The captain is dead, he is no more
His boxed life wasted
His crunchy remains
Scattered
Across the tile floor
I should be sore
But instead I’m done in
By a toddling perp
Who knows not his sin
Munching
With that drooling
Cereal killer
Grin
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Putting a memory to grin with a Quadrille…
Won’t deny it, I am mostly a city gal, born and raised and I love my gritty streets. But in my youth I had me a good taste of some country days and ways. Many summers spent down in semi rural south in Grandma’s house, I learned me some things most city folks know nothing about.
Don’t know why, but there’s something about this time of year, this early spring that takes me back. . The trees are mostly gray, the very first hints of spring raising from aground, yet that nip of winter making an appearance in the late nights. Yet I know summer’s not too long from coming.
And I’m reminded of being in the middle of a bench seat of pickup truck as a child. Or riding shotgun on a back road as a young teen. Riding hard somewhere that has never known the feel of asphalt with the spray of mud and gravel flying from beneath the tires. Oh and dappled sunlight filtered through a canopy of leaves, my hand out the window surfing the wind.
Yeah, sometimes this city girl craves a country road.
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Let’s see how others are slicing through what’s left of the weekend…
Slice of Life Story Challenge – Day 6 | Two Writing Teachers
I’ve realized time has been a been a thing with me as of late. No, not as of late, that’s disingenuous, I’ve always had a thing about time. Especially around now, around early spring for the past few years, but really from around this time last year until now, I’ve been a little more hypersensitive to its passing because this year, specifically this day, holds a special bittersweetness.
For in a few short hours, it will be ten years to the day, to the moment I became a widow.
Within days of it I remember looking at a clock and calendar through tear-stained eyes, wondering exactly how I would feel right now. I also recall when a few very short years ago I had posted on how weird I felt the first time I forgot this day and did not mark its passing somehow.
Honestly, were it not for the decade marker today would likely have passed as another ordinary day in moment of my life. No more or less important than when a couple of weeks ago I realized another date and casually threw a “Happy Birthday Bill!” into the heavens while getting in the car with my best friend to go shopping. The thought coming and going as quickly as a finger snap.
All of those years we spent together
Well they’re part of my life forever
I hold the joy with the pain
And the truth is I miss you my friendIf time is a healer
Then all hearts that break
Are put back together again
‘Cause love heals the wound it makes
— Time Is A Healer / Eva Cassidy
And as I sit here typing, taking a moment to acknowledge this as I prep for training, I am happy to say I feel fine. Understandably wistful, but fine.
Time is indeed a healer.
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Let’s see how others are slicing up their day….
Slice of Life Challenge Day 1| Two Writing Teachers
“… Yo that nigger was mad tight… The nigga seriously wanted to hurt somebody…No, but the nigga didn’t say that…Yo, my nigga really?… Nigga don’t go there…”
This was the piece of a conversation I overheard between two train stops as I rode home from work last night. I’m guessing my distaste for what I, and a good portion of the subway car overheard because he was not even trying to moderate his voice, must have shone on my face as he turned his back to me and continued with a string of words further enhanced with the slur. All of that from one person, all within the span of a standard television commercial break.
And here we go again, the love/hate relationship of the use of the N-word.
I remember growing up saying any version of the word was as much an epithet as dropping the f-bomb in front of my mother as it was as a phrase of solidarity among her male peers. There was/is somehow this unspoken agreement “my nigger” just did not apply to women. Even when I hear females say it now, 90% of the time they refer to someone male, sorry guys.
When trying to explain why I feel the use of the word offensive, regardless of who utters it, I’m often made to feel like I’m overreacting when I’m around some of my peers. Or the offending person feels the need to defend him or herself, because the only thing worse than being ignorant is being called ignorant.
And the thing that is hardest to explain is that the relatively unfettered use of this word is coming from a position of privilege most of today’s young blacks don’t even realize they have. This social advantage is so ingrained in our culture that most either aren’t aware or simply don’t care their comments are coming off the backs of centuries worth of hardship and oppression. They did not live personally through when word was nothing other than a vile degradation.
