Love, Sex, Drugs and Funk

I started reading "Glow", the autobiography of Rick James last Sunday and now, already more than halfway done with it, several things have become clear to me.

1. As a child born in the 70s I was most definitely conceived to some 70s music on par with "Fire and Desire." I just know that in my heart.

2. R&B owes so much to great 70s artists like Rick James. Hip Hop and Rap sampled the hell out some Rick James hits.

3. To a large degree Black music in the 70s was about love, soul, spirituality and accessing a higher plain of consciousness. It had not come very far from it's African roots. Black artists in the 70s funk genre weren't afraid to let their Freak Flag fly because they knew that so-called freaks were on a journey towards liberation, fearlessness and joy and for a brief precious moment that was more important to them than impressing a target market with imitation. So much of what often embarrasses or discomforts people about the flamboyant and sexually loose style of the 70s is that those who represented it best, like Grace Jones or Rick James, didn't give a shit what people thought. They went with their gut and their spirit and those who couldn't copied them. Elvis, Prince, Madonna, Gaga,  all learned how to draw a crowd by copying, appropriating, deriving and expertly reinterpreting the best in the business.

Ever wonder where African Shaman got their "style" from?

4. Prince owes about 70% of his career to Rick James. Everyone steals, imitates and borrows but James, cocky as he was, seemed more humble or came from a more reverent generation. Prince was a cold, insecure asshole in his early years.

5. The 80s was the dawn of artifice and excess. It produced a lot of great stuff with regards to music and it was the era I came of age in but what ever soul it had with regards to Black music was derived from what came before.

Grooooowwn Woman...

 So I turned 39 last May, graduated with my Undergrad degree on Tuesday and my wedding is less than a week away. Can anyone say hypertension? Anyone?
But as long as I look flawless it's almost worth it! LOL!

I met with Nicole Lyons yesterday who I discovered through an email from Harlem Skin Clinic. I asked my sister in law/wedding planner to get in touch with and we scheduled an appointment for a trial run through at her place yesterday evening. Not only is Nicole a sweet, professional lovely young lady but she is also an artist! I brought a few looks with me on my cell phone to show her what I was going for and then I just let her do her thing. She used various techniques on both sides of my face so that could see different options for the big day. She will be doing my make-up as well as my Bridesmaids.

Man! Talk about a transformation! She did her thing! I also really love that she listened to me. I didn't want to carry a lot of heavy color, particularly on my lips but I did want drama and definition around the eyes and blush which I have never used in my life. This is definitely make-up for lights and camera and there was also airbrushing used for a lasting hold. I was so excited about that. It just felt like wind on my face but the look is frigging immaculate! While I was sitting in the chair, I remembered what Truvy said in the movie Steel Magnolias, because I recently watched the version with the all black cast. Truvy runs the beauty store in town and when she first hires the new girl she tells her her motto: "There is no such thing as natural beauty." LOL!!

Well it's meant to be funny and a dig at the make-up industry no doubt, because if we all thought we were naturally beautiful, MAC, Revlon, Maybeline, etc would all go out of business. But let me tell you something. You can't take make-up too seriously. It's fun! It's like dress up for your face! It's drag! It's not actually you. It's you at lunch or you dining or you coming out into society, going to a party or you getting married!
But it is an art. And from what I learned, Ms, Lyons has been on this track all her life. I love it.

My fiancee was visibly wowed by my look when I got home yesterday evening. Most straight men's relationship to make-up is very different than to women who have been either wearing it or living in a world where it is required or desired from a young age and throughout most of their lives. He said he liked it but that he likes my face without it as well. That just moved me so much! And then I went back to prancing around in the mirror taking selfies! LOL!! He's used to that. He also almost pleaded with me not to wear the false lashes because he wanted to see my "real" eyes. Oooh honey!

To that I say, what's real is always there. It's fun to enhance as opposed to hide. Also, I paid for these lashes and this service and I'm taking it all the way!

This Rock, My Rock...

