Brandelyn: Lyrical Contradiction

 

            “And the depth of the laughter! The way it seemed to go so far down inside it scraped the inside bottoms of feet. No one laughed like that anymore. Nothing seemed funny enough. When his uncle and his guests finished laughing, they seemed lighter, clearer; even their activities appeared to be done more gracefully. It was as if the laughing emptied them, and sharing it placed whatever was laughable and unbearable in its proper perspective.”

Alice Walker, The Temple of My Familiar

 

 

            Saturday was an insane day. It has been a long while since I had a day like that!  It started with a morning conference call for a project I’m working on. Then I had fifteen minutes to get showered, dressed and find a parking space in Jack London on a Saturday so I could attend a luncheon I was invited to. Surprisingly and with much prayer, I actually made it on time. Well, five minutes late, but the program didn’t get started until 1 so we were all good. The luncheon was for a program called SMASH (Summer Math and Science Academy) where I was a guest speaker this summer. The program is five weeks long and this was their end of the program celebration. It was really nice. These students are so amazing. They are all in high school, sophomore to seniors and they truly are the cream of the crop. Amazing. So I’m sitting there, enjoying my raspberry sorbet and literally out of the blue, my name is called and I was awarded the first annual SMASH Hero Award for my “Accomplishments and Social Conscience”. It caught me completely off guard, but it was really nice. I have my certificate hanging up on my wall as we speak!

            The next stop was at my friend Lee and Kacy’s house for Kacy’s surprise party. I got there an hour and half late, trying to make sure I made it after the surprise. However as it turns out, I made it just in time. I love my people. So we were instructed to bring gifts that represented our relationship with Kacy and a friend of mine brought a basket filled with all kinds of stuff, and it had a pitcher of water and a bag of flour. Kacy, calls me and starts laughing but I couldn’t figure out the joke. Then my friend started telling the story and I fell out laughing. Back at Cal, a few of us were chillin at Kacy’s old apartment and the boys there decided to throw us out of the house and lock us out. Then they thought it would be funny to throw water on us from the windows. So we retaliated by throwing water and flour on their cars. It was hilarious. As we relived the moment, I was laughing so hard and for a second, the sound of my laughter surprised me. It had been so long since I had genuinely laughed like that and while most of the people at the party were looking at me crazy for laughing like that, I needed it. I felt like that laughter emptied out all of the negative weight I have been carrying around and I just felt better.

            After that, I went to a friends house to wash clothes and just kind of relax for a minute. It was really nice just being around girls, not doing anything, watching the fifth element and eating cookies. Not to mention the laundry facilities that probably saved my whole situation.

            With my fresh clothes in the back seat, I headed back to Oakland to stop my friends house who was having a party for her daughter’s first birthday. I sat on the floor among the balloons and candy and just chilled. The music was good and it was nice catching up with my girl.

            Once I left her house, I stopped by yet another function just because I promised I would and was there for about five minutes.

            Twelve hours later, I walked back into my apartment put my clothes away and woke up the next morning on my couch. I don’t even know what happened. But I do know that I needed everything that happened that day. Sometimes you just need to be reminded that it feels good to be alive and thriving. No matter what is going on, a good laugh can just change your whole perspective.

Peace Y’all

B

Posted by Brandelyn at 09:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

So I am having one of those ‘silly’ days, so please forgive me for this blog.

 

            This morning, I woke up at 7, got dressed and headed out for my daily ritual of walking the lake and spending time with Jesus. As I was walking and getting down with some old school Kirk Franklin, my keen eye picked up on a couple of thing...

            Have you ever seen a duck sleep? They just sit there, right in the water, bobbing up and down with the waves with their little heads tucked into their feathers, knocked out. I wish I had that kind of serenity. It didn’t matter what was going on around them, if another herd of birds came around making noise, or if some kids threw sticks at them, they were just knocked out. I used to sleep that way as a kid, but now that I live alone, every little thing makes me stir. And now that I am still on earthquake alert its really bad now. Hence my ability to wake up at 7 am and walk...hilarious...

