What he did

I know that it gets rough. And yes it has been rough. I have been trying not to let things get to me, but what am I to do when there is nothing that I can do. Tis the season - you know to be merry and all that stuff. Well, I can't say that I am not. I am doing quite well. Just trying to get past all of the rough spots. This morning, I have to tell you. I was cold when I got in the car - because yes it gets cold in Las Vegas. I was sitting there having got in the car without letting it warm up. He put the baby in the backseat and came to give me a kiss, we exchanged a quick I love you and he ran in the house. As I was getting ready to pull off, he runs back out with a blanket for me. I knew that the heater would kick on and everything would be okay, but I just wanted to say...thank you for the blanket. We all need something to keep us warm when the thing/person that we really want is not able to be there and do it themselves.

We Still Here

Grace and Peace

I have been asked to give thanks. To write something on a daily basis. Something that says that I am thankful. Today, O woke up and I let her sleep in. I should have woke her up, because last year at that time she had me fully awake and on my way to the hospital. I was ready to meet her and she was pressing her way on into my life.

Happy Birthday to my J-Girl. I am so happy to have you around and so happy to see that you are all right and doing well. J-Girl, look at you. A whole 1 year old. I thank GOD for my J-Girl. Yes, I thank GOD for you!

Bliss

There is No Cure

My friend stated to me that she felt like giving up. I couldn't believe I was hearing those words coming out of her mouth. Although I was trying to be the best friend that I could be, I knew how she felt. I mean we are in our early and mid twenties, to us we should be on top of the game and not dragging slightly behind.

I felt a brief sadness for us. To have to deal with life. I mean who says that we have to deal with it. Giving up is certainly the easy part and at times I think that all of us want to just throw in the towel and scream Mercy! But there is no cure for sadness, it simply just must go. (I know that that is a mouthful)

Almost

I had almost forgot. Almost let my guards completely down. I was ready to rest, to believe and to trust myself within someone else's arms. What a fool I am! I was ready to part with my INDEPENDENT WOMAN ways and let him do what he said he would do. Truth is, I guess, I am too comfortable. Or, I was too comfortable. I now know that the time has not yet come for me to let go and truly put myself within someone else's arms. As much as I want to. I simply can not.

Today was my last at work. Well not official, but the last day is soon approaching. The only promise I have is a part time job that doesn't offer the benefits I need for my baby girl. I was okay with the fact that it may take longer than I had anticipated to find a good job worth working. Now, I am afraid. There are so many things that I want and so many things that I can't have.

My gut says that GOD will bless me and I will be able to do more than I ever dreamed. I believe GOD and all that he says. In HIM is where my faith lies. Soon I won't have to worry about the prices of pillows for my couch or the price of a nice pair of shoes for me. If I see a blouse or vase that I just love, I won't have to pass it up. And those pictures for my walls, I will have with ease. Oh, and a bed for my baby (how joyful), that would just make my heart smile if her mommy could go out and say I want the most beautiful bed for my baby. A bed that is almost as beautiful as she is. One day, GOD will bless.

One day, with all things considered, I will be happy.

For now, the plan is to get in position so that I will be ready for the blessing.

Smallness

I think about it almost on a daily basis. My strong tendency to think often and then to often think. Maybe I have been branded by too many misguided souls, that mine too, has been lost in the waves and currents. My many secrets, those that keep me from knowing my true self. Yes, those many secrets. The ones that come back even after such a long absence, they always return. They come in and show themselves and them again they fall into my mind and live there. My many secrets, no matter how small, they are with me.

I think about it almost on a daily basis. The smallness of it and never the bigness of it. I'd like to think that most people ponder on how big a situation is and how much it will affect their relationship with others and with God. At least, I'd like to think. My daily routine, which by the way, is not very routine at all, is affected by the smallness of it. It is so small, so minute, such a speckle...that it becomes as big as the world that surrounds me and suffocates me.

And I relish in it. In my secrets, my many secrets...that are so small. Yes, I relish in them, I do.