I have not been planning my wedding since I was a little girl. Part of the reason for that may have to do with the fact that my parents were never married by any law except that which we call common. I never saw photos of them together under a wedding arch and I never felt like I was any worse off for not seeing it because I saw what they shared together while I was growing up and that was enough for me. We were a pretty warm and affectionate family and I enjoyed a wonderful childhood. Even though my parents did not stay together it never made me feel like I couldn't or would never get married. There was no wedding dress hanging in my mom's closet and no ring on her finger and never any sense on my part that she longed for any of these things. But like any human female girl with all my senses in working order I was flooded with the same nuptial imagery in television, films, magazines and literature that anyone else is. I loved it. I thought it was great. But I never fixated on it. In my mind I always thought I would get married but I wasn't saving any swatches or looking at dresses or diamond rings. Which brings me to diamond rings.

Diamonds are a naturally occurring mineral rock formation (which can also be produced synthetically) which our system has ascribed a great deal of value to. I remember being in love for sure with the way Marilyn Monroe sang about them in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes." I memorized not only that entire song but for some time, Monroe's entire performance. Marilyn shimmying back and forth in her sexy strapless pink satin dress with a thigh high slit singing in her sultry voice and all those men in black coat tails at her command really excited me. Still does. LOL!

But diamonds. Not so much.

When I look at most diamond rings (and I have looked at a lot) I see only what they represent to other people. I have witnessed the impression of size that diamonds make on people, not to mention price. I have also witnessed countless debates over the size and value of the diamond engagement ring being equal or representative of how much a man loves you or can provide for you. I will say myself that seeing a teeny tiny diamond rock in a poor setting is less than impressive but for me it's not necessarily because it's small or that the guy who bought it is insensitive or a poor provider but because I don't find it beautiful and doesn't make me feel anything. But as you may begin to gather at this point, even huge rocks don't do much for me. It's just the other side of the coin. A big diamond for me does not equal a beautiful ring.

Whenever I look the ring I chose I see what it represents for me. I was walking by the place where it was purchased and it literally caught my eye. It stirred my imagination. I don't really know how else to explain it. I know that it has the potential to have many different meanings for me over time in the way that a square cut or pear shaped (sorry Marilyn) single diamond never could. And trust me it's not for lack of trying to find a more "traditional" diamond ring that made me feel the same way.

I don't have any specs to share like where it was purchased, karat size or the price. But one of the things I like most about it is that in sun light or interior light, the diamonds set inside the sphere sparkle and glitter. I love glitter and glittering things. It makes me recognize that sparkle and glitter represent magic to me. And I'm all about the magic.

I've never been very practical and the things I love have a personal meaning for me that is sometimes hard to describe. But the desire to describe that which means so much is not as important to me as the fact that a sense of meaning exists at all. And it is for this that I am eternally thankful.

Diamonds are a girl’s best friend from Ars Memorandi on Vimeo.

The magical and practical Marilyn

Engagement Photo Session

My wedding is in June. Have I mentioned that? It's partially why I haven't written here in so long. Thanks to a Bridal Show my Sister in law/planner took me to last month sponsored by New York Weddings, we won a free Engagement photo session with one of the amazing photographers whose table we dropped our card at that day. We also ended up hiring them to shoot the wedding. I'm super excited about it.

So let me tell you a bit about the engagement shoot. If you ever want to make out with your partner in public (I often want to LOL!) just hire a photographer for an engagement shoot. All the engagement photo sessions I have poured over on Munaluchi Bride were very accurate research and preparation for this one. Although I'm not sure anything can really prepare you for getting directed to make out passionately with your partner for the camera.  I always wondered how photographers got such intimate and passionate displays from couples. I don't know how other photographers do it but ours kind of warmed us up a bit and then told us to go for it. LOL!!

Look, I'm comfortable in front of the camera. I was even prepared for giving a few sweet little pecks on the lips. I've done an engagement photo shoot once myself and had to direct a couple to get cozy and smooch. But uh, yeah, we were doing quite a bit more than that here. LOL! And umm, well it was ummm....it was hot. It was hot and there was a guy behind a camera telling us to do specific things so it was also a little awkward. And that made for a lot of nervous laughter. But there were also many very amazing, sweet and poignant intimate moments. I mean really lovely moments that just kind of happen only when everything is right. I've never had a photo session with anyone but my dad and it was great to have someone work with us whom we felt comfortable with, who loves his work, had great ideas and thought very quickly on his feet.