            Have you ever noticed that older black men always start their phrases with ‘okay’? There are a group of old men that I pass by every morning and it’s always the same greeting. “Okay, how you doing today sweetheart?” It cracks me up because the man who owns the coffee shop I practically live at now always does that. ‘Okay, how are you Brandelyn?” My old professor from Cal did it when we went to his house last weekend. “Okay, it’s good to see you.” LOL! I just thought that was funny.

            A friend of mine called me this morning to ask me about some medicine because he was sick and it got me to thinking about the last time I was really sick. It was last year and all of a sudden I was hit with the whole fever, chills, flu madness and it was not okay. After consulting Nana, I got on the phone with my boo at the time, put on tons of layers, turned on the space heater, crawled underneath every single blanket, sheet and cover I owned and settled down. I woke up the next morning feeling so much better because I sweated everything out, but it was also because the guy I was dating was extremely sweet about the whole thing. He stayed on the phone with me until I went to sleep and called me first thing in the morning to check on and called me throughout the day to check in. I kind of miss that, those sweet moments, but he turned out to more than a little shaky bakey, so I don’t miss it that much...

            Yesterday was my friends birthday and although we talked a million times yesterday, I just wanted to give her a shout out and tell her how much I love her and appreciate her in my life! ROSA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

Posted by Brandelyn at 09:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

            I was reading a friend of mines blog and he really inspired me to get back into it. I’ve been on hiatus for the last week from all of my writing projects, trying to recuperate from accomplishing a major goal. *And Joe, I don’t know if you are reading this, but you are truly an inspiration to me. I admire your honesty and beautiful way with words. Please let me know when the book comes out homie!* You all should check out his blog... http://www.trustintruss.blogspot.com/

            So yesterday I stayed for the triple feature at church and got a different word at every service. It was amazing. The one thing that resonated with me the most was the Pastor’s comments on women. There is a movement going on and maybe it’s just within me, but I see it happening with my friends too, but I am going to use myself as an example so as not to make any assumptions! LOL. Anywho, there is a movement going on within myself to learn to love who I am. The Pastor was talking about truly learning to admire the beauty that God has created you in. We are made in His image not Beyonce’s and its time for us to stop manipulating our bodies in order to fit into some fantasy ideal. My friend Thea wrote this poem that has become my anthem and one line says ‘if I want to be adored, I must inspire adoration’, and the only way that can happen is if we adore ourselves first. We have this concept of beauty that is so tainted and off key that we don’t know what to believe anymore. We take the words of strangers and use them as gospel because we are not strong enough to create our own definitions of self and live by them no matter what! The crazy thing is that I used to let all kinds of things dictate how I felt about myself, but I don’t do that anymore. I’ve learned to do me and if you aren’t on board, I don’t know what to tell you. I can’t let men dictate how I feel about myself. I have learned to determine my own flyness and bask in it. I might even have some not so cute days, but that’s cool because being fly is a state of mind, so even if my hair is whoped to one side and my clothes are wrinkled, I’m still fly. Before we can ask anyone to love us, we must first love all of who we are AS WE ARE.

            I feel really blessed to be the way I am. To be the size and shape I am. To have the talents I possess. To have the personality and sense of humor I have. To be everything I am because that is what God wanted me to be. I am perfect in His sight and I would be perfect in His sight if I were a size 2 or 22. Don’t get me wrong, it’s about being healthy too. I walk the lake in the mornings and try not to eat badly, but honestly, sometimes I do and that’s alright. It breaks my heart to see my sisters uncomfortable in their own skin. Tugging on clothes and shifting their bodies trying to hide parts of themselves all because they have been told over and over again that who they are and what they look like is not acceptable and they won’t be accepted until they start to lose weight and shed some of those pounds and then they will be perfect. Of course we all want to get to that point in our lives because thin women never have any body image issues and love themselves just as much as we do...right... So we are taught not to accept who we are and what we look like we are taught to always need and want to achieve more. When we look in the mirrors we don’t’ see the gifts God has given us.  All they see is the same thing I used to see, every single negative comment that has ever been said about them by a family member, friend, boyfriend, whatever. It is so easy to hold on to the negative things people say but nearly impossible to accept a compliment. Why is that?