What Happened to Love

Thrown into the harrows of utter silence. I sit and weep. I miss what I once had. I miss how it made me feel. I miss how he loved me and how he did everything within his power to prove to me that what he was feeling was real. What happened to love. Did the idea of time and space happen to it? Did the world come along and take it along with the undeceive wind? Or did I happen to it?



Am I hard or difficult to love? I think that I do what is in my will to make him happy. I think...however, the truth can be a bit disheartening. The days go by and then the weeks and after that the months and eventually the years. They all come and go and soon I see myself reliving the same month that I did last year. Like clock work that month comes around again and I am there again. I try to count the hours and the minutes, but I fall short. Because now the moods are sporadic and heavy. I hate heavy...but I am there. In the same hour as I was last month and reliving the same minute.

Nothing is ever right. Nothing is ever good enough. I wish that I was somewhere else and doing something else. I wish that I had new air to breathe. I new place to open its arms wide and accept me. I wish that I knew what happened to love. I would chase and ask it what has it been up to. Why had it left me? Did it not like my home, was it not cozy enough. I would tell love that I miss it and I want it back. I would...I would...I would ask love to love me again.

Sinking in My Own Pain

Grace and Peace

I have not been here, but I have been a few places that I can recall. Places that I dare not step inside of again. I have to admit that things are not always what they seem. A smile can be the true opening to a pain that lies deep within. A pain that can not be overcome. Have you ever known that kind of pain? Gradually, at times, I think that I have almost overcome the pain, that perhaps I have conquered it. But then I find myself in this place. Still here, sinking in my own...

What goes For Friday Afternoon Reading...

Before I was allowed to dismiss the "porch-monkey" racial slur; I was introduced to yet another racial comment made by a Radio Host. What is with white people referring to black people as "monkeys"? The article began like this:

"Is referring to a Black person as a "monkey" racist?"

I think that given its historical background that yes, the slur is racial. I do not think that it would be very appeasing for me to go around referring to white people as "crackers", even if I was only trying to make a point about their political activities.

"WELE 1380 host Big John referred to Daytona Beach Commissioner and Mayoral candidate Dwayne Taylor, who is black, as a monkey, adding that Taylor would be a bad choice for "his people".

The NAACP wants the radio station to give Big John his walking papers, but the radio station is refusing to do so. They believe that the listeners took the comment in the wrong way; saying that BJ is not racist; however, he does not like Taylor.

ON THE FLIP SIDE OF THAT; I ALSO READ THIS:

The FDA clearly says that they DO NOT WANT DONATED BLOOD FROM GAY MEN! The FDA are so clear on their policy, they don't even want the blood of a man that has had one sexual encounter with a man. The FDA has banned gay men for life. The FDA instituted this policy in 1983 when there was a contamination threat to the blood supply.

Other companies lifted their ban on gay men donating blood in March of 2006. The FDA is not having it, they say, "men who have had sex with men account for the largest single group of blood donors who are found HIV positive by blood donor testing."

Many people are deeming this ban on gay men discriminatory! Well I have to say that they are not the only people that are being discriminated against, the FDA has also placed a lifetime ban on anyone who has ever been paid for sex or anyone who has used intravenous drugs.

Well if that is the case just about all the women and most of the men in the world should be banned from giving blood. Cause just because they are not on the corner using what they got to get what they want, don't mean that they ain't doing it.

P.S. crackheads stay away!

Porch-Monkey

Scene: Bliss walks into her office at work and the white girl sitting behind the third desk has a question mark on her face. We share the usual pleasantries and I sit down and pretend that I am ready for what the day has in store for me.

Here comes the question: The white girl says, "I have a question for you, well...let me tell you the whole story."

Summary: She spoke with her ex-husband. He is white. She had a child by a black man. Ex just found out.

Ready for this: amongst calling her son a Nigger. He called her son a Porch Monkey.

Conversation: She asked me was that a negative slur used against black people. I tell her yes. She asked me why.

My Answer: Porch Monkeys were the lighter skinned black people that had the privilege of going into the "BIG HOUSE". You had House Niggers and Field Niggers. Porch Monkey was just another name for House Niggers.

