lovin' the self

sorry I've been MIA - I've got a lot on my mind that I wanted to talk about, but I came down with a pretty bad case of blog-yn-gitis. I lost my blog voice - everything I typed was raspy & fuzzy, kinda hard to understand. And since I wanted to get my own voice back, I've been avoiding the blogosphere - didn't want to mimic anyone else's. Hope all of y'all are doing well.

Ok, so I'd also been afflicted with a pretty bad case of PMS, and every thought that was occurring to me was filled with vitriol. I wanted to examine the 101 list, but I'm struggling with my road rage, weight loss and workout schedule as we speak. Still need to speak to this whole classism thing, with Ms. Wilbanks still on the horizon, and another stressed out Black man giving Buckhead-residing Atlantans the willies by threatening to kill himself on a crane (note: he's on an 8-story crane, threatening to do himself in. Why are you scared?). But I digress...

Antyhoo, God keeps waking me up extra early - 4:30 am & 5:00am, and I'd been fighting him to go back to sleep. Well, not this am - He was not having it. So I got up early, and decided to love myself. Oh, get your mind outta the daggone gutter - I don't mean like that...

I cleaned my kitchen, not that it was nasty, but it was cluttered, and the clutter was inhibiting my ability to think straight. I burned some music, favorite stuff like Mary & Erykah, songs that I can blare in my car and sing to. I made myself some Chai tea, another favorite. I put on my favorite circle skirt with the silver sequins, that violates my company's dress policy, but is too cute not to wear, and added my diamond hoop earrings, just because they match the sequins on the skirt so well...

Stopped at Mickey D's and got my fruit buzz on, because my body deserved some love too, and it is pretty tasty. And then Mary, Erykah and I worked some things out in the car on the way to work, for a GOOD 45 minutes (traffic was hellacious). And I swear, I didn't go over 80MPH the whole time, and I hardly weaved thru traffic...bear with me y'all, the road rage is real serious, and 80MPH for me is slow. Me, Mary & Erykah sang and danced, and had a good ole time - you know how we do. And other folks in traffic were tickled or stunned that this big ole' black chick with the crazy nappy hair was amusing herself.

Stopped at Walmart when I got to work, and bought a bouquet of wildflowers for my desk, just because. I curved into my company's parking lot on two wheels, radio blasting, and coworkers eyeing me like my mind had slipped a gear. The whole time, I'm thinking: "you better hope I come into the parking lot every day singing at the top of my lungs. The day I stop singing, is the day you should get really worried".

The whole process got me thinking - I can't expect anyone to love me, if I'm not loving myself. I can't expect anyone to take care of me, if I'm not taking care of myself. I certainly don't expect anyone to respect me, if I don't respect myself. Given the fact that we're confronted with negativity in our surroundings constantly, almost bombarded by it even, we should all embrace each other and hug e'ery day. But if we can't manage that, the highest praise we can give to Him (other than praising Him directly), IMHO, is loving our beautiful self.

Aight, enough with the preachiness already, Ms. Saga....you've got work to do, and Common is calling you (BE - and yes, this is good, no doubt). Y'all be easy. My beautiful mind needs to handle some things...lol.