As with all young children, I knew nothing of the world beyond the boundaries of my neighborhood. Thus in grade school learning of the assassination of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King was simply another lesson learned in history with no more or less import on my life as the lessons about Abe Lincoln and Harriet Tubman to my child’s eyes. Being all of four years of age when he died, the import was lost on me. I was a teen before I realized that I was alive when King was assassinated, and just how close segregated times were a reality for myself.
By the time I became aware of the world I was able to sit in the back of the bus because I wanted to, not because I had to. Thus, I could not understand why my mother refused to do so even when seats were available. It was ingrained in her reality as a person who came of age through segregation to refuse to sit in the back of the bus, but not mine as I child who had not grown up in such. It was a thisclose reality, but still not my reality.
Knowing the word nigger existed to hurt is one thing, living an existence in it’s hurt is another. Sympathy is not empathy. I can only surmise the ones who use it freely now really do not understand its power to hurt because it was never really used to hurt them. In a world where it the slur nigger holds as much impact as the curse fuck – it’s not their reality.
Now let’s consider other racial slurs that have come, and for the most part gone, in the immediate tome stream such as spic and kike, and for that matter coon and jigaboo. Words that you rarely hear spoken aloud any more. Because those affected by such slurs asserted their respect for themselves and refused to allow anyone to disrespect them with its use. And made damned sure the world knew to accept that respect.
So what the hell happened with the word nigger that it still survives and thrives to continue in its controversial life? Why can’t it die off as some of those other slurs?
Because of men like the young man on the cell phone who dropped the word several times without a thought in the less than three minutes it took to get from one train station stop to another, it keeps being used.
How can it die if we keep letting it live?
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An introspective slice from the Raivenne today, let’s see how others are slicing it up…
Slice of Life Challenge | Two Writing Teachers
I go into the kitchen to eat…
fork, knife, spoon,
glass, bowl, plate
All as it should be
and yet it’s all wrong as I turn off the pot,
I go to shower…
all the bathing gels, hair goop,
shaving products, fill the cabinet
All as it should be
and yet it’s all wrong as I turn off the water,
I choose my outfit for the next day
my overfull closet
of shirts, ties, pants
skirts, dresses, scarves
All as it should be
And yet it’s all wrong as I turn off the TV,
I wake up and find
Both sides of the bed
In disarray
As I raise a brow
and finally I realize…
Ten years…
When I eat, bathe,
Get dressed,
Even subconsciously in my sleep
I don’t make room for you any more
Except in memory.
All as it should be
And it’s all right as I turn on the lights
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Time flies…
Mary at dVerse prompts us to write about “room” however we choose to interpret it. My muse it translated to the day I realized I no longer made physical space for my late-husband in my life. Now as I acknowledge my tenth year of widowhood, he’s taking up a little more space than usual, but
“All as it should be
And it’s all right …”
It’s interesting/funny/weird what thoughts can pop into one’s head at any given moment.
Friends and I were conversing about our various upcoming vacations planned for the year. As is the wont is such cases several of us were “I can’t wait to go to…”. What struck me was when one friend ended her vacation itinerary with “Dammit! I wish it were May already!” It’s a common enough desire, especially when looking forward to pleasurable pursuits, but for some reason it struck me as wrong today.
“Don’t do that!” I stopped her.
“Do what?”
“Wish your life away.”
Naturally this generated some very curious looks from the others in the conversation.
We adults, and I definitely include my self in this, constantly say “I wish it were Friday already!” first thing Monday mornings. Oh but, what would we miss if we could just snap our fingers, bypass Tuesday through Thursday and land square at 12:01 am Friday? Because we focus on the humdrum of an average day, and we all want to be more than average, that we’re mentally, emotionally rushing to get to the next big joy that we’re skipping over the day-to-day of simply living through the small ones.
On my first day of business school I had wished, I was done and graduated because I was not looking forward to the eighteen months of school work ahead of me. Had that wish come true I may have never met the man who would become my husband and missed out on what are now some very fond memories of our time there.
