Vulnerability Isn't A Liability

"Do you think about me?"

The tweet passed my timeline but I just kept coming back to it. I'd always been the person who, while in infatuation, in romantical tangles, in whatever we chose to call those things that make us want to be in love, but aren't love...I'm always the person that seems to want it more. I'm always the person asking that question, because, so often, the answer isn't clear, or worse, isn't what I wanted to hear.

I had a hard day today. I woke up feeling terribly insecure and didn't know where or how to place that feeling. I've been confident in myself and in my world for awhile now so for the feeling to hit me so hard was jolting. What was missing? What was wrong?

And then my someone wonderful comes into the picture. And boy, did I unload all my insecurities on him today. I'm wary of this thing he and I are in because it leaves me feeling like I'm asking too much, or am too jealous, or too nagging or any of the other myriads of things I think that get me down. I'm wary of these feelings, these unprovoked (or mildly, depending on your perception) jealousies and worries; feelings, and people, change constantly, and I, for all intents and purposes, am a rock. I may shift, I may chip, I may be polished, but ultimately I am the same. Today though, I was not a rock. And for that reason, I kinda lost my sh*t.

You see, the way I'm used to it happening is this: I fall, they don't. They lead me on, and I stupidly follow. They drop me, and I bruise. I move on, and they miss me. They ask me do I still think about them, do I miss them? So many of my ex-somethings seem to still have my number. Seem to want to follow me on Twitter. Keep friending me on Facebook. My answer is in the response that they get: none.

I am weary of always being someone's "What if" or someone's "second place." I am weary of putting everything I've got into this love thing and never getting much back. And I'm tired of dudes from friendtationships past hitting me up on some Ne-Yo "Do You?" type sh*t because no, I don't. For a week or two after? Definitely. But someone's got me now who I don't worry about dropping me, as even if he does, I've know doubt he'd help me back up. Someone's got me now who tries to assuage my fears rather than feed them. Someone's got me now who cares about me where all others have failed. And if you didn't bring that to the table to begin with so long ago, I'd be a fool to miss you, much less think about you, now.

As for the me in the present? I won't lie and say I'm a secure girlfriend. At this distance? Insecurity chews me up inside some days. I try to stay cool, calm and collected, not letting it all get to me, and most days, I succeed. But days like today? Everything has me hypercritical, nit-picking, not at him or our situation but at me, and the myriad of things I could be doing better. I could be stronger, and more secure. I could be thinner and wear my hair differently. All these internalized things, because I simply don't know how to ask him "Do you think about me?" without feeling clingy, needy or naggy.

I forget sometimes that my vulnerability isn't a liability but rather the thing that makes me human. Vulnerability makes me nervous. It makes me feel weak and dumb and like I'm making a fool of myself constantly. If I'm vulnerable with you, please, be patient with me. I'll ramble like an idiot. I might cry a little. But if you handle me right, I come back stronger, better and ultimately more comfortable and confident, if not in myself, than in where I stand with you. In such case, you won't have to answer the question, because at that point, I'll no longer be asking it.

Trust Issues: A Family Affair

I have trust issues no Drake. I didn't know they were as deep or as encompassing as I've recently found them to be, but they are truly there and I'm wondering why it took me so long to notice them.

Yesterday at my job was hard; back-to-back calls, brand new rules and even more unnecessary pressure. I spend a majority of my day fighting; I fight my car, I fight my customers, my managers, the last thing I want to do is come home and fight. But sometimes what you want isn't what you get.

It wasn't necessarily a fight, but more of a calling to the carpet, yet again. I don't mind those, they let me know what I need to work on, but when I'm already doing the best I know how to do, and people are constantly telling me I'm not doing good enough when I know and feel that I am? It not only hurts, but it makes me close myself off even further back than I am in myself. And that is where I learned of my trust issues.

I haven't truly trusted my parents in a really long time; the last call to the carpet forced me to come head-on with that realization. I love them both, very dearly, but I don't believe in them the same as I used to. I have this settled feeling in my heart that they have, and will continue to drop me, leave me, or let me down just like they seem to have the settled feeling that life is going to f*ck me up and over, and that I will continue to let it and thus, let them down. 

It's been that way since the divorce. I always thought I'd gotten over that so long ago but as it turns out, it's just solidified in me a distrustful nature of my family. Instead, I pick my family as I go along - W is the sister, Soul Brotha is the brother that I've always needed and wanted. In my mind, I am my own mother, nagging and pushing, but encouraging and hopeful. I am my own father, firm and determined, constantly reminding me of my worth and that I deserve the best. My parents, their amazing qualities, are instilled in me already to make me push myself further; I just wish they knew they hadn't failed, which I feel they sometimes think they have. 

