Thursday, July 30, 2009

On some grown shit

I believe that part of being an adult is being able to let go of petty things, truly not giving a fuck what people think or say about you and coming to grips with the notion that vengeance is a retarded notion that isn’t really worth your time. The problem with all of this is that you have to keep going through shit in order to prove that you can handle it all like an adult. You know what I mean? Like, you can’t very well know that you’re able to let go of stupid shit unless stupid shit happens to you.

For instance – my friend Shalaria. She’s got some stupid immature beef with me and would rather put me on blast on one social network or another because she mad I’m through with the bitch. That shit don’t make no sense to me – meanwhile …


Bitch makes me laugh. I had no idea I had such an impact or was that important. I really wish she would just get a grip and not give a fuck. Like me – and my grown ass, I don’t give a fuck.

Do you see ME putting her on blast all over blogger? Nooooooooo. No you don’t.


Cuz I can let things go.


Do you see ME trying to get revenge and saying stupid shit about Shalaria? Things like she’s immature and way too concerned about what the fuck I’M doing when she should really just be living her own life? Noooooooo. You don’t.


Cuz I don’t do the whole vengeance thing.


I’m much too grown to be dealing with this nonsense. TOO GROWN.

Do you see me losing sleep over what she’s thinking about me or saying about me or blogging about me or tweeting about me??? Nooooooooo.


But if you hear or read my name come out her mouth, let a nigga know.


Cuz I’m grown.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

A Daughter's Dad

First, I need to vent about the fact that I do not have a photo for this blog entry. I did my usual google search based on the topic I am blogging about and tpyed in 'dad daughter pic' into the search field. The list of search results was riddle with porn! While I can understand that in the "be careful what you type into the search field" sort of way, I'm just disgusted that the sanctity of the father-daughter relationship is so tarnished that even google can't escape the mockery and depravity that the world has made of the most important relationship in a woman's life.



I could tell that my son was enjoying the opportunity to tattle on his sister - his body language, the slick look on his face (the one with that one side of his mouth ever so slightly curled upwards) and the subsequent "act like I didn't do a damn thing just now" demeanor ... it was all there.



Don't be fooled, parents KNOW. Parents ALWAYS know. And you parents out there need to back me up ... we know out children.



However, the reality of what my son had to say drew his indiscretion so far into the background that I've not even bothered to deal with it - and I won't. I had to delicately inspect the situation because if it didn't have the emotionally equivalent backlash that does the disarming of a ticking time bomb, nothing does. "She said you love me more," my son tattled.



"No, I didn't!" my daughter exclaims. And as the proverbial seconds counted down on the read out screen, I slowly went to work separating blue from red wire in an effort to diffuse this thing.



She denied it for a while until I was able to confront her when her brother wasn't around. "Well, you never call HIM names and when you call ME names, I feel like you love him more."



"Wait - what names do I call you?"



"Like, 'drama queen' and stuff like that."



In my defense, that child is the epitome of the drama queen - if she gets a scrape on the knee, she reacts as if her leg's been cut off ... she screams like mad, raising her voice to decibles that challenge the Ice Cream Truck, whenever she's fighting with her brother ... and all that. But I totally had NO idea she was feeling like I loved her less. Fuck ... fuckfuckfuck!



"Baby, you need to know that you are my favorite girl in the entire world - your brother is my favorite BOY in the entire world. I don't love you less or love him more. I love you both the same. I had NO idea that it was bothering you like this, so I promise you right now that I will never do that again. Not on purpose. If I forget and say a name by accident, just remind me that I'm not supposed to ... because sometimes daddy can forget. But it's just cuz I forget things, not because I don't love you. Because I do love you - more than I can even tell you."

