Geesh....

So I was searching through my email earlier today for a message about Thanksgiving and since GMAIL doesn't delete a damn thing, I found this email text I sent exactly 2 years ago to the day:

Good afternoon! I'm doing just lovely. I am in Atlanta, still. It's growing on me, and things are good. I love my job -- I'm working at *******. I head home to LA for Thanksgiving on tomorrow morning until the end of the month. Then I come back to celebrate my birthday in early December :) Can't say I'm IN love, that's a pretty foreign concept, but I'm dating. Atlanta men leave a lot to be desired, but I'm doing. What, you have someone to hook me up with? ~smiles~

She asked me was I in love, and I responded with the above. The day before Thanksgiving in 2006.

Two years later, ain't a DAMN thing changed.
Seriously.
That's pretty damn depressing when I think about it.
Oh what the hell have I been doing?
I wish I knew.
Had something to show for all this seemingly wasted time.
Sooo.....

I've just about given up on dating, though. The men I've been with are not familiar with the concept and I'm not in the business of teaching a man how to woo a woman. Doesn't seem to bode well for love and marriage, but how it's been conducted clearly has not been working, so there must be another approach. What that is? I'm not sure yet, but I will spend some time considering it.

My best friend always tells me to stay in the game, not to let my cynicism get the best of me when we discuss my latest and greatest woeful tale of lust gone wrong. But I thought I had been and what/where has it gotten me over the last two years? Talk about insanity.

My discovery and understanding of the concept of love languages can be the game changer. I've been guilty of settling in the past, but I'm learning more of myself and in turn, how to better love another. Prayerfully, I won't find myself settling in the future. Rather, winning in love....

Thanksgiving 2010 will prayerfully be much different!

Si, Se Puede!

I'm up early this morning. Before 4:45 to be exact. Like a kid on Christmas. Excited. Anxious. Tired. Who can sleep on this historic day, eh? Sleep later.

I'm also, what? Reflective. But that's not a surprise.

I think back to elections past that I have had a priviledge to participate in. And yes, my thoughts DO turn to which man I was with, or not with, in thinking about where I was on my life journey. I mean, really, what is a woman's life without the specter of a man, eh? HA

My very first votes were cast via absentee ballot for Bill Clinton, back in '92. I recall spending the evening with that gentleman from Jamaica. By the time Inauguration rolled around, I was had moved on to that exchange student from Princeton. Come 1996, I was in Ohio, in love with a brotha at school in Chicago, and mad because my ballot wasn't received in time to count in California. My candidates won, but I felt robbed of my chance to speak, if you will.

By 2000, I was a grown azz woman (or so I thought), no longer in school, living on my own and able to vote at a precinct for the first time. And the seeds of intrigue with Mr. Baltimore had just been planted. I recall feeling very hopeful about the future, that a new era was on the horizon. That the sun, moon and starts were aligning for a new beginning in love. But just like that election wasn't settled until weeks later, it was Inauguration Day that the fate for me and Mr. Baltimore was "settled" and come election day 2004, while standing in the longest line I'd ever been in to vote, I read more than a couple chapters of "He's Just Not That Into You." This wisdom of the read set in, as I was preparing to move on in more ways than one.

So 4 years ago, after feeling robbed again by the political process, I gave my job the finga, sold my shit, and moved south. I arrived with the determination to turn some red into blue. As much as I love the color red, all that red on the electoral map made my stomach churn, and everything in me said blue could return to the south. Full disclosure here: When I heard about the candidacy of Barack Obama, I felt inspired, but I wasn't a believer from the start. My full intention was to vote for him in the primary, so I could "say" I voted for a Black man for President. However, I just "knew" Hillaryland would sweep the primaries and I'd be voting for her come today. But......

I donated money and time to a campaign for the first time in my life this year. I even went to the Democratic National Convention this year for the first time in my life. I have been entirely attentive to the campaigns this year for the first time in my life. I have been enthralled, engaged and inspired by the Obamas and the realization of the potential for the country and the world. I cast my vote a couple weeks ago in a process that took about 35 minutes in downtown Atlanta. A new dawn, a new day, a new life.....Georgia feels blue!!

And "Change We Can Believe" in is not only a campaign mantra, but is also what I'm feeling for my relationships. I need to believe that what ever is next for me in life, in love....will be distinctly different. Granted we'll have to see what the day brings, but whatever transpires, we are starting anew.