1. Dreams fulfilled: Around October I started brainstorming on things I wanted to accomplish (and I blogged about it), and the more I think about it, the more I come up blank. I've done everything I wanted to do. Part of the reason I was able to do so much is because my attention is so incredibly short. As soon as I learn to do something, I very rarely want to do it anymore. I wanted to publish a book. I wrote two. Done. Sold both. No interest in writing another. I wanted to design nails. Did it. I wanted to design T-shirts. Did it. Ceramics. Did it. Go to college. Did it. Grad school. Did it and was bored halfway through so I left. Live in another state. Did it twice for four years. Learn to play the saxophone. Did it. Learn to play the piano. Did it. (I suck at the piano now and have no clue whether I still remember how to play the alto sax now but I was decent as a kid.) Visit Hawaii. Done. Hang out in Canada. This wasn't even a goal of mine (it was my mother's graduation gift) but my gawd I loved it there. I've literally had 21 different jobs and none of them were like the last job. Most were seasonal jobs or college jobs or part-time/temp work, but there is no industry I haven't worked in that I wanted to. While some go their whole lives without hitting up their bucket list, I did all of mine. I smile because of it, but I'm also a bit restless wondering why I can't think of anything else I really want to do. I never wanted children. I'm indifferent about marriage. So from a family perspective, I'm content with the life I live and the freedom I've always had. So my smile for this is more of a half-smile because I want to find more things to dig around doing. The other side of my mouth smiles remembering how much fun I had doing all of this stuff though so I'm still grinning about it, especially that Hawaiian vacation. 2. Lincoln: I kept trying to convince people to see this movie with me but heard excuses about it being 2 1/2 hours long, the weather outside, blah blah blah. Finally I went to see it on my own today and it was pretty good. Mind you it really is raining hard outside and it's kinda cold and it was freezing in the theater and I bought a lemonade which made me colder, but I was determined to see this film. History was not my favorite subject and I memorized social studies topics long enough to pass a test so a lot of the characters I either never knew or just don't remember, but Daniel Day-Lewis did a great job playing our second president. Click here for the review.
I should've written this blog when I turned 30 instead of 31, but last year at this time I was sleeping in LAX airport and missed my flight to Maui. Then I spent five days in Hawaii so you already know I was preoccupied. This year, I was supposed to be in St. Louis sometime tonight but since those plans fell through, I'm in Chicago hanging out for my 31st birthday (on Sunday, Veteran's Day) so I have a bit of time on my hands. I started reflecting on my 20s and how they made me into the woman I am today. Here are the top five moments in my 20s that prepared me for my 30s.
It could be coincidental but I've noticed a lot of attention paid to dreams coming true and life goals lately. While watching Ne-Yo's "Behind the Music" on Sunday, he said, "Every dream that I've had has been realized. How many people can say that? Not very many."
Then I bought an Android phone and my horoscope for Wednesday was: "What do you want to be when you grow up, Scorpio? Whether you're eighteen or eighty-eight, this question may apply to you today. You've been thinking about your life and whether you are fulfilling your purpose here on Earth. If you haven't found your path yet, you may be wondering what direction to take. If you've made some major life choices and you're established, you may be thinking about changing your direction. Either way, the stars say this is an excellent time to embark on a journey of discovery to figure it all out."
To top that off, I was reading Gordon Livingston, M.D.'s "And Never Stop Dancing: Thirty More True Things You Need to Know Now," and there were lines about the future: "It turns out that few of us are living the lives we imagined for ourselves when we were young."
Now I'm seeing this stuff on my phone and in my book and on television, and I kept coming to the same conclusion: "I've accomplished every single goal I wanted as a kid." I used to get so agonizingly bored and the only way I found to regularly entertain myself was to read or to write. My goals as a kid all had something to do with reading or writing. That's it. I have never had any desire for children, was indifferent about marriage and never really thought much about where I'd live outside of wanting to visit New York. But overall I've accomplished all of the goals Little Shamontiel set out to do. So with that said, those are my five things I'm smiling about.