I chose the location of Bethesda Fountain in Central Park and we all met very early in the morning when the light cloud cover provided ideal lighting for a good hour or so. We feel very blessed to have had such good weather conditions for the shoot and we can't wait to see how the photos turn out! This is the first time in a while that I have actually felt just sheer excitement about this wedding as opposed to debilitating nervousness. Photography always does that to me.
: )

Don't Just Stand There! Be!

Last night I was in the kitchen making salad for myself. I was tearing pieces of Basil and chopping some small vine tomatoes and red onions which I love and then two cloves of garlic. It was while I was chopping the garlic that I realized for a moment it was all I was doing. I was just chopping the garlic. Nothing else was going on, in my head, in my heart. I was fully present. Just mincing garlic, just getting the job done with the right tools and the right attitude. Enjoying the smells and the sounds, looking forward to the outcome whatever it may be. I like making salad.

I know it sounds like a small thing but it’s huge for me when I experience moments of being fully present because I am rarely fully present. Even when I try to inject love and light and positivity into my daily efforts it still feels like just that. Effort.  Deep down I don’t believe that effort has any place in truly being. We don’t put any effort into breathing if we’re lucky. In fact we hardly notice it until we are instructed to pay attention to it and then we experience varying degrees of anxiety over whether we’re breathing right, whether we know how to breathe, if we’re thinking the right thoughts when we breathe….effort.  

Then all of a sudden we can’t stop thinking about breathing and breathing can no longer just be itself, the thing that keeps you alive that filters the air it brings into your lungs and blood stream and expels what it turns into carbon dioxide, just doing its job without you even noticing it. It’s rare that we pay attention to our breath until we are short of it. 

When you find yourself drowning in an ocean like I did many years ago in Barbados, great big gulps of air become like life blood. When you have a panic attack or find it hard getting to the top of a flight of stairs or exhaust yourself working out. These are the moments we notice our breath, when we sometimes flail around wildly grasping for it. Otherwise, we’re more preoccupied with thoughts and feelings. I know I am.

When I find myself really arrive in myself anywhere, with no invitation or conscious instruction, I am quietly very thankful because I know that in the next minute or two I will let my “self” be dragged right back into that familiar space of not really being there, of being in the past or in an imagined future but not right where I am, where I’m supposed to be. I want to be able to get myself here more often because I know this is the natural state of being for any life form. I know it because it feels natural to me and I remember feeling this way 99% of the time as a child as opposed to maybe 15% of time now as an adult. Deflecting, distracting, protecting, avoiding, managing, juggling multitasking, imagining, interneting, means you’re not being most of time. And if you’re a single parent! God help you! 

And the crazy thing, is that just being is like my deepest wish and fantasy for myself and others. If anyone were to ask me what I wish and dream and hope for, it’s like I have this image of myself being able to just be 100% of time! 

Here’s what it looks like:

Never feeling like I need to run for cover from people I don’t want to engage with or put on a fake smile or protect myself from negativity, my own and that which comes from others, never worrying about how much money I have and being able to be generous all the time with my money, my love, my time, my light within reason without feeling like someone is out to get me or rain on my parade. Feeling like I can trust people’s expressed intentions and just be more trusting in general. Never feeling like I need to purchase something useless to make me feel valid for a few minutes or make me feel like I’m in with the trends. And lastly just being able to be where I am wherever I am and whomever I am with.  That’s what I want. That’s my deep wish. Even admitting that gives me tiny but sharp internal stabs and a kind of hollowness in my chest.  Why should just being and living your purpose be such a big deal to want?  I don’t think it is. But I think society and our own implicit contribution to its systematic structure works daily to send us the message on many levels that just being is not valued at all.

Capitalism can only grow when it is shoveling the perceived feelings of desperation, panic, unworthiness, lack and self hatred of the masses down it's throat. Sometimes I have to go off the grid. Fortunately, I am not alone.

Emerging Esteem

In 2009 my honey and I vacationed in San Francisco. I wrote this long entry about meeting my cousin on my dad's side there for the first time. I just happened upon it today on my flash drive while I was doing some classwork. It resonated with me suddenly because of a conversation I had a while ago with my friend and fellow blogger over at soulsistah4real about the effect that fathers have on female self esteem. I hope I haven't posted this before. I don't think I did. But anyway. Here it is.

