intense thoughts continued

 

Is it because of my thighs, my quick wit, my cynicism and intense criticism of all things life? Is it because I laugh too much, whine too much or focuse too little on certain things in life? Or could it be my astounding independence? Is it because of all of these things or any of these things that I can't seem to make it work.

Things are just not getting better. I won't say they are getting worse because I know what worse feels like. They are just not getting better. Sad, but true.

My home used to be this place I could run to after a hard day at work and dealing with the world and just sink into my thoughts, and reflect and plot and laugh, and curse and drink, and just generally be what I can't outside. But now, it's always something with my mum. Always something. Since Sunday she's been moody about nothing and I tried to avoid her the first couple of days, going on my own, went to see Slumdog Millionaire, went window shopping at the mall. It was fun. But lately I just feel like being at home instead of out in the cold and I can't because she just makes it tense.

I feel like running away. Going someplace and not telling my family, not telling anyone, just go there, go back to school, try to become a lawyer in Iceland. It can't be that hard. And just start a home for myself away from all the pressure. I wish I had the means to do that. This should be a free world, devoid of governments and immigration laws. People should be allowed to go live in whatever country they want to, make a home for themselves and try to live their lives there if they choose to. A free world.

How do you think Iceland is this time of year?

dribbles on a bar napkin

Saw Mickey Rourke give an interview on the Today Show and he looked noticeably humbled. I don't know what it is about those Today Show hosts but they are always able to talk everyone into coming out of their celebrity shell and being honest, profound and in-depth. Good stuff. Once saw John McCain there, years ago when his presidential campaign was in trouble and he said some good stuff. Made me think this guy is going places and indeed he was.  

One of the movies I enjoyed last years was Man on Wire. It had that man defying all odds, achieving his dream against all odds sort of feeling. Watching the movie was an event for me because I never go to theaters to watch documentaries and there I was reading this article on UrbanEye Weekend in the New York Times, and the headline read: Go See Man on Wire. 

I enjoyed it immensely.

Today I might go see The Wrestler. 

School of Escapism

I haven't really felt like doing a proper update since I got back from the heavenly week at the beach.

I just came down from that high with a thud. I went through last week wanting to escape my life. Thought about running away to do some volunteer work in Senegal, Mogadishu or something, feeding the kids, helping the WHO (do they still exist) just doing some humanitarian work that is not self-serving but fulfilling. I actually thought of abandoning everything, my job, my clothes, my car, my bills and my very expensive lifestyle and just going.

But I haven't.

Right now, that school of thought has been shut down... for now. May reopen sometime soon.

Now, it's the Numb school of thought (not the Escapism school). And so now, it's just sitting and waiting for some bright idea (or bright young man) to come to me.

Now, I understand why people choose to do humanitarian work. Corporate America is bullshit. And what is all the work for? For a life you don't enjoy.

economic copycats

I think because most companies that are going through hard times, interpreted to mean - not made a profit, need to cut costs, or lost a lot of money and profits have dwindled considerably, overhead is high - are feeling the need to cut their staff in order to reduce costs. Other companies that are not going through any of these hard times feel the need to do the same. It's like a copy cat effect, ripple effect I know of, but the copycat effect, use the economic downturn as an excuse to cut staff to loosen up money for other things, maybe that trip to Alaska or a ski trip I promised all the partners.

This is just something I have been thinking about for a while. Every time you turn on the news, some company is cutting a significant percentage of their staff. Comon, they can't all have lost money in the past year. Every single company announces its intent to shut down some offices and cut its staff. And then, it turns round and declares a profit. Insane. Where do they expect these unemployed people to go...magically into the atmosphere where every other company has sworn off expansion?

Human Nonplus

I found this somewhat empowering and reinforcing my opinion on the top ten reasons to move to Europe. So, maybe it's my environment that's squashing my self-esteem, causing me to doubt my self-worth and become one of these women who feels their self worth is determined by their love relationships. A pitiful vision of my self.