In the words of Stevie Wonder: I wish those days could come back once more…
Take into consideration that when we wish our lives away we’re taking the world with us because El Sol and La Luna do not turn in tune just one to individual’s desire and leave the rest of our time alone. We don’t just rush our own lives, but the lives of every one else. You know the saying time flies when you’re having fun? Imagine your moments of joy literally being shortened by someone who is wishing their own horrible moment, hour, day, week, month, year, life away.
An uncle of mine once said to take your age and double it, and then think about chances of your reaching that age. I believe was all of twelve at the time, and in the selfish immortality of my youth, living to see twenty-four was a given so who cares? I’m a long way from twelve, and for that matter twenty-four, while I may have decent odds of doubling may fifty-two years on this earth, the reality is sobering when one considers the inevitable.
Because no matter how long we are alive, it’s never going to be as long as we are dead. After all…
All we are is dust in the wind…
Do we really want to randomly wish moments, minutes, days, weeks, months, and/or years of it away because we can’t be so bothered to actually live it?
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Let’s see how others are slicing up their day…
Slice of Life Challenge: Two Writing Teachers
I remember
that first night
the feel of his hair
intertwined with my fingers
the touch of his skin
as I grazed against it with my chin
the yearning in my bones
when he held me in his arms
the pressure of his lips
as his tongue grasps with mine
the taste of his kiss
and the scent of his hair
the way his body feels
pressed tightly with mine
the heat between our bodies
invigorating, and passionate
the ripples of my flesh
as his hand glides over my breast
as my next pulse quickens
I’m numb to all
but the sense of pleasure
beneath his softened lips
as the growth of passion exceeds us
need turning my voice hoarse
as I realize the noise I hear
is naught but my moan of his name
the steam rising from our backs
the sense of power
flowing through his limbs
eagerness withstanding
the warmth of his breath
around my nipple, gently sucking
the trace of his tongue
as it glides down the slope of my stomach
the softness and the passion
as he brings me to heightened ecstasy
setting each nerve on fire
the firm grip of my hands
as I bring my hips to meet his
clashing gently in the night
to bring our souls home
again and again and again
feeling the nod of his head
and the arch of his back
under the strokes of my nails
feeling the beat of his heart
as it beats in rhythm with mine
we have had many
such nights since then
but that first night
yes, oh yes
I remember
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So, I was privately asked by a surprising number of people why I had not temporarily changed my Facebook profile picture in a show of support for Paris. I who am usually up on the latest Facebook fads to have not done so was surprising to them. They have a point, but this Facebook Paris profile thing is just one I could not do.
I’ve been to Paris, but even if I had never step foot in the city I still would wholeheartedly feel for what Paris is going through. Just as I felt the outrage for London when they were bombed in 2005, often referred to as 7/7 – the date of the occurrence, just as I know both countries grieved with us here in the United States when 9/11 happened. There is this overwhelming sense of helplessness when one is reading of such a tragedy from afar. After all what can the average Jane and Joe from so far away do right? Granted, most of the world did not have social media, let alone the ability to easily change our profile pics on FB in 2001 or 2005, but today if we can’t really do anything else, the very least we can do, and it really is the very least, is change our profile picture to show our support for Paris right? Right.
When I noticed the changing profile pictures my very first thought was that’s nice. Our hearts are in the right places, I do not make light of it.
I get it.
I really do.
Still, I could not help but ask myself the following – where were these near instantaneous profile pics apps of solidarity for
Where are the profile pic apps for any all of them?
A couple of months or so ago, here in the US, Facebookers were able to be “StraightOutta___” whatever they chose to be straight out of in honor/celebration of the release of the movie “Straight Outta Compton”.
A movie.
A simple movie about a rap group from the 80’s was worthy of being on our profile pictures, yet today is the 580th day since 273 Nigerian school girls were kidnapped by Boko Haram terrorists in Nigeria. 57 escaped and 219 are still missing.
Where’s their profile pic overlay app?