These are five goals I had as a kid that I can check off the list:
Been a minute. Plenty to grumble about but the point of this blog is to remind myself about things I've smiled about. I missed last week so here's 10 instead of five.
1. Ma Po Tofu at Lao Sze Chuan: The spices on the food still kill my stomach, but I love it. I haven't been to Chinatown in a couple of years (although I've eaten a lot of Asian food at other locations) so it was cool celebrating someone's birthday there yesterday afternoon. The food and service were great for both of us.
2. Jennifer Lopez purple dress: Retail therapy is something else, and I got a beautiful dress from Kohl's for a great sale price today. I know retail therapy can hurt your wallet, but new clothes do something for women who get into style. I can't wait to wear this dress any place I can think of. I like it almost as much as my Daisy Fuentes blue and green dress. Almost.
3. Kohl's Cash: Yeah, NY & CO has City Cash, but it takes so long to use it that I usually forget about it. For every $50, you get $10 from Kohl's and you don't have to buy something else to use it. You spend it like you would a regular gift card or cash. I got two today from my retail therapy session and finally got a new watch after I'd torn mine all up at Great America (scratches from falling during Fright Night), dying battery and fading silver. I loved the watch, but it was time to get something new.
4. Silver and blue watch: I love my new watch. It goes with my blue jeans and since I wear so much gray, it looks nice with that, too. I don't want my whole list to be materialistic, but I'm feeling the shopping trip I just went on.
I woke up and after waiting for the maintenance guy in my apartment to fix an issue, I headed out to run errands. I used to people watch more when I was younger than I do now. There are times that I observe people, but then there are times when I'm so focused on getting things done that I just don't care what everybody else is doing. On my way from the bank to a CTA stop to put money on my Chicago card, a guy strolled by me, said "Hello," I said "Hi" and kept it moving. He goes, "Eh, cah ask you a question?" and immediately my eyes rolled. I don't know what he was getting ready to ask and anybody who can't find anything better to do than hang by an el stop on a weekday isn't somebody I feel I'm going to get some beneficial information from. Maybe it was beneficial, but it just looked like he had a lot of free time on his hands. I just kept walking. I really didn't want to hear it. (My instincts were right. A police car rolled by and he disappeared faster than Casper!) A few days back I was on my cell and this guy screams out, "Eh 'scuse me, 'scuse me, oooh she bad! Don't you think she bad?" I'm sure it was meant to be a compliment, but it just made me cringe. First of all, the guy was my father's age, and I know some women like older men, but I can't stand it when folks who could've been my father walk up to talk to me like we're on the same level. You should be trying to teach me something not trying to undress me. Gross!
However, there are times when I will stop and listen to people speak about a bunch of nothing. There's a special place in my heart for the elderly.
When I was in Atlanta, my godfather showed me how to load, unload and shoot a gun. Before I went into the shooting range, I was excited to do it. My mother, on the other hand, was ready to leave as soon as we pulled into the parking lot and looked terrified the entire time we were there. She's definitely the "lover, not a fighter" type although I'll never underestimate her strong woman radar. But anyway, my godfather (who is a veteran) was patiently teaching me about aim and what not to do. After I left the shooting range, I looked at my target and all the holes in it (specifically the one in the neck) and completely lost interest in guns and shooting ranges. Was it a skill worth learning? Absolutely. Does it make me want to go out and start collecting guns? Nah. Do I own one? You already know it's illegal to own a handgun in Chicago. There are some folks who are really in an uproar about the recent news in Wisconsin that made it legal to carry a concealed weapon. Personally I'm not jealous.