Requesting Your Help: I felt that my answer may have been a little too vague. Is there anyone out there in blog land that can help me?

IGNORE THE BULLSHIT!

I believe that the time comes when everyone must learn how to ignore the BULLSHIT! I have always wanted to know how people become depressed or unhappy in their lives. The answer to most of it is that they have not learned how to ignore the BULLSHIT!

I am entering into something new. A time that is best for me and anyone that I have to carry (notice have). I have to make the best decisions for me and the children and the family that I hold in my future. FUCK what everyone else says. FUCK what everyone else thinks.

If at any time the BULLSHIT becomes too much for one to ignore, then Maya says it best:

"If you don't like the situation, change it. If you can't change it, then change your attitude"

Almost!

The time is almost near. I can feel it, I'd like to run my fingertips across it. Read it as if it were brail. I'd like to plant my nose in it and smell whatever there is for me to smell. I can see it...there, there it is. Hiding in the near distance. Slapping its knee and luaghing....ooooooweeeeee...its laughing at me. Oh, I think it's smiling at me, wants me near it. It calls me friend...a friend...bestfriend.

I am Almost there

Almost

Peace is almost here...for now it is just resting over there.

What Has Rap Done?

A friend sent this to me, which has inspired me to write about it. When the piece is done I will post it. Until I will keep my commentaries a secret. The story was posted on this site!

New rap problem: criticism from within
Date: Friday, March 02, 2007By: NEKESA MUMBI MOODY -- AP Music Writer, Associated Press
Inside story with Jacque Reid; Topic: Is Hip Hop dead?...

NEW YORK (AP) Maybe it was the umpteenth coke-dealing anthem or soft-porn music video. Perhaps it was the preening antics that some call reminiscent of Stepin Fetchit.
The turning point is hard to pinpoint. But after 30 years of growing popularity, rap music is now struggling with an alarming sales decline and growing criticism from within about the culture's negative effect on society.

Rap insider Chuck Creekmur, who runs the leading Web site Allhiphop.com, says he got a message from a friend recently "asking me to hook her up with some Red Hot Chili Peppers because she said she's through with rap. A lot of people are sick of rap ... the negativity is just over the top now."

The rapper Nas, considered one of the greats, challenged the condition of the art form when he titled his latest album "Hip-Hop is Dead." (LISTEN NOW: Hip Hop is Dead) It's at least ailing, according to recent statistics: Though music sales are down overall, rap sales slid a whopping 21 percent from 2005 to 2006, and for the first time in 12 years no rap album was among the top 10 sellers of the year. A recent study by the Black Youth Project showed a majority of youth think rap has too many violent images. In a poll of black Americans by The Associated Press and AOL-Black Voices last year, 50 percent of respondents said hip-hop was a negative force in American society.

Nicole Duncan-Smith grew up on rap, worked in the rap industry for years and is married to a hip-hop producer. She still listens to rap, but says it no longer speaks to or for her. She wrote the children's book "I Am Hip-Hop" partly to create something positive about rap for young children, including her 4-year-old daughter.

"I'm not removed from it, but I can't really tell the difference between Young Jeezy and Yung Joc. It's the same dumb stuff to me," says Duncan-Smith, 33. "I can't listen to that nonsense ... I can't listen to another black man talk about you don't come to the 'hood anymore and ghetto revivals ... I'm from the 'hood. How can you tell me you want to revive it? How about you want to change it? Rejuvenate it?"

Hip-hop also seems to be increasingly blamed for a variety of social ills. Studies have attempted to link it to everything from teen drug use to increased sexual activity among young girls.
Even the mayhem that broke out in Las Vegas during last week's NBA All-Star Game was blamed on hip-hoppers. "(NBA Commissioner) David Stern seriously needs to consider moving the event out of the country for the next couple of years in hopes that young, hip-hop hoodlums would find another event to terrorize," columnist Jason Whitlock, who is black, wrote on AOL.
While rap has been in essence pop music for years, and most rap consumers are white, some worry that the black community is suffering from hip-hop - from the way America perceives blacks to the attitudes and images being adopted by black youth.

