If this is what 6 days with no fb does, I wonder how much better it will be the longer I stay away?

I had meant to spend the week posting true love stories that I remember before my memory fades but I just got busy doing other things.  Believe it or not the hardest time to stay away from fb is at work.  Like I’ve posted before, I use it as filler time while I wait for people to respond to emails and phone calls.

It use to be that people got 5 business days to get back to me.  This week people had 48 hours. Period. If I had to send a second email, I cc’d their supervisor. *smirk* I know there are some people who wish I would go back to fb. *chuckle*  I was way too productive this week and I wasn’t interested in listening to anyone else’s drama. *chuckle*

I had a lovely Valentine’s Dinner.  I had to wait until Thursday, 2/16/12 to eat it though.  I picked up some stomach thing over the weekend.  No biggie though because it was still delish and I was full as two ticks! *lol* Faidley's crab cake, linguine with capers, olive oil, and cheese, and brussels sprouts.

Yeah.  I know, presentation could have been better but it was still delicious so whatever. *chuckle*

Even made myself heart shaped cupcakes.  I’m still perfecting how much batter goes into each heart tin.  This year I put two dollops and they still overflowed.  It didn’t seem like there was that much in the bottom but at least this time they kept their heart shape somewhat. *chuckle*  I guess this means one dollop per cupcake tin.  *lol* I’m learning.

I took a break from the internet sites period.  No fb, BA, OHN, or BL.  It was hard those first few days but today?  Heck, I don’t want to go back!

Six whine free days! *chuckle*  And it was lovely.  Someone is always whining or unhappy about something.  I don’t have a man.  There are plenty of them out there ain’t nothing stopping you from having one but you.  If my fat out of shape behind is turning down men then anyone who wants one should be able to get one.

I’m still getting my sexy back. *chuckle*  I was out one day and just felt the need to strut!  *lol*  I think I had been watching Staying Alive and it put me in the mind to do some strutting.  I was working my walk that day.  Could not tell me a thing I didn’t already know.  I even caught this really petite looking olive skin toned guy checking me out smiling.  I was like, not yet, give me a few more months and I’ll be ready for you.

Well, dang it, I went and sat down for an extended period and when I got up again everything from my waist down was calling me names! *lol*  My hips were like, HEFFA!  You know you ain’t strutted in years!  You got to warn us with some stretches and sh*t before you just up and decide you are sexy again!

*lol*  So I’ve started my stretching routine again. Ugh!  Sad to say it is so needed.

But I digressed, people whining that they hate their life, they hate their family, they hate this that and the other.  *shrug*  I just ain’t there and I ain’t interested in being there.  I’m not saying that I don’t throw a pity party from time to time but I always temper it by remembering there are AT LEAST a billion people in this world who would trade places with me in less than a blink of an eye and who I wouldn’t trade places with for any amount of money.

I lived there in Bitterland or I Hate Land or Lonely Land or whatever a person is whining about at any given time in my newsfeed once upon a time, then I got busy and occupied my time with other things.  Then I looked up and suddenly I didn’t live there anymore.

Everyone is on their own journey in this life.  I am hoping I am finished with that part of the journey.  That I have lived and learned from those past sojourns in those dry waterless places.  I know my challenges aren’t done.  I just hope those challenges are done and I move on to new lands to conquer.  I wish those still struggling the best and hope to welcome them on the other side of tribulation which is jubilation.   Never realized until now that those two words rhymed.  Makes a person think.

Yeah.  I could tell people how to get out of their funks.  As a matter of fact I have but if a person ain’t ready to hear that their relationship is over then they won’t accept it.  If a person is lonely and wants desperately to be in a relationship then the last thing they want to hear from me or anyone else is that they need to learn to love themselves first.  They will get mad and defensive and assure all that they love themselves.  But ask them to quickly name three things that they love or even like about themselves and see if some stuttering and stammering doesn’t happen.  They have to learn it for themselves.

Back when I use to hide my smile, a guy I dated briefly asked me did I like myself.  I had to think about it before I answered because I didn’t but I didn’t want him to know that.