I am not the college student they raised me to be. I am not a doctor, or a lawyer, not yet a teacher not yet even on my own. But I am a great person. I am smart, I am kind, I am stead-fast and hard-headed with my goals. If that isn't enough for them for now, then I suppose it's time I stopped wanting to please them so much. 

Not to say I will stop honoring them, not to say I will stop listening to and learning from them, but my heart is hard against them, defensive, and I don't really know where to start chipping away at it in that respect. I'm not sure if I'm ready to or know how, but I know that my love for them is going to push me, I'm just apprehensive about if it's pushing me closer or further.

Musing: Fear, Love and Chess...?

There was once a time where I was fearless. I would get on a bike, knowing I would be almost magnetically drawn to the one pole/ditch/bench/object in the area, fall and scrap something, and yet I'd do it anyway. There was a time when I was fearless, and wrote a boy in my class a love poem, because he told me he thought it was cool that I read above our grade's reading level by at least 4 grades. I used to be fearless once.

When my Dad left my Mom, I thought I handled it well. My dad was my best friend in the world at the time, and all I knew for sure were the three of us (and my dog Lucky) and suddenly I didn't have that knowledge any more and couldn't be sure of the ground I stood on, much less the people in my life. And now that I think on it, that's when I started to become afraid, not only of doing things away from my two people but of life in general.

So between the ages of twelve and eighteen I was existing in this world; life was happening to me, and I didn't really have any feelings about it. Point of fact, all I was interested in during those years was falling in love, and being somebody's everything and having something, some love, that I felt was lacking. And I looked in all the wrong places for that validation. Once I hit nineteen, for the first time in life I lived exclusively with my Dad. I stayed with him no more than two years all together.

When I was nineteen I fell in love with this guy who could never and would never love me back. I spent the better part of my year or so knowing him trying to force myself to be what he liked, force myself thinner, prettier, funnier, anything so that he would see things the way I did, so that he would see me as a woman who could love him. And then I spent the next two years learning to trust myself again, and forgive my foolish heart for not taking the hints that were given; I spent those years undoing all the damage that he and I caused myself.

Over time I've become fearful. I fear not having things as much as I do having them. I fear making friends, as because of my nomadic past I have a tendency to pull away from people once I feel like I'm no longer needed or that I may be moving. I fear not being near either of my parents, because to me they (and W) are all I've got. I fear falling in love again because the first time was disastrous and took me so long to come back from, and I still feel like I'm missing pieces from it.

But I can't let fear govern my moves anymore. Life is scary. You fall in love and you don't know how or when or why but you do, and for someone not knowing how and not having answers that could be terrifying. You find a new job that you're not sure you're even qualified for, where it seems everyone, including you are expecting you to fail. You make a move that's so out of character for you, you question your own mind and intentions. Life is scary, but not living it would be the real nightmare.

Not taking those leaps when they present themselves is short changing yourself, psyching yourself out into believing that, for whatever reason, you don't deserve or wouldn't know what to do with those things that you crave and that you do, indeed, deserve.

I keep thinking that I confronted my fears on a snowy day in Fayetteville, that the day my heart was broken was the day I came face to face with my worse fears and overcame them. Only now do I realize that fear still hides behind my advice to others, my cautious way of living, my unusually tough walls to get behind. I give the veneer of being shy and reserved, but the fact is I'm amazingly outgoing...once I stop being afraid of you. And I'd never realized it until, once again, I got overwhelmed with feelings of missing home, and remembering that crazy dude who didn't realize that he'd broken me. I got caught up in the 'what if' game of these new things I'm attempting, this new life I'm trying to forge for myself. And I cry when I get overwhelmed which makes me feel really...girly; more than one emotion at a time and I'm pretty much putty that's another blog for another time.

Fear of rejection. Fear of pain. Fear of losing things you hold close to your heart. We've all got them, and we all process them differently. I forget that not dealing with them doesn't make them go away, rather for me they make them all the more tangible. As a woman who's going through this inner change into who I'm meant to be, I neglected working through my fears as I figured you grow out of those, right? You grow out of not being picked first for the teams, and the teasing, and whatever else made you fearful as a kid...right? No, fear is something that'll grow within you if you let it.

So my sage words for today are diminish the fear. Everything you do is going to have risks and consequences, and anything you think you deserve is going to take sweat and tears and work. Not taking those risks to avoid those consequences cheat you out of the rewards. Letting fear rule you makes you a pawn on the chess board of life when you should be the Queen (or King), the piece that makes all the moves, the most valuable piece on the board. That's not to say be hasty and just move your Queen around whilly-nilly, but recognize the good before it's too late. Don't let the fear of losing the Queen piece cost you the entire game.