But the rapper David Banner derides the growing criticism as blacks joining America's attack on young black men who are only reflecting the crushing problems within their communities. Besides, he says, that's the kind of music America wants to hear. "Look at the music that gets us popular - 'Like a Pimp,' 'Dope Boy Fresh,'" he says, naming two of his hits.

"What makes it so difficult is to know that we need to be doing other things. But the truth is at least us talking about what we're talking about, we can bring certain things to the light," he says. "They want (black artists) to shuck and jive, but they don't want us to tell the real story because they're connected to it."

Criticism of hip-hop is certainly nothing new - it's as much a part of the culture as the beats and rhymes. Among the early accusations were that rap wasn't true music, its lyrics were too raw, its street message too polarizing. But they rarely came from the youthful audience itself, which was enraptured with genre that defined them as none other could.
"As people within the hip-hop generation get older, I think the criticism is increasing," says author Bakari Kitwana, who is currently part of a lecture tour titled "Does Hip-Hop Hate Women?"
"There was a more of a tendency when we were younger to be more defensive of it," he adds.
During her '90s crusade against rap's habit of degrading women, the late black activist C. Dolores Tucker certainly had few allies within the hip-hop community, or even among young black women. Backed by folks like conservative Republican William Bennett, Tucker was vilified within rap circles.

In retrospect, "many of us weren't listening," says Tracy Denean Sharpley-Whiting, a professor at Vanderbilt University and author of the new book "Pimps Up, Ho's Down: Hip-Hop's Hold On Young Black Women."
"She was onto something, but most of us said, 'They're not calling me a bitch, they're not talking about me, they're talking about THOSE women.' But then it became clear that, you know what? Those women can be any women."

One rap fan, Bryan Hunt, made the searing documentary "Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes," which debuted on PBS this month. Hunt addresses the biggest criticisms of rap, from its treatment of women to the glorification of the gangsta lifestyle that has become the default posture for many of today's most popular rappers.

"I love hip-hop," Hunt, 36, says in the documentary. "I sometimes feel bad for criticizing hip-hop, but I want to get us men to take a look at ourselves."
Even dances that may seem innocuous are not above the fray. Last summer, as the "Chicken Noodle Soup" song and accompanying dance became a sensation, Baltimore Sun pop critic Rashod D. Ollison mused that the dance - demonstrated in the video by young people stomping wildly from side to side - was part of the growing minstrelization of rap music.
"The music, dances and images in the video are clearly reminiscent of the era when pop culture reduced blacks to caricatures: lazy 'coons,' grinning 'pickaninnies,' sexually super-charged 'bucks,'" he wrote.

And then there's the criminal aspect that has long been a part of rap. In the '70s, groups may have rapped about drug dealing and street violence, but rap stars weren't the embodiment of criminals themselves. Today, the most popular and successful rappers boast about who has murdered more foes and rhyme about dealing drugs as breezily as other artists sing about love.
Creekmur says music labels have overfed the public on gangsta rap, obscuring artists who represent more positive and varied aspects of black life, like Talib Kweli, Common and Lupe Fiasco.

"It boils down to a complete lack of balance, and whenever there's a complete lack of balance people are going to reject it, whether it's positive or negative," Creekmur says.
Yet Banner says there's a reason why acts like KRS-One and Public Enemy don't sell anymore. He recalled that even his own fans rebuffed positive songs he made - like "Cadillac on 22s," about staying way from street life - in favor of songs like "Like a Pimp."
"The American public had an opportunity to pick what they wanted from David Banner," he says. "I wish America would just be honest. America is sick. ... America loves violence and sex."

Then There Was Mya

Just when it looked like the sun wasn't going to shine anymore, God put a rainbow in the clouds:

She was simply...amazing. She spoke from the four corners of the world to the innermost portion of the soul. Her voice was so, so unreal, so fantastic...truly it was a gift from God. Before she spoke a word she sang to us.

Just when it looked like the sun wasn't going to shine anymore, God put a rainbow in the clouds:

Ohhhhhhhh...she overstands what it means in this world to be black. The meaning of being big and black. The meaning of someone thinking, pointing or labeling it UGLY. She has the ability to take big, black, ugliness into the palms of her hands and into the pit of her stomach and onto the small of her back and make it beautiful!