Ask me now what I love or like about myself and I can do at least a five minute monologue. *chuckle* You might have to interrupt.  I’ve come to like and love the odd, chunky, cheery, chocolate cherub that is me.

Anyway, back to my week of loving me.

Oh my word, Saturday me and the Sandman had a lovely day together.  I kept telling myself I needed to get up and run some errands and Mr. Sandman kept saying no I didn’t and come back to bed.  *chuckle*  I got up and made lunch with the intent to get myself together to go out and run those errands.  But lunch was so good I laid across the bed to revel in it and next thing I knew I was asleep again. *lol*  I haven’t slept a whole Saturday away in years.  By 5:30 pm I gave up trying to go out and got up and made dinner.

Of course that meant I had to run errands, wash clothes, and cook today but I had the energy to burn today so, I guess yesterday was needed.  I wish more people could find a way to carve out a day of bliss that easily.  I even had energy to blog about my week and tweak CCW1’s post.  I have one paragraph to add and that post is done!

So now, what to do with fb?  I actually do have some folks on there who I’d miss if I cut fb out all together.  I definitely need to severely limit it though.  Eh, I’ll figure it out.  My week of peace isn’t over until Tuesday.

*tips mug at monitor*

Celebrating Love

So this is Valentine’s week and I am all in for celebrating love.  The first thing I decided to do was take a Facebook hiatus for the week.

Why no FB?  Well, for starters there are a lot of unhappy people on there downing the holiday. *shrug* To each their own, I guess.  Second, FB has started asking questions like: How well do you know [insert name on fb friends’ list].  Ummmm, FB that ain’t your business.  I don’t know you like that, FB.  Yeah.  It is getting really weird on FB.  Lastly, all the Whitney mourning.  It is so strange.  I was fine until I watched the Dateline special on her last night.  Then they showed one pic of her standing at a mic.  You could only make out her silhouette and I lost it.  I boo hooed! *smh sadly*

So much negative energy on there.  People mad because people are mourning Whitney’s death.  People mad because people are mad because they are mourning Whitney’s death.  And just people who seem to stay mad no matter what is going on in the world.  So a FB hiatus for the week is definitely in order.

I’ll post CCW1’s story next week.  I’m all about celebrating love this week.

I was struck with some thoughts last night watching Dateline.  They played Whitney’s rendition of The Greatest Love and it hit me when I heard these lines: The greatest love of all is easy to achieve. Learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all.

It is true, the greatest love of all is loving yourself but it is NOT easy to achieve.  Or perhaps it just wasn’t easy for me.  I use to concentrate on all my flaws so much how in the world could anyone like/love me with all that was wrong with me.  From my teens and into my 20s I use to hide my smile behind a hand because of my gaped, bucked toothed smile.

Now I think my smile is one of my nicer attributes because when I’m smiling and/or laughing I am happy and being happy is a good thing.  My smile may not be picture perfect but it is genuine and that makes it as pretty as anyone else’s smile.

It has been a long and difficult road to here.  I truly am amazed to be here sometimes.  I use to cry lonely tears in my 30s when I was alone again.  I wanted my Heathcliff.  No, not Bronte’s Heathcliff but Cosby’s Heathcliff. *sigh*  There just aren’t enough of them to go around for one.  For another, back then I didn’t like or love myself enough to have even drawn one to me.

I use to cry for loving arms to hold me tight at night.  Now I just wrap my loving arms around myself and go to sleep.  I sleep pretty darn good nowadays.

See, I can’t fall in love with just any man.  I need a man who will love me just as much as I’d love him.  A man who has been looking for real love just like me and knows how precious it is.  A man who celebrates love once he finds it because he knows just how precious it is and how hard it is to find.  He is content with his life and is seeking only experiences and people who will enrich his life because that is where I am now.  To paraphrase the Bible, I’m awaiting a man with whom I am equally yoked.

What if he never shows up? *shrug* I’m still good.  I’m not saying I don’t need a man because that would be a bald faced lie.  We all need companionship regardless of our sexual orientation.  We all need to connect intimately with another human being.  Intimately does not equal sexually to me.  It means something so much more.  I know what it means to me and the man that I would be with would know it as well.  No need to spell it out here.