This is an excerpt of an interview with one of the co-authors of the book - He's Just Not That Into You.

LT: Countries all over the world had bought the rights to He's Just Not That into You and France still hadn't. And it was so irritating to me. It became like the guy who doesn't like you so you like him more. I became obsessed with why France didn't want my book. And then I became interested in what it is that goes on in France that they don't think the book applies to them. I realized they don't have a single culture there. They don't have Bridget Jones' Diary books or films. They have films about love and marriage and infidelity but not about the single girl. I started wondering why that was. So, in a nutshell, France didn't want to buy my book. It really annoyed me. I wanted to find out why and that started this curiosity about how women are being single in different parts of the world.

LL: So, why do you think France doesn't have a culture around being single?

LT: When I went there, there was just a complete, innate sense of self-esteem and entitlement among the women. Their mothers already told them they're great as they are, that they should never chase a man and that they always need to have pride. They said 'Why would I need a book to tell me a guy's not into me if he hasn't called me?' They thought it was the funniest thing. 'So, you made a lot of money writing a book that tells women that when a guy doesn't call her he's not into her?'

Courtesy of Single Edition Feature Article

same time every year

At this time last year, I stopped to ponder my future. 

I asked God for some direction in it, and I prayed that I would get some kind of profound direction, some guide to lead me to the path that I seek. It always seems that by this time in the year, with a new year just beginning I always ponder my future, I often wonder why God has forgotten me. I may not have any kids, or pending responsibilities, but I represent that lone sheep that the shepherd abandoned all the other 99 sheep for and went to seek in the wilderness. Why can't He stop trying to solve world peace, helping the Obamas, the Lindsey's, and all my friends that are rich, professionally and personally, why can't he abandon those 99 sheep and stop for a wee second to help poor Anita?

That's just my take, selfish as it may be. I have waited a really long time. :(

Today I sighted this course in Switzerland in Human Rights Law that I would love to take and for a few seconds I asked God for the will and opportunity to live in Europe. Then I went to my favorite store Anthropologie with the European inspired fashions and pretended that I was in Europe somewhere. Yes, I would love to live in Europe. I would love to study and major in Human Rights law and help achieve world peace...or at least world unity. Yes, Human Rights for personal reasons it is one of the few areas of law that resounds in me, that seems like an effort in achieving my life's voice, in speaking for people that have been stifled. 

And yes of course, Europe...To live and love simply, tour cafes and their rich history and architecture and not be consumed by capitalism, gigantic malls and family friendly contraptions like I am right now. That is my dream, my prayer. They say if you have a prayer write it down, make it as specific as possible because God has a way of going by your specifics. So I am writing it down in this here journal. This is what I want. I am done with corporate law, helping companies achieve their profit goals and having to live through another Xmas without a single corporate bonus for my troubles. 

I want Europe with their small streets and their EU Directives and Regulations, and snooty accents and cobblestone streets, tiny homes and Human Rights, mainly Human Rights. Europe has made wonderful advances in Human Rights that there would be no better place to study it than over there. I love America. I loved America. But I am over it. I am sorry.  I am so over it. And this is what I want. When I lived in Europe everyone I met wanted to live in America, I wonder if they feel the same now. I didn't then. I was indifferent. And I still don't. Not unless Obama changes my mind in some way. 

So that is my New Year 2009 prayer, that in some way God would stop for a wee second to help me, the lone sheep, achieve my life goal. And I promise some good deed along the way.  

That's it and that's all.

Home

We are back...

In the end, I'll always have Myrtle Beach. Myrtle Beach and the picturesque view from my hotel window, the calming sea breeze, the friendly inhabitants and of course, my one week at the beach.

Happy New Year to me...and everyone else

So how have I been?

Very well, actually. And I am having a very relaxing New Years too.