            My birthday was last Wednesday and I turned 28 years old. In the next year of my life, I am determined to love me. I’ve spent the last 27 years feeling self conscious and everything a big girl in this society has been told she should feel about herself, but no more. His opinions no longer matter, in fact, he has been cut off because he is not on board with the program, and I’m creating the definition. It is so liberating to just let go of all the garbage and love. I hope this helps somebody today!

Peace Y’all

B

Posted by Brandelyn at 06:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This is dedicated to T-Mac and Ike who encouraged the retelling of this story with all of the embellishments I can think of! LOL!!!

 

            So, picture it. We are driving down the street and standing on one of the islands in the middle of the road is a man, who is clearly very angry, cussing and screaming and doing that I’m about to fight somebody back and forth strut all the while holding a screw driver. There is another man across the street standing in the doorway of a barbershop who is clearly trying to see what is going on. All the while, parked sideways, half on the curb and half in the street is a white work truck. A third man is running from the island where screwdriver man is standing and he makes it to the truck, dives into the back of the truck and comes out holding a large comforter. He then runs across the street to the island, bounces up and down a few times like boxers do and then he swings at screwdriver man with the blanket. He takes a step back, bounces again and takes another swing at screwdriver man. At this point, screwdriver man is trying to outrun the blanket and swing at blanket man with his screwdriver. The guy who was in the doorway at this point runs across the street to the island and tries to grab the blanket, because clearly that is the more dangerous weapon in this story, and pushing blanket man away from screwdriver man who has now returned to the angry back and forth strut, trying to cool himself off.

            We were driving, so I can’t say how the story ended, however, I have to give Oakland two snaps for the sheer innovation of it all. It doesn’t always take some crazy weapon to win a fight. Sometimes the very thing we snuggle up with to keep us warm at night is the very thing that can make our point in an argument. All I know is that if my trunk worked, I would carry a blanket with me. You never know when it would come in handy!

PEACE Y”ALL!

B

Posted by Brandelyn at 09:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Okay, so there are many things I can handle, Blizzards, random gunfire, Oakland. However, there is just one thing that I cannot take and that is an earthquake. Last night I was resting comfortably in my bed, knocked out even and then all of a sudden, the entire earth started shaking. The quake which they said was a 4.2, but I think it was much stronger than that lasted for 10 seconds, which I think lasted at least 10 minutes. My entire apartment shifted and slid around and then all was silent. There weren’t even any aftershocks, that’s how crazy this thing was. The earth was so tired that it couldn’t even be bothered with an aftershock. I’m telling you the whole thing was a mess. The cold part about it is that the epicenter of the quake was in Oakland. I feel like that is unfair. Oakland has enough to deal with as it is, we don’t need earthquakes. We can deal with being on the edge of an earthquake in walnut creek or something, but being the epicenter is doing just a bit too much. So now, anytime a truck rumbles by to loudly or the garage opens, I’m headed to the doorway ready to brave it out. The whole thing was completely unnecessary and now I’m on edge. Man...this whole thing is not the business. Dang...there goes the garage opening again...I gotta go...
Peace Y’all

Posted by Brandelyn at 05:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I think I may need to get out of Oakland for a while. I’m not sure where I could possible go because even with all of its tomfoolery, the city simply fits me. Well for the most part it fits me, but then there are moments like this one when it is JULY and the temperature is 50 degrees and overcast...Yes Guns, the clouds are back! But, besides that I realize my life has become just a bit too Oaklandish when my first reaction to hearing a song I like is to start shaking my head as though I had dreads and scrunching my face in the “thizz” fashion as my form of approval. I don’t even blink anymore when a bay area native driver decides to make a left turn from the right lane cutting across four lanes of traffic to do it against a red light. I get slightly miffed when I have to go to Berkeley for whatever reason and now automatically believe when I hear a popping sound that it must be fireworks, (which isn’t too outlandish considering the holiday that just passed) but I guess that theory could only work during the first week of July.