"ok"

I kissed and loved on her and all that. And she asked me not to tell anyone. She said she would be embarrassed. And I promised her that I wouldn't. Now, I'm telling my blog family, but I'm gonna go with "that's different" because

  1. Daddy needs to vent too sometimes
  2. Her issue is that our immediate family would find out and she would have to discuss it again, and
  3. No one reading this would ever tell her I vented about it

Life Lesson

This happened nearly two weeks ago and I have spent a lot of time sorting through my feelings about it. I've experienced some dissonance about it because I am thrilled that I have the relationship with her that I do, that she could discuss it with me and trust that I wouldn't use it to embarrass her. Yet, I'm mortified at myself for being the one who has hurt her feelings. Mortified, I tell you.

So this duality has made me emotional. Tonight she came out of her bedroom and came to me in the living room. She said she looked around her room and felt lonely. Then she crawled on top of me, laid her head on my chest and the 75 pound child drifted off to sleep ... but not before telling me she feels safe when I am holding her.

I'm such a softie for that child. I could've cried right there. One of the other things I've contemplated over the last two weeks is the tendency of today's fathers to abandon their fatherly responsibilities ... and I would be lying if I said I hadn't wondered what it would be like to do that ...

Now, don't get me wrong. I've wondered what it would be like ... but I haven't DESIRED to do so. There's a difference. I don't know any parent who hasn't at least wondered what their life would be like if they didn't have children ... it's not that you don't want them, it's just that you wonder. You know, like ... I wonder what life would be like if my parents hadn't moved to Brooklyn when I was 14 (as an example, although I've never lived in Brooklyn).

Anyway, I continue to work in one city and live in another because of my children ... and after 15 months of driving back and forth weekly, I'm still not tired of it. It's amazing, but I never once have yet dreaded the drive. So, while i understand the "what if" mind game one plays ... i do NOT understand actually walking away from your fatherly responsibilities ... I seriously don't get it. And I don't WANT to get it. Despite all the nonsense my ex-wife has put me through, once to the point where I had to fight to maintain custody of my children, I have never EVER wanted to leave them.

And this evening was one of those times that I understood the importance of a father in a little girl's life. Dad makes her feel safe ... takes away the feeling of loneliness, even if she was just in the other room laying there looking at the walls. And just WOW at the thought of her feeling lonely and wanting her daddy and my not being there.

OMG .. men ... MEN, please be men ... and be a daddy once you've become a father. Please. There's likely a little girl just waiting for you to take away the lonely ...

... God help the nigga who wanna step to my little girl to fill that void. I'll have to hurt his feelings, if nothing else.

... God help the daddy-less little girls who thinks a nigga might just be able to take that lonely away. That they not become the result of someone's twisted google search.

... and God help the father who refuses to be a daddy. (or strike him down. Real Hard, too)

JACK

Sunday, July 12, 2009

Sing me the news, dammit!

Friday, July 10, 2009

Wordsmithing

Modern-day vernacular keeps the people at Meriam-Webster busy, I'm sure. I mean, do we add "LOL" to the dictionary, or not!? No, we don't ... but FRENEMY, yes.

Frenemy (1977): one who pretends to be a friend but is actually an enemy.

That shit is important to spell out. And Oxford didn't let me down with this other new, and equally importnat, entry:

Sock puppet (1959): a false online identity used for deceptive purposes.

And here you thought it was when you put your hand in a sock and made it talk. Silly minions, I mean ... Americans.

But there ARE some entries I'm proud of ...

Earmark (15c): a provision in Congressional legislation that allocates a specified amount of money for a specific project, program, or organization.

THAT shit is important to understand. Besides, kids should TOTALLY be using actual book marks to hold their places when reading ... especially library books.

And how about THIS new entry?

Reggaeton (2003): popular music of Puerto Rican origin that combines rap with Caribbean rhythms.


I'm proud, in a "OMG, it say puerto rican in that definition" yet "hasn't that style of music really run its course" sort of way.

There's more here if you're interested.

JACK

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Sucking it out of me

Do you know that family member that is humanity's equivalent of a blood-sucking leech? The one who always manages to have a need for something (usually money) and they happen to need it RIGHT NOW? Every time, it's an emergency ... like, if I don't get 400 bucks to the landlord by 5PM, I'm getting evicted! And it's 4:35 PM.

