Overwhelm, and Facing the Music

Godwilling we will get through this. I will for my stuff too. Amen.

All I am is overwhelmed. I don’t know when this will end. I think bullet points are the best thing to do at this moment and then get to things. I’m trying to do everything and don’t know how I will with a job where I work until 11pm four nights a week. And take Uber back. But I think hopefully I can keep this going for one year and things transition naturally. That it sucks waking up at 7:41am and getting back at almost midnight the nights I work. I don’t know. I am trying. So here is all I am dealing with. If I get through this all, we do, it will be amazing and really, the next level will present itself with the right foundation, Godwilling.

The Things, Difficult Stuff

• Figuring out my time — it is time to be open about the issue and know among my siblings to be open about this with them and everyone, the trouble of getting to sleep and walking up at a decent time. I will continue to work on this. And figure it out accordingly for the many late nights I work.
• Difficult/bad news in my personal circle (to be very vague) and really this being really hard to deal with and priority to make sure they are okay and will be healed fully, for many many years
• Texting my older brother who doesn’t communicate with me or others because of staying in secrecy, silence, perversion, and shame. I think it is a generatioal curse we carry. I’m almost certain of it.
• Trigger warning for people who care (most reading don’t, protect me from their eyes): I finally emailed my father who abused me as a kid, little girl. An incident that counts as this. Who didn’t share condolences for my mom dying. Who didn’t acknowledge that in the having to self protect and not talk with him (I WILL MAKE IT, GODWILLING), I turned 30 and 35. With my mom losing her life in between.
• Being in a space I think I’ve grown of maybe, even with my shortcomings. And finding a way to let go of it all and just be nice to people. God please give me the right home and support for my vulnerabilities.

What I have started to do however is face all of this rather than let it chase me or us. Well or two of these things I said don’t count as this.

There is more but the only way to say more is to take it one step at a time.

So blogging will hopefully allow me to get there. One step.

When I was 13, this memory is from then. I am 37 now so this was 24 years ago.

There was a White girl I went to school with, in the same grade, who was in my dance class too. I don’t remember what day it was, but after school ended at 3:20 I think, or at some point, her mother would pick both of us up and I’d hang out at her home in Buckhead, and then her mother would take both of us to dance class. It was fun. It sucks that she is a White girl and had more privilege than me. I hope I can still win in life and kind of leave this in my past. And rise above the circumstances of all of the White culture I’d been around. I say this instead of people, to beat the concept moreso.

I hate that people knew my name because it’s not forgetable after I’ve “made an appearance” or whatever. So please don’t let me meet any of these people ever again, even the Black ones, Godwilling.

Memories that helped me find center I guess.

I went to Jaliscos one time with them after dance, a Mexican restaurant on Peachtree Road or Street or something like this.

I also did something called the Tree Project in 9th grade, freshman year.

Oh yes, this was in 8th grade with this girl, this White girl. It sucks when I met a Black person years later, they informed me that because she was a White girl, she had it easier than me, but that I should still be nice to her.

I actually hope I do extremely well as well. I’ve noticed this type of thinking from Black people, like the assumption of my oppression. Which means when I do okay, you will downplay it. If you do the math of that type of projection.

It is true, but only once I tell you. Not once you assume. I don’t know.

Anyway, the next thing too is that the Tree Project. I wish that the teacher I had, what was his name? I forget. Well I let him have my project that I’d finished at the end, but it was probably the best one in the class.

We had to look at trees around Atlanta and answer different questions about each tree. Lots of maple trees. It was around fall, so I got some really pretty trees after cross country practice, running on Roswell Road I know. We’d run along the Chatahoochee River, the entire team, and they were nice to me. Even with the racism in the school, I realize now. So no, I don’t need to be double voiced I guess. But they paid for me to go to cross country camp in Southern Georgia.

The one Black boy I danced with at the dance. Actually I don’t care for being Black in White spaces because I find that actually triggering. You see two Black people, a boy and a girl, and suddenly they are connected. Actually, that makes me really uncomfortable. Actually, weird and invasive. Protect me from this Godwilling.

Anyway.

Elm. Maple. I loved this project. I didn’t think the teacher liked me really though. I always felt he just liked the athletic White girl more. I’d name her but I try not to name names unless they deserve it like David Norwood. Years later I’d mess up my AP Music Theory class, given by his wife, done by being so late all the time.

Okay let me go now. I have to watch a video. I don’t know if I can share more because it’s not for me. And I don’t want someone else to be the topic of my article who isn’t okay with being written about. Some things I say when it is too much to stay silent, I guess.

Anyway, God give us the strength to get through this, what has just happened.

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