Just when it looked like the sun wasn't going to shine anymore, God put a rainbow in the clouds:

Ha! She was flirty, elegant, down and righteous! She moved me, whispered in my ear that black is of an earthy tone. Ha! She danced poetry on the tops of our heads. Ha! She kissed each and every one of us in a dignified way. Naw...she didn't pimp her words, instead she laid them in front us for us to simply eat.

Just when it looked like the sun wasn't going to shine anymore, God put a rainbow in the clouds:

She was almost as stunning as my very own mother. I wanted to touch her, I wanted to sit shoulder by shoulder with her. I wanted to lay my head in her lap and tell her my story, so that she could possibly help God fix me.

Just when it looked like the sun wasn't going to shine anymore, God put a rainbow in the clouds:

A true blessing it was to be blessed by Mya Angelou

Grace and Peace

Many thanks to The Lord of my Life

What I needed

Her: Hey baby, how you doin' today?

Me: Fine, thank you and you

Her: Blessed. Yes, yes...I am blessed

Me: That is really good to hear

Her: Let me give you a hug. I likes to share my love.

And then she hugged me and pulled apart from me, looked me in my eyes and hugged me again. I don't know her name, had never seen her face but I am glad that she came when she did. It was most amazing how she singled me out. She couldn't have known what she would do for my spirit and the everlasting joy that she would provide me with.

I may have even held onto her a little bit longer than I should have. There in her arms, I felt safe and innocent again. I was a child accepting the random love from a random grandma. She wasn't my grandmother, but I wouldn't mind if she was. I would have even accepted a kiss on the cheek or a soft pat on the knee.

How good it must feel to rest always in those arms!

Thanks for the Hug!

All Star Weekend!

Okay, okay, okay...The NBA All Star Weekend is coming to Las Vegas

Everybody will be here crowding our roadways and spending all of their money this weekend. There are so many events that are happening, I just have to make sure I am out there.

I just wanna see T.I. - IF ANY OF YOU KNOW HIM PERSONALLY TELL HIM TO GIVE ME A CALL OR E-MAIL ME.

BLISS

Please call me if you see him!!!!

Maya Speaks...

"The need for change bulldozed a road down the center of my mind."

Maya Angelou

Mrs. Angelou will speak in Las Vegas at the Cashman Field Theater on Tuesday, February 27, 2007.

Maya Angelou was born Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri, on April 4, 1928. She grew up in St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas. She is an author, poet, historian, songwriter, playwright, dancer, stage and screen producer, director, performer, singer, and civil rights activist. She is best known for her autobiographical books: All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes (1986), The Heart of a Woman (1981), Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas (1976), Gather Together in My Name (1974), and I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969), which was nominated for the National Book Award.
Among her volumes of poetry are A Brave and Startling Truth (Random House, 1995), The Complete Collected Poems of Maya Angelou (1994), Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now (1993), Now Sheba Sings the Song (1987), I Shall Not Be Moved (1990), Shaker, Why Don't You Sing? (1983), Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit Me Well (1975), and Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie (1971), which was nominated for the Pulitzer prize.
In 1959, at the request of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Maya Angelou became the northern coordinator for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. From 1961 to 1962 she was associate editor of The Arab Observer in Cairo, Egypt, the only English-language news weekly in the Middle East, and from 1964 to 1966 she was feature editor of the African Review in Accra, Ghana. She returned to the U.S. in 1974 and was appointed by Gerald Ford to the Bicentennial Commission and later by Jimmy Carter to the Commission for International Woman of the Year. She accepted a lifetime appointment in 1981 as Reynolds Professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. In 1993, Angelou wrote and delivered a poem, "On The Pulse of the Morning," at the inauguration for President Bill Clinton at his request.
The first black woman director in Hollywood, Angelou has written, produced, directed, and starred in productions for stage, film, and television. In 1971, she wrote the original screenplay and musical score for the film Georgia, Georgia, and was both author and executive producer of a five-part television miniseries "Three Way Choice." She has also written and produced several prize-winning documentaries, including "Afro-Americans in the Arts," a PBS special for which she received the Golden Eagle Award. Maya Angelou was twice nominated for a Tony award for acting: once for her Broadway debut in Look Away (1973), and again for her performance in Roots (1977).
This bio was last updated on , . --->

www.poets.org

Bliss says: I will be in the house to see Maya speak!