Emerging Esteem

            This summer I went on vacation in San Francisco with my fiancée and met my cousin D. on my dad’s side for the first time in my life. She is dark skinned with locks, fifty or so but I couldn’t tell by looking. I liked her even before I met her. I just liked the way she sounded on the phone when she called me at the Hotel to find out what my plans were.          

            She picked us up in Glen Park and drove us to her mother’s huge house. All three of us, me, D. and F. ended up talking for hours. We were out in the yard for a bit but then we came in when it got cool. We sat in a large lounge area in the basement  that she said was designed and built by her father, my uncle, a man I’d never met and never would but heard a lot about from my dad since I was a girl. My dad called him “Brother.” They had has an unfortunate falling out and stopped talking. If there was ever the possibility of reconciliation it didn’t happen before “Brother” died of a heart attack. This happened when I was still young but old enough to feel the impact it had on my father even if he never talked about it in detail.

            D. said that this room her father built was her favorite room and I could tell by the way she talked about him that she really cared for him, very similarly to the way I feel about my own dad, her “Uncle George” whom she loves as well. Somehow we ended up talking about how her father would give her some of the best advice she ever got on exactly what the perfect age was for her to have sex. This was when she was a young girl! I was stunned. I could never have had conversations like that about sex with my father when I was young, never!  It seemed a radical and frankly icky notion to me. But then D. said something I’d never heard before. 

“Woman get their self esteem from their fathers.”

            Well at first I was kind of resentful of that statement, especially considering what a strong and progressive woman my mom is. I watched her boldly face down so many obstacles for my brother and she was always encouraging me to love myself I that I always felt I must have gotten my self esteem from her. Aren’t mothers the main role models for their daughters and vice versa? But I didn’t protest too much because I started to feel like she was onto something,

            She went on to say that women who have good relationships with their dads don’t freak out so much about men in later years. They tend not to place too much meaning on a definition of their worth as seen through other mens opinions. That was something worth thinking about. 

            And let’s look at me. I’m a classic daddy’s girl, been best friends with my dad since I was born. We’ve always shared a special relationship. He was my protector and my hero. Of the two parents, my dad picked me up in his arms the most, so I went to him more often because I knew he wouldn’t mind carrying me. My mom wasn’t so much into that and I’m glad she wasn’t. My dad spoiled me enough. I needed balance in my life. Plus I also had my brother around who played with me all the time and that made being comfortable around men a lot easier to this day.  So maybe there is something to what my cousin said. I certainly get an unconscious feeling of entitlement with men from my dad. I guess because I knew there was nothing he wouldn’t do for me he could.

I remember once walking in Prospect Park in Brooklyn with my dad. I guess I had gotten ahead of him a bit and in trying to cross the road got hit accidentally by a biker who couldn’t figure which way I was turning and was maybe going too fast to stop. I was around five years old or so. I don’t remember getting hit but I know it was bad. I was scared and all I remember was balling my eyes out in shock.  My dad was so angry he took the guys bike and through it over a bridge at the overpass we were on. That was the end of that bike. That was the end of that period. That man knew better than to retaliate.  I’m not saying my dad was right. But this incident sent a little girl a very affirming message about how her dad felt about anyone hurting her, and that’s something that stays with me in one form or another for life among countless other protective and supportive things my dad has done for me and still does to this day.

Good+Bad+Girl

 Let's go see some naked daughters and moms!

-Liz Lemon

"30 Rock"

 

I was listening to “Mine” on the Beyoncé album this morning as I’m starting to retreat back into music after flooding myself with podcasts during commutes for the last month or so. I love that song. To me it’s technically multi-textured, melodious, emotional, and sentimental. I love it and I love Drakes part as well even if to me, the idea of “Good Girl” is a kind of male fantasy created to protect the male ego. 

I mean first off, I don’t see any girls anywhere in this song. I’m just being factual here, just deconstructing. I refer to myself and other grown ass females as girls as much as the next woman but when a guy does this, it has a slightly more direct meaning for him. A “Good Girl” is well behaved and virtuous and obedient and sweet. Still though, there is much talk in the rap world about the irresistible nature of the “Bad girl.” Right. Same goes for the “Bad Boy” in our culture. Except that the “Bad Boy” is always regarded in higher esteem then the “Bad Girl” ever will be. A “Bad Girl” can’t ever change to “Good.” Once a Good Girl goes bad, she’s bad forever. Isn’t that what Jay Z said? Right. This is what I’m saying. For men, when a “Good Girl” goes bad, that’s it. No redemption, no coming back. You know who else that rings true for? Pretty much the world. “Good women” gone “Bad” rarely ever get a second chance with us. But a “Bad Boy!” OH!