Or, they need steel toed boots because they finally got a job, but it's at a factory and they require boots and they can't possibly be expected to buy boots when they need the job in order to make money in order to buy the boots ...

Or their kid need formula and they haven't eaten since noon. And it's 10 PM.

Or they're at your house and their tank is on E and if they don't get gas money they gotta stay the night.

I'm telling you - I'm thru. There's TWO of them mother fuckers around here and I"m THRU. One is quick to say "can you hurry up, I've got things to do" and she's fucking waiting to take you to work in YOUR car so she can have the car to run an errand. The other came over to help with yard work, filled ONE bag with old mulch and left. And there are 22 bags of old mulch back there.

I'm THRU.

I'm cleaning house.

Don't fucking come here no more. Don't ask to stay over. Don't call for milk. Don't fucking let my name fall from your lips ...

when you figure out what gratitude means, call me. but also make sure you've figured out how to give as well as you've perfected the art of taking.

I'm MOTHER. FUCKING. thru.

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

If I don't put a stop to it ...

My daughter. I love her so much no language has the appropriate word to fully describe its profundity. The universe knows no depth like the depth of my love for that girl. I tell her ALL the time that I love her more than any girl in the entire world. And, let's face it - I'm gay. My ass ain't lying.

But wool does not shield my eyes from the self-centered, entitled side of her that irks me. She always has to be the first, have the largest piece of cake, the most coins in her little cup from Chuck E. Cheeses, always has to decide who's "it," and manipulates her little brother to swap all the good things he has (i.e. Nintendo DS games) so that they become hers.

I've addressed it before - but today? We were driving back from their baseball practice (don't get me started on the clusterfuck that is the YMCA - that's for another post) and I told them that they had to go to bed right after we got home and took baths. The damn practice is from 7 to 8 pm and by the time I went to Walmart to replace her swimming suit because the other one's strap broke, it was 8:45pm. She asked why.

"Because it's nine o'clock at night," I responded.

"It's nine o'clock at NINE," she said mocking me.

"I said NIGHT."

"No you didn't."

"Yes, honey - I did."

*moment of silence*

"It's 8:forty FIVE," she said with a tinge of sarcasm.

"I will REACH back there and smack you, girl!" I exclaimed, making sure that she knew in no uncertain terms that I was about to whoop her little ass if she so much as SPOKE again.

"You NEED to watch you mouth," I said with finality. And it was quiet all the rest of the way home.

After her bath she came to my room and said, "dad, I'm sorry."

"For WHAT?" I asked flatly.

"For talking back," she sniffled.

"Come here, baby." And she sat on my lap.

I proceeded to detail her behavior the last few days - how she told some kid while they were playing that she was "The Boss." And how at the baseball game she wanted everyone to know she was the OLDEST.

(Do these kids think we don't watch them?!?)

I told her that she needs to stop acting so selfish and that other people want to shine sometimes - that she can't always be the best, or the first, or the oldest or the decider (dub-ya call back, if you remember). Other people need a chance too.

The flood gates opened and she explained that all the kids at daycare treat her like that and her brain makes her want to do the same to other people.

"But just because other people steal - does that mean YOU steal?"

"No."

"If other people use bad words, do YOU say them?"

"No."

You need to always stop and think about how other people feel and remember that they want to be just as special as you do ... and you can NOT continue to put other people down to make yourself feel better.

She cried in my lap for a while and I held her.

And as soon as they're asleep - I'll close my bedroom door and cry myself.

Friday, July 3, 2009

I forgive you

It turns out that everything I thought to be my past with my first love is actually quite skewed ... in our talks yesterday, we figured out that what we were each made to believe about the other was simply not true. And we were torn apart by a third, kept apart by that third party and now it's all out in the open.

We've accepted our responsibility for it - we were both young and confused and easily manipulated and so, we were. However, we both see that we're better people for having gone through it and we're both stronger than we were ... and we weren't very string back then when we thought we were.

But I am releasing said third party - I cannot live life holding a grudge and being angry because the bondage would be mine and I refuse to live in bondage.

So, PF - I forgive you.

Really. I do.

Smiling,

JACK