BE...

EYE JUS WANNA BE!!!

Stomp The Yard!

And I Love It!!!!!!

When Y'all see it, we will talk about it.

Utterance of Happiness...

What is lost can never be found, because then... it wouldn't be lost anymore. It would be somewhere in-between growth and failure. It could be somewhere mounted on the wall, it's head protruding out, a celebrated beacon for everyone to see. Then it could be seated on the bus stop, waiting impatiently for something or someone to arrive - waiting to be lost again or found again, so that it wouldn't be in-between any longer. Waiting for the chance at happiness.

It happens almost suddenly and reveals itself bit by bit, not all at once. It is given in small grains of simple memories, past loves, a reminiscent tunes, sweet smells and everything good for the body; and everything tangible for the soul.

The rule says that once we are happy...and that is in our youth. Well, we now know that the rule lies. Youth...can be seen as the gateway into misery, a past that may definitely determine the future. What happens to Happiness?

What Happens to Happiness?
What Happens to Happiness?

I believe that it has been misplaced...placed at the very back of the shelf, not to be found until one day it is too late. There does come a time when someone doesn't want happiness, doesn't care for its kind and flees at the mere utterance of it.

Happiness, could be somewhere hiding- playing a sly game of tag. It's foot sliding in the mud, if a hand gets to close. I see it laughing and playing...I think that maybe even happiness is lost. What is lost can not be found...because then it wouldn't be lost anymore.

Yo Go Girl!

WASHINGTON - The lady is a stamp! The U.S. Postal Service honors the First Lady of Song Ella Fitzgerald with her own postage stamp Wednesday.

The 39-cent stamp is being released at ceremonies at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York, and will be on sale across the country.
People who don't know about her will see the stamp and think: "What makes this person special? And perhaps find out about the person and about the music," said her son, Ray Brown Jr.
Fitzgerald wasn't self-important, perhaps reflecting the values she sang about in the Rodgers and Hart song "The Lady is a Tramp":
"I don't like crap games, with barons and earls. Won't go to Harlem, in ermine and pearls. Won't dish the dirt, with the rest of the girls. That's why the lady is a tramp."
Phoebe Jacobs, executive vice president of The Louis Armstrong Educational Foundation and a longtime friend of Fitzgerald, described the singer as "a very private lady, very humble."
After Fitzgerald confided in 1961 that she had never had a birthday party, Jacobs gathered a star-studded collection of people for the special event. The party was a secret, so Fitzgerald was told to dress up because there was a television interview.
"When the lights came on she took her pocket book and hit me on the shoulder," Jacobs recalled. "She was like a little kid, she was so happy."
Fitzgerald was a baseball fan and the guests included her favorite player, Yankees slugger Mickey Mantle. They embraced and traded autographs.
Fitzgerald's appearance on a stamp comes less than a year after Mantle was featured among baseball sluggers.
Born in Newport News, Va., in 1917, Ella Jane Fitzgerald moved with her mother to Yonkers, N.Y., as a youngster and began to sing and dance from an early age. She began winning talent competitions in the early 1930s and was hired to sing with Chick Webb's band.
She later became famous as a scat singer, vocalizing nonsense syllables, and performed with most of the great musicians of the time. She recorded the song books of such composers as Cole Porter, Harold Arlen, Irving Berlin, Duke Ellington, George and Ira Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, and Johnny Mercer.
Over the years, Fitzgerald won 13 Grammy Awards' and many other honors, including the National Medal of Arts, presented to her in 1987 by President Reagan.

Bliss Says: There are some of us that just do the damn thang! I truly believe that if at that time, Ella did what she did, then I can do what I can do! Ms. Ella...you are a keeper of the flame! I salute you.

Bliss