For the life of me, I just can't understand why somebody would complain about how bad their own neighborhood is and then move into another neighborhood to screw that one up, too. If you like being in the hood, stay there! (Yeah, somebody's going to be mad I said that, but I bypassed caring last month when my mail was stolen. I'm still mad about that.) It's aggravating to watch a neighborhood being ruined from folks who could care less while others who do care either have to move or watch their block go straight down the drain. One thing that I've loved the most about living in the neighborhood I've been in for over seven years was the decrease in ridiculous approaches I got. By approaches, I mean guys walking up to you spitting game that doesn't work on anybody but rats. Yeah, that might sound harsh, but it's the truth. Within this past year, there's been a significant change during my train ride (folks are selling candy to make-believe organizations, opening train doors jumping from car to car, putting their legs up on seats, blasting music without using headphones) and now I'm seeing folks hang out by my nearby el stops and just walk around randomly loitering. One perk of my own building was this beautiful set of flowers and freshly mowed grass. There's no porch. There's no stoop. So it's strictly for show and nobody hangs out. I came home one day to see two teenagers flopped down on the ground in front of the door. Extra tacky! Why would you need to hang out by the door when there's a lakefront and a beach a few minutes away? Although I preferred peaceful, quiet rides on the el station once it passed the downtown area, and I liked walking down the street with folks getting off of work, walking their dogs and working on their lawns, the neighborhood is changing. And to be honest, I don't care for it. One of the things that I really loved about living on the north side is the diversity and the peace. My mother has joked a few times about how she thinks I'll never move. I told her I genuinely liked the area. I like being able to take a walk without worrying about what neighborhood I'm going through. I like being able to jog at night. I like being able to go to a beach not overcrowded with litter and not being concerned about somebody shooting somebody else on the basketball court.
Earlier this year I got into a huge argument with a guy who tried to rationalize stealing. His logic was that if his family is in need, they're hungry and the lights are out, he should do everything he can to make sure they're taken care of. No doubt about it. I agreed with him, but stealing isn't the answer and he was trying to justify that illegal tactics are quicker and necessary for certain circumstances. He said as the man of the house, he has to do what he has to do. I told him, "That's not a man. That's a dumbass." You do more harm than good when involving yourself (and, by default, your family too) in illegal activities. Although he claimed to be past that stage in his life, the fact that he was defending what he'd done told me one thing--you'd do it again if times got hard and you're not altogether convinced it was wrong. That to me is simply unacceptable.
When I was in preschool, my mother and I were walking home and two guys tried to snatch her purse. My mother is a very even-tempered woman but she went stone cold crazy over these two guys trying to take what's hers. You never know what a person will do in a situation like that, and logic should've told her, "Let the purse go." Instead she let her fists go flying. Whoever told you a woman can't fight a man surely lied because I'm still astounded that she was defending herself so quickly.
Now I don't know what those two freeloaders were going through to make them feel like it was OK to rob someone of her possessions, but from then on, every time I hear about an incident like this, it rubs me a little harder than it might for someone else. It's personal to me. When my parents moved into their first house, I was the one to come home to see their place trashed and things stolen . . . twice. You know what they did? They refused to move. Place got robbed again. They stayed. My mother, once again, flipped out. She got an alarm, a gate and a dog. We didn't have any problems after that, but she's always been the type to feel like there's nobody on Earth who's going to run her out of any place. She was who I thought of today.
The May 2011 issue of Ebony magazine made me remember my elementary school days. There were two girls I talked to all the time when I was little, one of which was a friend of mine and the other was a pretty good associate. I can't remember the "friend's" name nowadays, and I don't want to murder the spelling of the other girl, but my point is that both of them were biracial. Friend was Mexican and black, but I remember mentioning her being biracial, and she immediately checked me on that and said she was black. I asked her, "Why don't you want to be Mexican, too?" and she got a little huffy. Apparently her Mexican father wasn't around much, and she felt like since her mother (a black woman) was, that's who she would identify herself as. However, she looked nothing like her mother and it was clear that she was of Latino descent.
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