Just Me

In the past week or so, I've had like 5 customers tell me that I can't possibly be from stl. And while that gives me some reassurance with the knowledge that I don't say "hurr" and "thurr", it also makes me wonder why I never seem to fit in.


I always feel out of place, everywhere I go. I always feel like I am the only one who thinks like I do, the only one who feels like I do and generally like people just cannot relate to me.

It's funny how it was never cool to be different and now that is all anyone wants to be.

Random musings posted from the new sidekick.

I can only be me, like it, hate it or misunderstand me, but I will not change for the world.

General Classroom Building no longer....

I've had a few proud moments in my life, but something happens to me everytime I think about this:

http://atmizzou.missouri.edu/aug07/Stickland.htm

The fact that within the last few months, I've lost two excellent black leadership mentors, pioneers on the campus where I spent my last two college years is a hurtful reminder that we're not here forever.

How many of us get to do something, be a part of something that actually MATTERS?

The first.

It's the FIRST building on a 168 year old university to be named after an African American.

A BLACK MAN.

The FIRST. A choice word that implicates more to come.

And I can say I was a part of that.

Accomplished isn't the word.

I imagine this is what the term labor of love exists for.

I'm overwhelmed.

Closer.

There's a quote that's been stuck in my head for a few days now.

"It is when we are not afraid to fall that we fly the highest."

It's a moral that I should have taken away when I read one of my favorite books, Johnathon Livingston Seagull.

It's the same sentiment the Coach Carter-catapulted- Marianne Williamson quoted-Nelson Mandela credited- "Our Deepest Fear" speech holds.

But I like it better.

Once I accept that falling (and also failing) is an option, although not THE option....

maybe,

.....I can write again.
Without fear that words will fail/leave me. Write without fear that my words will betray me and show things I never meant to display.

...I can love again.
Without fear that I will give myself, my all to a man/boy who doesn't deserve it. Without fear that pain and love will once again become so synonymous, so intertwined that it takes me years to decipher between the two again.

....I can achieve.
Without fear that I won't perform up to my standard. The one I hold myself to. The ones others hold me to.

Maybe, just maybe....

When I quit looking down and remembering how the ground looks, I'll be able to appreciate the vastness of the sky.

Maybe when I realize that once it hurts, that's all it can do.

I can live.