The mom unit and I decided to take a vacation because, for obvious reasons, the construction in front of my window was driving me nuts and I had no plans in Atlanta. I spent one boring afternoon on Xmas Eve and then Christmas Day being bored out of my mind. Then, on the 26th I went to Spin Class and that was it, a whole day left to do nothing but obsess about what…could be between me and my chance meeting with some idiot, about my life, about everything. I had to get out of there!


So like ripping out a band-aid I made vacation plans to, not Miami (I don’t have that much money) not Tampa, either, I couldn’t drive that far but to Myrtle Beach. We got this great deal to a family friendly beach resort, hotel on the beach equipped with a kitchen in wonderful, quaint Myrtle Beach, in the Atlantic Palms Resort. I saw this hotel at first when I tried to book a hotel for myself, on hotels.com which is a great find, who knew…and I thought I might as well take her with me, so we decided to drive up there, two old women in a car driving down south. It was different. Without the kids, it was a lot different. We made no stops except to use the bathroom and that was for me, and there are no food breaks. We did it in one fell swoop.

South Carolina, at least the Myrtle Beach section, is a little different from Atlanta. For one, there is 1 black person for every 100. We do not dominate down here. Maybe we do in some areas…ahem… Atlantic Station, but not here. Ocean Boulevard is lovely, very quiet; you can hear the sound of the beach waves from your living room, very nice. If I didn’t know better I would try to make this an annual tradition, New Years at the beach, but we’ll see. The hotel rooms are cheap because it is off season, the weather is on average in the 60’s, who wants to go to the beach and feel the cold graze of the water over your skin. The only warm day was the day we arrived and that was about it. I imagine that living here might be great to take an afternoon off to go sit at the beach after a rough day of work but asides from that it is touristy, nothing revenue wise for the inhabitants, the people sound all "do-hickey," (that's southern twang with an extra twang) with a great quantity of retired folk too. You can tell they are not used to black people, especially the foreign black folk like me, I come up there whipping an accent and they get confused. We thought we had all these black folk down, and then you come mentioning that you are from straight up Africa, this is too confusing. There is no Macy’s. This is too confusing. They actually think Macy’s exists only in the north, and confused me for some New York gal. What flattery!

We, my mum and I, went out on New Years Eve to a bar that would ordinarily have an exorbitant cover in Atlanta, ahem... Gordon Biersch, to celebrate. She accompanied me for private reasons, and I went because I didn’t want to spend my New Years cooped up in a hotel room, so we went to a bar: very different set up from Atlanta. For one, we didn’t have to pay to park, we didn’t encounter a million and one cops on the road, and we didn’t get carded as we walked in. We just walked in, sat down and ordered our drinks, and everyone whispered casually because we were the only black people there.

At midnight, they all wished us Happy New Year like they forgot about the color of our skins and that was that. I even got a New Years kiss from a fellow singleton for the first time…pretty exciting. I don’t get that in Atlanta. You go into a white only joint and your fun is limited, you get at least one person to speak to you and that’s it, the rest of them wonder secretly inside them, “Didn’t they tell this chick this was an all-white party/event/bar?” And the women all cling onto their men like you would snatch them away just by staring at them. Oh, wait, that last line represents every woman in Atlanta.

In Atlanta, everyone is so hung over on being someone else, being someone that they may or may not be, hung over on being some pretentious prick. You come on to a guy and that’s no longer an attractive feature, what are we 12?

Needless to say when you get away you encounter the much different side of life that you may not have encountered and may never have if you hadn’t taken the chance to want to experience it. I am glad I did. I had been to South Carolina but the Hilton Head Island end of it, and that not as much fun. Myrtle Beach represents a whole new awakening for me and a lot of respect for the south. Things are different down here. Very new type of different. It’s a warmth I would like to experience and that I have mentioned several times over but with a little more doused in, maybe like financial security. I kept thinking, maybe this is the simple life that I have been seeking. Maybe it’s the simpler type of fun with no pretensions, no credit card bills and no pressure. Just I love you, you love me, let’s go live the simple life and raise our kids.

But there’s always the hope of Paris.

Peace, love, and much love…this New Year.