The Human Manifesto

I’m up and can’t sleep. So surfing the web I come to BNTM or Britain’s Next Top Model.  I was struck at how more congienial these girls were compared to out-of-the-gates-back-biting/hatin’-on-each-other they were compared to the American show. But then I then I had a Ah-Ha moment. How we are teaching young girls ,no matter how hard they try, how good they look, they are never enough. These shows with their hip muzak and slick editing cuts and slight but “honest” barbs from judges who mind you have been in the biz for several years and have loads of experience and training under their belts, take 13 young girls and demoralize them for entertainment. Of course, the girls/women aren’t without fault, yet, who can say they had much wisdom at the ages of 19 to 23, especially when it came to the pursuit of happiness in the form of a dream?

I don’t know many people who can be willing to call being rejected over and over a dream, let alone a sign of character. I don’t even know if being judged can actually qualify you for something worthy in the long run. But I do know that if any of these so called judges on these shows call themselves feminists, they may want to rethink their definitions.

It must be hard to raise a daughter in times like this. Having to compete with educating them and allowing them to retain something that is uniquely them. For these shows are aimed/marketed at the tween/teenage years where beauty is paramount and should any young girls watch these shows, they must leave with some impression that they must not make the same “mistake” that the contestants do. But therein lies the trap, what is the mistake? How their beauty could kill their chances for happiness in the form of material gain?

Even with Hillary Clinton making a hard earned educated effort to take the world’s highest office, during her campaign she has had to undergo a gauntlet of criticism  relating to her own femininity. I wonder if women, the bearers of life, which is about is close to perfection as you can get will ever see that they are enough.

Just Chillllllllll

Spring break is almost a day away!! Hu–fucking–ray!!! Okay, that’s a bit of the salter side of me, but I’m really glad, as the pressure was really getting to me. As it was to everyone. Truth be told, no wonder Americans are fat, and dealing with so many health problems. We work these long stretches of work and then take two days or two weeks of rest. It’s  insane!! My biggest problem with it is that unless one is self-employed there’s no wiggle room for individual needs which is why I think so many problems exist in today’s society. I know how I work well, and how I don’t. And as I get older, I realize more and more if I’m going to have a life which supports me, then I’m going to have to create situations where I work positively and not against my own grain.

This past week really drove that home for me as I was having health problems for the first time. In December, I had a check up and was told of the existing problem, but of course, since I didn’t have any of the more serious symptoms of the issue, I blew it off somewhat.  So when the symptoms arose, I felt really isolated.  I’m 36 and about 10 to 15 lbs above what I probably should be. But I’m thin, so I take that for granted. What a false sense of security to have.  So, now I’m faced with having to educate myself on what I can do to lower the impact of future symptoms. And it hit me as I write this entry, in fact I’m a bit mad, how my doctor didn’t really explain much to me about my condition. Perhaps she was busy, perhaps she didn’t care, perhaps she is jaded because the condition I have is very common among black women and perhaps she thought, I wouldn’t do much to change the situation.

Whatever it was she thought, I think, I am going to have to educate myself and be accountable as well as responsible for my wellbeing. Much like one’s own happiness.

The key to having it, comes from within.

I’ve been wanting to log this thought for quite some time.

As a child, I was bussed to school. For an hour, my bus would wind through several of Chicago’s South Side black neighborhoods. I never minded the ride, as I enjoyed the architecture that changed as steady progressed toward our destination. In Spring, the morning sun would illuminate the characteristic red brick on rows of bungalows, making it seem like I was riding through Edward Hopper’s “Sunday”. All this changed when the bus would round the corner near 78th and Marshfield.

Each morning a man would stand out in front of his home, with Bible in hand, shouting verses. To a group of mischievous and restless school kids, we saw this as an opportunity to impress each other. The first time we happened on this man, we shouted, “Amen” and “Hallelujah” “Praise Jesus” and fell back into our seats laughing at the small reaction we got. By the third time, several of us tried to come up with tricker devices to use to deter the man from his morning sermon.

“The path of the righteous is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men,” the man would shout.

“You moma is so ugly that gorillas think she’s a queen!” shouted one boy. We would fall back into our seats, hysterical with laughter.

I recently thought about that man and wondered what brought him to such a public display of prayer. What was he praying for? Had his life been so beset with problems that he was moved by the spirit to pray publicly as a form of redemption? Or could this be his testimony of how the Lord works?

I’ll never know. By the end of third grade, the man was no longer praying outdoors for our consumption.

As I think about that period of time, our shouting could have been an encouragement to him, a test to his faith or willingness to stand apart for what he requested of God or believed in. I’ve been struggling for years with this whole concept of individuality and group. And listening to spiritual tape, it clicked for me how having it does not necessarily mean that it’s manifestation from one’s being as I had previously thought .