A “Formal” Introduction
A short introduction about some things I have to say…
Hello Friends,
I wanted to properly introduce myself and share a little about who I am and what I intend to use this platform to say. If you read my “About Me,” you will have learned, “I have a lot to say about a lot of things!”
Writing has always been a way for me to channel and process trauma. I didn’t know how healthy of an outlet it was until I was an adult, but I have been writing since I was a child. (yes, the trauma started early.)
When I first started writing to process pain, I was in about 5th grade. I had a complicated relationship with my mother, I loved her deeply and I was doing everything I could to please her, but to no avail. Instead of throwing tantrums, talking back, or refusing chores (an obvious death I wasn’t ready for), I wrote.
I wrote about being adopted and being made to feel like I was indebted to my parents for “saving” me from squaller. I wrote about how awkward it felt being the only little brown girl in camp, and school, and on the soccer field. I wrote about how uncomfortable the man at church made me feel every Sunday when he took my hand and wrapped his arms around me a little too long and a little too tight, but not tight or long enough to draw attention from all my church moms. I wrote about how my church moms loved me more than my mom did, yes, the one that adopted me.
I also wrote about the biological mother I never knew but resented. I resented her with a passion. So much passion that I secretly loved and missed her, even though I never knew her. For years I would search for her in the faces of strangers. I have a picture, so I knew who I was looking for; I still haven’t found her. I recently found a 1st cousin, though. She’s from London, is really dope, and is a badass (clearly a trait that runs in the family); shout out to Ancestry.com. I digress; I also write about my keen awareness and relationship with white supremacy. I’m pretty astute to its inner workings. Since elementary school, I always knew it was a force conspiring against me.
I even wrote about that time my mom and I saw a KKK rally while pumping gas in our baby blue dodge minivan. From white hoods, I saw baby blue eyes and wondered if it was Halloween. If it was, I wanted to be Belle from Beauty in the Beast. It wasn’t, I was five years old then, and I didn’t know what I was seeing until 5th grade. That’s when we learned about slavery and the KKK. That’s when hot shame first ran over me with a knowing and awareness that the people in the history books, the ones with chains, the ones with the wide noses, had something in common with me, just me.
Then I wrote about how my teachers hated me. The proof was all those in-school suspensions, all for “insubordination.” We all know what that really means, but only I knew the real reason my teachers hated me; I was always on the honor roll. Funny how I was never in AP classes; what’s even wilder is that I didn’t know they existed until I was in college. It makes sense why I have such a passion for education. Over 13 years in education, and I took every day personally, literally. Ultimately, I paid the price, and in a heartbeat, I would redo every day, even that day. The day I had white supremacy, misogyny, and misogynoir after me.
Over the years, I have filled dozens of notebooks with awful poetry, some hilarious commentary, and some earth-shattering vulnerability no child should have had to reflect upon. After years of therapy and surviving an intersectional assassination attempt by white supremacy, misogyny, and misogynoir, (and having survived that time I almost took myself out), I am finally ready to get some things off my chest.
“I have a lot to say about a lot of things.”
And so, with this blog, I intend to write for the young black women who look like me. I intend to write for the black and brown people who collectively grieve the desecration our black and brown bodies at the hands of white supremacy. I also intend to write about all the ways in which “men are trash,” how humans are redeeming and how I will always be in the corner of humanity.
I plan on calling a spade a spade and making you uncomfortable with my truth. Please understand that I am a human first and because all lives matter, I won’t ever put my race, gender, or sexuality before humanity. Wrong is wrong, and I won’t make excuses for the ills of humans because they share the same race, gender, or sexuality as me. I mean it when I say, “I have some unpopular opinions.”
The thing about surviving an attempted assassination by white supremacy, misogyny, and misogynoir; is I’m not afraid of anything.
My mother always used to say, “my mouth will be my ruin,” but my words have always been sacred. Should I go down in a ball of firey flames, at least it will be by me speaking truth to power.
Sounds like a martyr to me.
Thank you for taking the time to read my piece.
To contact me you can reach me here: n00rthisn00rthat@gmail.com
Keep up with me on my Instagram @noorthis.noorthat.