Yeah.  I know a lot of people have a problem with how commercial Valentine’s Day has become.  But that is just what the retailers wish it to be.  That doesn’t mean that is all it has to be about.  I declare for human beings to swear they are so smart we can be so dumb and narrow minded most of the time.  Just because someone wants you to spend $1,000 you don’t have doesn’t mean you have to spend it.

I love diamonds and sparkles but if the man I’m with doesn’t have it like that, I’m good.  That does not, however, mean he does nothing for Valentine’s Day.  It just means he’s going to have to think outside the box.

One of my favorite episodes of the Cosby Show was when Cliff, Elvin, and Martin competed to see who could be the most romantic.  They couldn’t spend more than $25 on the gift.  My favorite gift was Elvin’s of all people.  He started out as such a jerk but then changed over time until he was someone you wouldn’t mind be married to. *chuckle*  Anyway he bought Sondra a necklace with a pearl symbolizing each year of their marriage.  He would add a pearl for every wedding anniversary.  *sniffs*

I do not care if Elvin and Sondra divorced, as long as it wasn’t for something like cheating, Sondra will hold onto that necklace if her heart is anything like mine.  To me, each pearl would symbolize a year of living and loving, of trials, and tribulations.  Each pearl would be a reminder of each precious year of our lives together.

Time passes so fast that sometimes you don’t realize how fast it is moving.  You start to take things and people for granted.  Each time I looked at that necklace, it would be a reminder not to take time or the people I spend my time with for granted.  It would also mean so much more that I can’t really express.  This thing we call language is still so imperfect.

Still, all of that for a mere $25?  Yeah.  Think outside the box.  Not to is just lazy in my book and if that is the case, how much does this person really appreciate your love?

Case and point, BFL’s daughter got married a few years ago.  She called me to vent.  It seems her daughter had shown her the wedding dress.  She found it in a catalog.  It was a backless, strapless, animal print dress with a slit up the front and back.

*blank stare*

I tried to picture it and couldn’t.  When she drove down for our monthly lunch she brought the catalog.  It was as bad as she described it.  She and her husband had stood firm and told their daughter they would not be attending any wedding where she dressed like that.  So the parents ended up buying the dress and a very pretty one at that.  Her daughter loved it.

So BFL asked her daughter why she picked the other dress.  BFL’s daughter’s answer:  He was pressuring me not to spend a lot of money on a dress and to get married at the justice of the peace.  I didn’t want to do it that way but that was the only way he’d agree.  So I picked that dress because I was angry that I wasn’t getting the wedding I wanted.

Her parents and she pulled together a lovely wedding that was officiated by the bride’s grandmother.  Unfortunately, the marriage didn’t last a year.  He didn’t treasure her and she didn’t feel treasured.  It was doomed before it started.

So yes, I want the best from a man in every way he is able and every day he is able.  Because I’m grown up enough to know that sometimes he can’t be what I need all the time.  Just like I’m not going to be able to give him my best every day.  That’s what Valentine’s Day does, makes up for the shorts, though they may have been necessary at the time.

According to many everyday should be Valentine’s Day but that just ain’t reality.  Everyday isn’t Valentine’s Day for Heathcliff and Claire or Stephen and Elysse Keaton (Family Ties).  Real life doesn’t work that way either.

For example, at 1:00 am when your 2 month old baby starts screaming and won’t stop after you’ve changed him, fed him, burped, and walked him and he continues crying until 7:30 am you will not look over at your significant other and feel a lot of Valentiney feelings.

 

I have days when I’m not too happy with myself in how I handled a situation or mishandled it or ignored it. *rolls eyes*  Valentine’s Day whether I’m with someone or not is a day to celebrate getting through all of life’s BS without letting it destroy the love I have inside, be it for me or for me and someone else.

So Happy Valentine’s Day and Week!

*tips mug at monitor*

RIP

Whitney Houston died last night.  RIP lady.  *sad sighs*  

That voice.  