Tes Gets Jealous Easy

I am messy. The two rooms that are my responsibility have clothes everywhere, maybe a couple empty containers of God knows what and hair paraphernalia literally everywhere. I start off this way to say, I'm not perfect, as much as people may peg me as such, or as much as I'd like to be.

I'm also easily jealous, especially if I'm not sure of my standing with people. I learned  acknowledged this earlier in my college life where I was in the running to be this guy's potential girlfriend; he was a flirt and almost no girl was off limits. As such, I became really insecure; was I not enough for him? I wore make-up and sexed up my look, I dumbed myself down and acted a little more like those girls he was into, but yet it was like he was still searching for the next best thing, not realizing (or maybe realizing and not caring that) he had a girl who would care, love, and be there for him all in me.

It took me two years to fully get over that guy. I think it was because I wanted it so badly and it just ending up not holding, but what I never got over was that irrational jealousy when people I genuinely care about are involved. I wish I could get over it, as life would be so much sweeter for me that way.

Jealousy for me doesn't feel like "look at that b*tch, over there eating crackers like she owns the place;" jealousy grips my heart like a very vague but very biting fear. It's never just towards women on the street; if a woman's doing her thing (and doing it well) I'm the last person to hate on that. But if there's a guy involved I've been known to get a little vicious.

I mention it today tonight because there's this guy I'm interested in (not sure if you noticed...) and I fell asleep for a few hours to find some new broad all up and through his Twitter. Now, for most women I'm not sure if that would be a problem but for me? Oh, my aching little heart went all tight in my chest and I kind of wanted to ruin her life just a little...

But I took a step back (and a deep breath) and assessed not only the situation but myself. I found I was feeling this way because I, despite my cool demeanor about where he and I are going, am still unsure; he likes to credit me as being the level-headed, patient one, and this is true but not when I get all jealous. At that point,  nothing else matters but removing that source of jealousy from the picture all together. And...that's wrong; I shouldn't have to start removing people from another person's life to make me feel better - that's childish.

Me being jealous isn't because of some random girl, it's because of me. Because I'm not confident in myself and what I have to offer, any other person moving in on my person seems threatening to me. Because I don't know what this guy sees in me, it makes it seem like any girl off the street would be able to give him something he could feel (literally and figuratively) and that scares me more than I'm willing to admit; my heart is all caught up, but what if his isn't, or he doesn't feel the same? I'm back in that boat I was two years ago, pining after someone who would never, and could never feel the same for me when I promised myself I'd never go back there.

I read once that jealousy is like drinking poison and waiting for the object you're jealous of to die, and it's  been true so far, but I've never been able to see it that way until now. All the times I was jealous in my life I'd put so much energy towards disliking, and ultimately screwing around with and hurting this other person that I neglected what doing that to them would do to me. It made me feel, in the long run, like a vindictive, petty little monster who manipulated people and their nature to get what I wanted. The sad fact of it is, in doing all of that, I never ever got what I wanted.

So after assessing all this, I calmed myself down: this guy thinks I'm one of a kind and the feeling's mutual. This guy is kind and wouldn't do something to intentionally make me feel a negative way. As for the girl? I've no idea who she is or what her intentions are or if she even has any. My overactive mind was just putting doubts in a situation where there's so much room, in my eyes, for error, trying to make me fail.

Jealousy, I think, is a product of our insecurities trying to make us back down or lose focus from the things that really matter. I really matter; I've done so much fine tuning within myself that I've become comfortable with who I am as a person but I'd be kidding myself if I said I didn't have so much room to grow. And this guy matters, because he legitimately makes my heart sing and makes me feel comfortable enough to actually be myself when I talk to him. Everything else? Well, none of that matters much unless I make it matter. And for the first time, I refuse to let something like jealousy get in the way of me being happy; I refuse to make jealousy matter.

The Plight of the Superwoman

Everyone has that friend. The one who's doing it all with very little sweat, tears or fanfare. The one with all their stuff together, ducks in a row, and they just make it all look so easy you wonder why you couldn't do it. We all know that superwoman, and some of us are that superwoman.


I've been the "superwoman" friend as long as I could remember having friends. I was the one with the assignment done the week it was assigned (or pulled an A from thin air an hour before class). I was the one with all the relationship answers, despite lacking my own relationship to test it out in. I was the one with the quiet, modest plan in life to be a super glamorous, highly respected high school English teacher, simply because, of all the things I could do, molding young people's minds was the one that stuck out the most.


