Hi Hater

"I'm just going to make these haters my motivators".
"These haters won't hold me back".

We've all heard some type of shit like this, people talking about the hate they receive on a daily basis. Someone is just always hating on them. My questions is who are these haters you speak of??? Because I don't see them. To quote The Temptations movie , "ain't nobody coming to see you Otis". When I say people I'm talking about grown ass folks 25+, how are you 33 and have people hating on you? What is your life about that you think people are plotting against like you're Malcolm X and the US Government and the Nation of Islam are against you? I can understand someone in high school talking about haters and whatnot, because well its high school and high school can be a real life version on Mean Girls for some. High school is where haters breeds for the most part. So if a person has haters in high school...that's believable. College??? that's a stretch but I guess its possible because college is just a big ass high school. So if you have haters in college okay maybe you do if you say so.

As far as the 25+ crowd... we don't believe you, you need more people. If you're in the entrainment or some high intensity industry (think Marty Khan House of Lies) shit is different and you may probably do have haters, so never mind what I'm saying. But others all this talk about people hating on you, girl and boy I need receipts. You're a loan application manager at Chase, who is hating on you at this level of hate?  I'm having a hard time understanding this concept of your grown ass having other grown ass people hating on you and blocking your shine. With all the things most rational adults have to do on a daily basis, such taking care of kids, bills, going to work, cooking dinner, going shopping, going to school, watching Scandal, drinking wine, and trying to stay above water..... who really has time to hate on you? Now I'm not talking about people giving you side-eyes and making little shady ass remarks about you. No, I'm talking about the people who think that or claim that folks are out here plotting your downfall like a character off of Dallas or something. The people that claim that others just constantly won't let them be great.

I would just like to know, who these hating ass people and how they have time for all this hate they have?  Who are these people that are plotting to take you out like you're JFK or somebody because hating on someone takes time and energy.  Personally I have no time to sit around on hate on someone. Especially to the point where some of these folks are claiming that others are Jolly Green Giant green with envy of them and that all they do is just hate. There's too much to do and so much more going on for me and I believe most grown folks, to hate on that level. Like the amount of shit going on with the average person or me... work, paying bills, facebook, remember to buy milk, mopping the floors, having sex or not having sex. I just won't even have the time to hate on that extreme level and I'm willing to bet most folks don't either, but hey I could be wrong. Maybe you have more hate come at you than Keri Hilson every time she opens her mouth to sing.

Who Raised You?

As I was trolling the internet last week, I came across a blog post that I'm too lazy to find and link but I believe it was at  http://www.abelleinbrooklyn.com/. The post was about Jada Pinkett and her snap back session she gave on facebook about the criticism she and Will Smith have been receiving about their daughter Willow's Hair and image. If you aren't familiar about this situation, the gist is basically the Blacks as I call them have going in and letting have on Jada and Will about Willow and her behavior. This criticism went to level 10 when Willow shaved her head last year or earlier this year, I can't remember when she did it. People were going in on them because Willow shaved her head and her parents allowed this to happen. Jada's defense was basically that its just hair and her daughter's beauty isn't determined by the length of her hair and that people have to stop holding onto this European idea of what is beauty. The post basically cosigned what Jada said and I do to about what people's image of beauty is or isn't.

I mean when Willow shaved her head, the blacks went on attack. The outrage was pretty damn bad, the comments ranged from why, to she looked like an alien, to she was on her way to getting a starring role on The L-word ten years from now, Will and Jada were horrible parents and everything else in between. Now really didn't see what the big deal was when she shaved her head and how her doing that made Will and Jada worst parents than Casey Anthony and Joe Jackson. I shaved my head when I was her age, not by choice. I fought tooth and nail about shaving my hair but I was in boarding school in Nigeria and we had to shave our hair. In fact that's a common thing for young girls over there, why? It's easier to maintain and it is/was. I would put some Pink Oil Moisturizer (this was before I found out that shit was like putting WD-40 in your head) and brush it and go about my day. I learned at an early age hair is just hair, when I was crying in that chair as my hair fell to the floor; my dad told me it was just hair and it would grow back and I was still beautiful with or without it. But at the time I wasn't trying to hear that shit, all I could think about was the hair falling to the ground from my head. I get it now..... it's just hair and it did grow back. So I totally understand where Jada is coming from, she's practicing what India Arie was preaching in I am not my hair, as she should and we all should.