            Whatever the case, my level of hood is about to exceed its limits and maybe I need to go to Atlanta or Houston for a while and calm down. But then, my creative side I believe would suffer. Oakland inspires me in so many ways and my little notebook that is starting to fill up with the new poems would probably not appreciate the change, so I don’t know. It’s just something I was thinking about.

            But just a quick update for y’all. The writing career is taking off and I’m super excited. My first reviews came out in the June issue of Vapors magazine and I am hard at work listening to more albums and I have my first artist interview on Wednesday. I’m a bit nervous, but more so excited. My good friend Yancie has officially revamped my website and it is beautiful. So make sure you check out the changes www.beencee.com and let me know what you think! I’m also thinking about stopping with the email reminders, or at least doing thing every once in while, like with those blogs I really love. Let me know what you prefer. Anywho...it’s 7:39 in the morning and I’ve got a ton of fun work to do. So, let me know what you think about the new site and have a fabulous day!

Peace Y’all

B

Posted by Brandelyn at 07:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I never understood the goal until I heard a song by Kem today entitled ‘You Might Win.”

He says:

            “In the end, there can be only laughter

            After the dance, lies a whole new chapter

            So never wait too long to try

Cause you might, you might win

Love is all that we’re after

Though we pretend

There’s much more to capture

These are sacred days

Let’s make room for each other

And let love have its way

Have your fill of its wonder

But never hold on to too tight

And you might, you might win”

 

            Often, I find myself pretending that I am comfortable with the fact that I just might be a career woman, a new generation Oprah if you will. I can imagine a life of work, meeting people, traveling, growing, but never having someone who will fully understand and get all of the pieces that make me what I am. I can see myself surrounded by people that only know so much about me and only ever get to see the smiling confident side because what I am slowly learning is that people often just can’t handle anything less than perfection. Weak moments are not tolerated and the moment you have one, because yes they are inevitable, you begin to lose some of the magic that makes you special.

            But what if we were allowed to be unspecial, even if just for a moment? Listening to that song, I realized that all of us have a goal. Whether or not we chose to admit it, everyone has a goal to find love. But not just any love, we all hope and pray that someday we will be blessed to find blind love. We all want to find someone to be ugly with and to cry in front of and to be vulnerable without the consequence of losing ground in the relationship. We all want someone we can fall apart in front of, who will not only laugh at our jokes but get them. Someone who understands the quite times and appreciates them. Someone who can tolerate our crazy taste in music and might eventually start to feel some of those beats themselves. Someone who can appreciate a breezy day and a home cooked meal. Basically, the goal is to find someone who can live inside of the barriers and fronts and be comfortable there.

            In my life, there is a lot of expectation. There are people that expect me to succeed, and a lot of people who expect me to fail. There are people that expect me to be creative and productive and to not only live up to a certain standard, but often times, create that standard. The pressure sometimes is unbelievable and yes for the most part I do my best to handle it, but it would be nice to be around someone who didn’t expect me to be anything but B. Sometimes I just want to be the silly, goofy, creative, slightly neurotic, unorganized, procrastinatory, perpetually sleepy, often too lazy, insecure, pseudo-chef who loves to experiment in the kitchen/vocalist who sings in falsetto/girl who never quite understands men.