He can do bad and good and bad and bad and good and bad and good again! Forgiveness for the “Bad Boy” is never a question. I mean look at Bill Clinton! “Boys will be boys.” Case closed. 

Men have a really tough time allowing women to break out of the “Good Girl” box and do something “Bad” and still think of them as “Angels” or “Good Girls.” One strike (and this could be anything from speaking your mind about sexual preferences openly or wearing a dress with a slit to your thigh in public or crawling on a piano half naked in a music video) and you’re out for good. Oh fathers! I sincerely feel for fathers everywhere having to watch their "Good Little Girls" grow up into grown sexual beings. It's hard for men and even women for that matter not to immediately associate a female who chooses to express herself sexually with someone who has sexually loose morals. But a dude! Oh he's just doing what a dude does.

 Beyonce climbs the piano half naked. 

WHORE!!!!! BURN HER!

 

Which brings me back to why I love the Album “Beyoncé.” Every time I listen to it, I discover what I believe to be tiny nuggets (with huge influences) of female liberation of a kind I have not seen explored by popular culture in a long time, probably not since Madonna came on the scene. I suppose it’s easy for some to dismiss “Beyoncé” as just another sexually exploitative project where B, lets it all hang out for a buck but that would be just plain ignorant. “Beyoncé” is a dedication of love, fidelity, sexual exploration, motherhood, womanism and creativity. 

Last night, I was glued to Scandal like I am every Thursday and reading and posting Tweets and Facebook statuses at the same time.  The way they are exploring Mellie’s character right now is just incredible to me. They are opening her up in a way that makes it just unavoidable for me continue see her as just the wicked witch they have portrayed as for the most part up until now. The pressure that she puts on herself in addition to the pressure from her peers, from the media, from society to be a “Good Wife” and a “Good Girl” just got smashed open to reveal all the shades of Mellie, how she got where she is, why she is who she thinks she is and the raw truth behind why she, like many women struggle with expressing their true desires and power while at the same time trying to avoid threatening the prevailing rule of patriarchy which promotes action or inaction as a result of fear. 

Mellie is beautiful. Mellie is vulnerable. Mellie is feminine. Mellie is sexual. Mellie is ambitious. Mellie wants to please and support her husband. Mellie has been assaulted, violated and demonized. Her public persona is icy and opportunistic.  Which of these qualities are the ones that we as women usually cling to or identify with? Which are the ones that we shy away from and avoid expressing out of fear of shame and ridicule?

What is a “Bad Girl?” What is a “Good Girl?”  Why is the word girl one we continue to use to address one another even in our 30s? It’s a question, not a judgment because to be aware is to be powerful. To own and understand your choice of expression means that it does not own you. That is why Beyoncé and Shonda Rhimes are so powerful to me. They entertain but at the same time they also provoke and they do it mindfully, with the intention of causing a scene not only to titillate but also to turn inside out the destructive cookie cutter notions of what it means to be a “Good Woman” or a "Good Girl" and in Olivia's case this season, "A Good Daughter."  Men are never held to that standard. So when Beyoncé and Rhimes put this kind of work out there, of course it’s not always well received least of all by women themselves who uphold patriarchy as faithfully and steadfastly as any white male

Patriarchy and the white male gaze are threatened by this kind of overt exposure of a woman’s insides. There is no platform in this system to reconcile that a “Good Girl” can also have “Bad Girl” qualities. It fucks with the whole two dimensional definition that goes along with the nature of stereotypes. You can only be one or the other, not both or bits of some and chunks of the other or shades of gray. Oh no! What does that mean?  I can’t call you a girl anymore? I can’t think of you as a Madonna anymore? And vice versa, if you provide the services of a stripper or a call girl, how dare you use God’s name or perform religious rituals or go to church. Blasphemy!

This is why women live longer. We were born to be the truly talented multi-taskers. We have the balls in the air, the apple pie and prayer and faith as well.