Some have tried to say that most of the above didn’t count because the countries have been in some form of contentious states for years, even decades now. But just because Paris is relatively brand new to this and is considered a safe place, are they more worthy than the Israeli and Palestinian who live with the threat of a bombing as a daily fact of life? Uh. no. And please let it begin and end right here with why tragedies to brown faces get less news coverage and hold our attentions far shorter than tragedies to white faces. I just can’t/won’t go there with that today for we are all hurting.
We cannot look at the events of Paris and not share in their grief. Nor should we ignore the horrors of one tragedy in order to acknowledge the horrors of another. I have no qualms for the many Facebookers who have temporarily changed their profile pictures in solidarity of Paris. Again, because I understand it, I really do. I have changed my Facebook cover to better reflect the suffering seemingly everywhere, for I have no solutions or resolutions either.
It’s a jacked-up world we’re living in and the events in Paris and in Lebanon and in Nigeria… and… and… are already fading into the happier glow of the coming holidays, because it’s all we can do to hold to what little happiness can be found out here for us.
Let’s find it and try to hold on to it long past the times that go by with auld lang syne.
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Slice of Life : Two Writing Teachers
Those memories, times I’m sure we’ll never forget
Those feelings we can’t put aside
For what we had, sometimes I tried to understand
But it’s so heavy on the mind
The Commodores / Still
I watch a golden leaf fall
Autumn’s glory starting to call
And I’m trapped in the past, a moment set
The heart stops the clock time has met
Those memories, times I’m sure we’ll never forget
It all comes flooding anew in my heart
As though Time itself had not ripped us apart
Memories from when we lain astride
Each whisper, each touch freshly decried
Those feelings we can’t put aside
We weren’t perfect, but each grew stronger
I didn’t expect forever, but certainly longer
Only to have it gone at Fates command
These things I came to learn first-hand
For what we had, sometimes I tried to understand
Oh what I would give to have time slip
And once more have the taste of your lips
The Fates are almost never so kind
And with the moment gone I continue my daily grind
But it’s so heavy on the mind
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Using a modified glosa for a poetic rendering of a moment relived in time.
How did I not know Pearl Paint closed?!?! Not just closed, but closed for a little over a year now. It felt as though I was just there recently, but time is indeed fluid to the heart as it was December 2013 I was there last according to my bank statement.
I had wanted to go by Pearl on a day off just because. The place always inspired me and as one can see from the dearth of posting as of late, I could use it. Still, something said go online and check the store’s opening hours before I drag my tail down there and that’s how I learned yet another NYC societal if not historical landmark that has fallen victim to the giant called capitalism.
After the shock of the discovery, I semi-joked I have not been this mournful since I read the Red Wedding scene in George R.R. Martin’s “A Storm of Swords“. If you do not know what the Red Wedding is by now, don’t bother asking. Just understand that it’s something bad. Sucker punch, gasp out loud, gut wrenching bad.
Because it’s a new wound for me, i want to pass by the site and poor libations on its threshold. That’s how the unexpected loss of Pearl Paint has struck me.
Pearl Paint was an eight decades old institution. Whether the amateur looking for stamped tin foil for an occasional scrapbook or the professional looking for gold foil leaf for a mural in a skyscraper, Pearl had it. I did not go there often, as Pearl was off my beaten path, but once I was there, I was there for a couple of hours minimum. Since the early 80’s, when I first discovered the place, it was six floors of dusty, seemingly nonsensical, glorious mayhem. But if I needed it artistically, Pearl Paint had it. And it was not just an art supply store for many of the staff and fellow shoppers were artists in their own right. I come in with what I think is a simple question or request and leave some time later having absorbed knowledge, techniques, tools and sometimes gossip.
And now it’s all gone.
I mean doors locked, gates closed, assets sold off .
*Gone*.
Yes, there are other art supply stores, this is New York City, but none like Pearl Paint. I Alas no, like so many other places and spaced becoming a part of my past, it’s now just memory.
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Come see how others are slicing up their days.
Tuesday Slice of Life Story Challenge – Two Writing Teachers
Raivenne-lations 