There are some days when the pressure sits so heavily on my shoulders that all I can do is let the tears fall. I am surprised by the number of people I simply cannot cry around, and like my girl Thea says in her poem, “Sometimes I cry just so I can feel something,” sometimes I cry just so I can make room to breathe. And yes, sometimes I would love to be able to cry without losing a little piece of my power. One of my biggest fears is to be looked at as weak, but sometimes, the tears need to just fall. And I realize that that’s okay.

As a creative person, I need someone who will inspire me. I want to be able to look at you or hear your voice and hear lyrics. And while that may sound like a hard order to fill, all it truly takes to be an inspiration to someone else is passion. If you are passionate about something in your life, it is easy for someone just as passionate to pick up on that and want to bottle it up. The goal is to find that, to bask in that and to find someone who will not only allow you to do that, but on occasion create the environment for that to happen.

I don’t know. I’ve been told that my expectations are too high, but I am physically incapable of lowering them. But that song really just opened up something in me today. But I’m glad that laughter is what is waiting for me in the end. That tells me that no matter what happens, whether love comes my way or not, I will have laughter and I will be happy.

 

Peace Y’all

B

Posted by Brandelyn at 02:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

 

            I was on the bus the other day, heading to Berkeley to teach a class and instead of hiding my face behind a book like I normally do, I decided to simply watch. The bus was packed full of people and in a rare event, Oakland was having an extremely warm day, so the bus was about 15 degrees hotter inside with all of the body heat. As I sat in my seat I saw a homeless man who seemed to be a little crazy taking up extra seats with his legs stretched out, mumbling to himself, nothing out of the ordinary here really.  But I noticed that anytime anyone sat next to him or near him, he cracked a joke and made that person laugh. One woman laughed loudly and shook her head and thanked the man for making her smile today because she was having a really bad day. This homeless man nodded his head and went back to mumbling to himself until the next person came along. At one point he jumped to the aid of a woman in a wheelchair who was struggling trying to get her hands in the straps so she could hold on, smiling and mumbling the whole time. A few stops later, he did not hesitate to give up his seat to an old man who couldn’t keep his balance with the jerking of bus. I watched the man as he mumbled and talked to himself and when I got off the bus I suddenly felt a million times better. Even though I was not having the best day, watching that man just be nice to perfect strangers just made me feel better.

 

            On the way back home, the bus was even more full, a hundred degrees hotter and everyone including the bus driver had a major attitude. However, a blind woman got on the bus and for at least three stops everyone sat and watched her struggle to stand up as the bus jerked and pulled its way down the street. A young woman who had gotten on a few stops before the woman and was laden with at least 10 bags, got up and let the blind woman have her seats. It took her a couple of minutes to get all of her bags out of the way but the blind woman could not have been more grateful. When the young lady with the bags exited the bus, one of the men on the bus helped her with get off the bus with her bags before jumping back on the bus.

            As I was sitting there watching all of this, the woman sitting next to me suddenly tapped the man sitting in front of us on his shoulders and said something to him before touching his hair and pulling a spider out of his hair. Now we are not going to into why he had the spider in his head, but it was the fact that she was nice enough to do something about it. As we all know I don’t do spiders, so I probably would have alerted the man it its presence, but that’s about it...I’m just sayin’. But it was nice to see people taking care of other people.

            Helping friends out in a time of need with groceries or gas or even rent just because you love someone often goes unnoticed or unappreciated. Being supportive of someone, even if they don’t support you is something that is difficult but can be so beneficial to our spirits, just like praying for people who have done you wrong and wishing those people well. These are random acts of kindness and they are not as distant a memory as I once thought. People are nice to each other and there is still a general sense of kindness in our society. The problem is that often we are too involved in our own worlds to notice the needs of other people. But on an occasion it’s good to keep your nose out of your book and just look around. Seeing all of those little things the other day really inspired me to just try and be more attentive and most importantly, nice.

Peace Y’all

B

Posted by Brandelyn at 12:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)