I am thankful to the Lord God that I had the sense of hearing to be able to have enjoyed the gift He bestowed upon her.  I am thankful that she was able to share as much with us as she was able.  I wish her nothing but peace.

However, I will not be online and participating in the mourning.  I mourned for her when I saw one of two of the only episodes that I ever watched of Being Bobby Brown.  I mourned for her then while everyone else made jokes, took pot shots and made the show a hit.  It was then I saw how far she had fallen.  I hoped and prayed she’d come back to us.  I guess whatever it was that she grappled with was too strong for her in this life. I wish her freedom and peace from it in whatever comes next.

Rest in peace, Whitney Houston, Don Cornelius, and Etta James.

*dabs eyes*

So CCW1's post

*chuckle* Every time I think it is finished, I think of something else to add. I really wish I had had the forethought to start it back in 2009. *shrug* But who knew. It is now 17 pages long. *smh* Sheesh!

Oh! The couple I blogged about, the one where I didn't feel like he had claimed her? Well they broke up. I gave them till spring mentally. I would never tell anyone, unless forced to, that I didn't think their relationship would make it. It is a shame because she really loves him. I think that his affections lie elsewhere just from a few of the things she has said. Like how much of his time, energy, effort, and money he spends ELSEWHERE. *smh*

One thing I have learned about men, especially black men because we blacks are more financially challenged than Caucasians, is that wherever men invest the majority of their time, energy, effort, and money is where their affections lie. Everything about their relationship just seemed to scream at me that there was someone else he wanted but that someone didn't want him romantically. JMHO of course as I've never met the two of them in person. Just conversing over the internet.

Now his ex is in a bad place. I hope she doesn't take him back when he comes crawling back because he's coming. The scenario I see is that whoever he really wants has been especially nice to him right now. He's going through it personally. He is, as many people do, mistaking sympathy and kindness for something deeper. It won't be long before that person puts him straight yet again and he comes running back to his ex. It will be around the time she is healing nicely but ain't completely over him. *smh*

And the wheels on the bus go round and round. There is very little that is new under the sun.

I think me and TPL are going through a thing. Or rather he is. *smh* I haven't heard from him much of late. I know one of his cousins is near death. And him and his brother are going through some issues so it may be just him having family stuff to deal with. We just usually talk 3-5 times a week and now we don't talk at all. This started with the new year. *shrug* I'll just have to wait and see I guess.

I came up with a pretty good business idea...for someone else. *chuckle* It would require having patience with senior citizens and my patience is just about at a bust. With so many baby boomers headed for 65 and above they will need people to either run errands for them or drive them to errands. I've noticed that a lot of boomers' children are super busy (read selfish) and don't have time to do things for their parents. People running errand services would make a killing in this business. Also, paid companions for the elderly. A lot of them have the money but not the mental acumen to judge people correctly. There should be a company(ies) that run(s) background checks and does personality matches so that the elderly person can have a paid companion to look after them since their family can't (or won't) do it.

My best idea is a black dating service. Not none of these fly by night jobs but a black dating service like Match dot com where you do a thorough background check: credit, criminal, personal (yes check them exes), family court, etc. Get all up and through their business. That way both parties could relax and know that they are both just looking for love.

As a black woman, dating is treacherous. As soon as a black man finds out I'm single, no kids, and got my own place they try to latch on. I'm like WHOA!!!! I'm trying to get to know you and he's trying to move in. No, ninja, no. Then they try to run mind games. I don't love them like they love me. *skeptical face* Like ninja, I just met you 2 weeks ago. You ain't in love...with me. You are in love with the fact that I don't have any crumb snatchers in residence to get on your nerves like at your current woman's place.

A service geared toward black folk, because our issues differ from Caucasians, would be wonderful. How many baby mommas/daddies do they have? Who do they live with? Do they have loan sharks or drug dealers looking for their azzes? Do I have to repost about the dude MB3 tried to hook me up with who was running from some drug dealers? *shivers*

So yeah. That would be a great service. *sighs* Now when is someone gonna get on that? I don't have the patience for it but somewhere out there is someone who this is right up their alley. They would love doing it.

Oh well...that's tricks for now. *tips coffee cup at monitor*