I am a superwoman. Not by choice, rather by circumstance so I am often tired and under-appreciated, or rather feel that way because I don't take time to rest and appreciate myself. The plight of the superwoman is in her quiet nature; because she is so sure and steady, people take her minute motions and gestures for granted, and as such, she starts to take herself for granted. 


I am a superwoman. When everyone leans on me I am a rock, I never falter. If they ask me the same question a thousand times my answer never changes. On my own, in the quiet between the dark and the dawn I have to still my own waters, be my own rock not because there's no one who will listen, but often those people who listen will somehow always turn the conversations back on themselves, or spout cliche'd -isms they've read on plaques and bumper stickers that never fully fit me. I have to find my own mold, in the quiet when I should be sleeping, I often find myself sorting through feelings, thinking or daydreaming of a day when I'll no longer be tired, when life will fall into place.


 I'm a superwoman, but I'm still a woman. I find I crave the things that used to scare me so. I don't know how to get out there to go get those things I really want, but have recognized my issues and am taking very small and short steps before making a running leap into the unknown. I'm insecure about my body and sometimes wonder if I'm unattractive to men my age as so few of them approach me. Wonder if now, like in middle and high school, my wit and advanced state of mind has me in the minority yet again. 


I'm a woman. I think a lot before I do anything. I work really hard and sleep a lot less. I'm always writing and creating things in my mind. I still like to color with Crayons and listen to offensive rap music in the same hour I'll listen to jazz and alternative. I cook barefoot while listening to soul music. I cry, sometimes for no reason but often compose myself in a few minutes. I sing love songs when I'm sad, and rock out when I clean. I'm complex and quiet, a tough combination, but my heart is full of love and care, just waiting for someone who'll care to listen to it's soft beating.


I'm a woman. I happen to do super things. And so, I'm a superwoman. I'm proud. I'm exhausted, but I'm so proud of me it rings vibrantly with energy enough to keep me going. That's more than a lot of women, super or otherwise, can say. And for now, it's more than enough.  

Storytime: Tes and Jewish Men

My aunt used to love to take me shopping in Germany. Admittedly I loved the culture, the people, the candy food; it was all like something out of a fairy tale. The buildings weren't over three levels tall, the streets were cobblestoned, and people could take carriages throughout the district. It was beautiful and it drew me in something serious, even as a kid. Coincidentally that was the around the time I first saw a Hassidic Jewish man praying in public.

While my aunt was heckling with a vendor buying things from a vendor, I had time to observe and listen closely. He was speaking in a language I couldn't understand but that was melodious and calm, though with lots of hard consonants. He was wearing a wide brimmed black hat and loose fitting black clothing. He had a long beard and two long curls of hair on either side of his face. And as he prostrated before his G-d, I decided in my no-more-than-eight-year-old mind that I liked this guy.

And its been like that ever since.

Over time I began to look into Judaism and found that I felt more drawn to it than any other religion I had been flirting with. Christianity scared me when I was younger; in my mind it looked like God was just coming down and touching people making them pass out and holler. Later in my teens I flirted with the idea of Islam and although I felt better there than with Christianity it still wasn't an easy fit.

A year or so ago I met a man at a Borders bookstore. We were both looking in the poetry section and he asked me if I knew much about the book I had picked up and suggested another one instead. ("Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair" by Pablo Neruda in case you were wondering.) I could tell he was older, how much so I wouldn't know until our third time meeting where we met for coffee (tea, actually) and discussed the book.

He was an odd looking guy; he, much like the man from my childhood, wore all black and a wide brimmed black hat. He had long peyes (uncut sideburns) and vibrant green eyes and an amazing smile. And we dated for roughly 8 months. I think we were a crazy sight; him in all his glory and I, a full foot shorter in sneakers and t-shirts and big hoop earrings. Visually we didn't fit, but in most other aspects we did. In the end though, it wasn't the right fit or the right time.

I felt real with him. I know it's odd to say that before I felt like a piece of something, a figment of my own imagination. He brought out what was real with me; my anxiety, my jealousy, my short-sightedness...All the bad things were called to the carpet, but immediately after we would talk about the good in me, my willingness to try, my intelligence, my compassion. It was a give and take relationship that made me a better person and gave me a great respect for his perspective and the perspective his religion gave him.

I think in that fairytale setting so long ago I saw something real. I saw something that could withstand time, language, race and whatever other qualifiers a person can come up with. And I saw it in a man, unashamed of who he was, where he came from or who (and what) he represented to the world. And there started my appreciation, respect and admiration of Jewish men.