Happy New Year! I hope your New Year's Eve celebrations were worthwhile. I had an interesting evening, drank perhaps more than I should, but at least I was at home drinking. Had a good meal with friends. You can't go wrong with sushi...mmm.
This afternoon it's a quick jaunt with E.J to Hershey's stepbrother neighboring city for pork and sauerkraut dinner and movies at Queen Hester's. My house is still a disaster from Christmas, so I'm on a cooking strike until I get around to properly cleaning. Oh sure, it's straightened up, but its messy enough I need to get on my hands and knees and CLEANSE this house properly.
I might pop over to my sistah-girl, Tamodi's, later for some greens and mac 'n cheese. I pray though she didn't make chitlins! Ugh. I will never eat that shit! Yes, my southern roots & heritage have given me a taste for trotters (pigs feet) every now and again, but chitterlings, aw Hell no! I'd sooner starve, LOL!
So it's officially 2008, huh? Thinking about the year ahead, I want to do something with my life, something creative and challenging. The blog has been a big help, but I also want to expand my horizons beyond the Internet. I might attempt to volunteer again. Until I got sick last summer, I'd been volunteering at the AIDS Alliance and a local homeless shelter. Perhaps I should pursue going back? Maybe I could do something different. What I'd like to do is get more involved in the SGL/LGBT African American community here in Central PA. It's fairly underground unless you know exactly where to look. I need deeper connections with my community and I'm feeling a void lately.
Being an openly gay/bisexual man of color in my area has been interesting to say the least. I break stereotypes, or so I've been told. I see myself as so queer it isn't even funny, but most of my straights say I don't come off as gay. Is that a problem if I don't? Hm? Last night I made the comment about a friend who's totally clueless about my sexual leanings. I said to my group I don't butch it up, don't try to hide anything, that I openly make comments that leave no questions as to where I stand sexually around said friend. Miss T smartly replied "When did you ever butch it up?" Ha ha ha. Very funny. I know she was playing, but her remarks stung for a moment. Striking core to my self-identity issues.
I've worked hard these last few years to come to self-accepting terms. Missing in my life is a large compliment of normal gay people of color. Sure I have gay friends of color, Napoleon, Leoban, Brother Soulman, RaShawn, Daniel, Altors, but their lives are outlandish and prone to exaggerated drama. I'd like a larger social base to draw support and companionship from more on my comfort level. I've been thinking I need to get off my duff and have the conversation with my parents (I'm sure they know, but I need to grow a pair, and just say I'm a 'Mo and be done with it!) so I can go home to Philly. Philadelphia as a huge African American LGBT community.
Perhaps, I could even more back to DC. Moving back there might be tough though because I remember DC doesn't exactly have the most inviting Gay Black community. If you're not already established on the inside, good luck getting in. At least how I remember growing up with my(gay black) father back in the 80s. Perhaps it's changed. Should I give it a second chance?
Moving back to Washington would also be emotional because a significant disruption toward young development happened there. Yet DC always feels like home when I go back. It's a double sided issue. All my family that lived there are now dead.
I should drop down there in the next few months. Yeah. Reconnect with better portions of my past. Maybe catch the Cherry Blossoms in the spring. I've been longing to see the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum for years. Or even catch a ride on the Metro, descend deep underground to DuPont Circle station on the Red Line (always a favorite memory) that'll get where you need in they City. Perhaps I could take a ride out to Tyson's Corner. Go to McLean or Reston and see old buddies I haven't seen in forever. Peruse old haunts in Georgetown even....
2008 lies before me with promise. Its tabula rasa, clean slate. What I do in the next 3-6-5 should be things to strengthen, uplift, build my self-esteem, self-worth, and character. I feel the itch of 40 coming faster and there's so much I want to become before that life change. I want to endeavor to be happier this year.
In '08, I also was want a partner, my companion, that special significant other. He's out there, I just have to work to find him. Sure, life will go on if I'm not in a relationship. I'm continuing to learn one must be happy and love self before others can do so. Once I get my foundation in order, everything else will fall into place. The place I'm at right now isn't bad, but it's lonely. I want to be more than who I've been. Have more than what I have now. Not so much materialistic, but rather, spiritual and emotional wealth.
Good? I hope it'll be.
1 comment:
Sounds like your New Year's eve was about the same as mine. I visited a friend in Chicago and we stayed in and ordered Sushi and watched movies all evening. BTW - I have no tolerance for chitterlings either. In fact, I've never been able to get past the smell, therefore I have never even been able to bring myself to try one (my family thinks I'm bougie because of this).
Sounds like you have a very interesting life there in Pennsylvania. It also sounds like we have some of the same goals for 2008. Living in Cleveland, I too desire to move to a more cosmopolitan area where it may be possible to cast a wider network of gay friends of color.
You are in a very interesting place in your life, and I can certainly identify. There are times in life that we are content, there are times we aren't, there are times where we just go with the flow even though we don't want to, and then there are the moments we realize that we must implement change ourselves. Do we ever reach nirvana?
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