However, I think some of the critics of Will and Jada's parenting skills isn't coming from what this post or I just said about hair determining what's beautiful. Now I'm playing devil's advocate here, I think some of the criticism Will and Jada get is coming from Willow at times just being the most or what some deem not age appropriate. We are talking about a 12 year old girl here and some are saying the things she's doing aren't what 6th graders should be doing. I'm inclined to agree with this to a certain point. Now I'm nobody's parent but if my 12 y/o child told me she wanted to shaved her head, I would let her. Where I would give her that bitch please face is if she wanted to dye her hair every color under the rainbow, why? Because she's 12 not 18. I while back Willow took a picture with what I believe was a fake tongue ring. Real or fake if I did that at 12 I won't have tongue  to put a ring in because my mama would've promptly snatched my tongue with the ring in out of my mouth. I would probably do the same thing if my 12 y/o did some shit like that. When I was that age my mom didn't let me do certain things, like get piercings, wear a face full of makeup, clothing that a 12y/o shouldn't wear eg. booty shorts. Now I wanted to some of those things because that's what others were doing  and I thought my mama was being a hater. I see now she's wasn't a hater, she was a parent. A 12 y/o can't do the same shit a 18 y/o can do and this is what I think some people have a beef with Will and Jada is about.

I'm not in their household and how they choose to raise their kids is nobody's business but their own. People shouldn't model how they choose to raise their kids based on others. Nevertheless, I don't think people's gripe with Will, Jada, and Willow is about whipping hair back and forth hair, tongue rings, being a free spirit or Willow giving us her best  Annie Hall impression . It's not so cut and dry. I see no problem with let your child express themselves in a way they feel comfortable but at the same time they're kids and they just can't do whatever they want because that's what they want to do. In looking back on my childhood my parents didn't let me do certain things because they weren't age appropriate. The way some people raise their kids are different from other. My parents logic in not letting me do the shit I wanted to do was that wearing makeup and certain clothing  made look too old for my age at that time. Those types of things bring along with it a certain type of attention...... Being 12 and dressing like you're 18-19 brings the attention a 18-19 girl gets and at 12 that type of attention isn't needed. At 12 I didn't need to concern myself with those types of things. So I guess my mom was trying to prevent me from ending up on 16 and pregnant. I see some of these kids today, and I'm not talking about just Willow or any celeb kids now. Some of these kids are just out of fucking control, they are some of the some disrespectful, mannish, and ill-mannered creatures on this Earth and I can't deal. If I ever had a child and she/he behaved like some of these kids I see in street.... well get a jail cell ready for me because I'm going to beat the living shit out of that kid. It just makes you think you the fucked raised you?? There's a fine line between being a parent and being your kid's friend, a lot of today's parents have friends they can claim on their taxes.

Its About Forgiveness

I used to be one not big on forgiveness, I was of those people that held on to grudges like Lebron is trying to hold on to his hairline. You know, if I got into it with a person and it got to the point where I didn't want to even talk to the person, said person was dead to me. No matter how much the other party was willing to make amends, I just wouldn't have any part in that. I would just stay mad at them and even when my anger towards them subsided, I still put up a front towards them because in mind my reconciling with them would mean they won. I just couldn't give them that satisfaction, what can I say I'm a Taurus and I'm stubborn like that.

Then one day I kind of had an epiphany, with the help of my mom. See me and my real dad don't have the best relationship. So without really going into the semantics of our relationship, let's just say there's some huge cultural differences (my dad's Nigerian). Me and him didn't speak to one another for about four years, I remember one time he called my house and wanted to talk to my mom, I answered the phone and took the message he wanted to pass along to my mom. And during this 1 minute exchange neither one of us acknowledged one another, he might as well had been talking to an answering machine. There was no how are our you doing on both of our parts, in fact I don't even think I said bye I just hung up and I never do that. Even after I guess my dad got over his anger and decided to call me on my 21st birthday, I was still angry and I just pretended not to be when we would speak. I just wasn't ready to let go of my anger. I guess he realized that and we spoke less and less, until we weren't speaking at all again. One day my mom told me I had to forgive him and let go of my anger, and that doing that would set me free. It may not make my relationship with him better but it would make me better, because carrying all the anger wasn't healthy and it just took entirely too much energy. So I let go of it and I'm not saying me and my dad's relationship is great, but at least I don't want to hang up the phone when he calls. That's progress people.

When you forgive somebody, there's always the chance they may or may not forgive you back. So don't do it to get back into that person's good graces. Do it for yourself. When you stay mad or carry around grudges against someone, you allow that person to have power over you, even if that person or you doesn't realize they have this power or not, its there. When you roll your eyes whenever someone mentions their name or how you give them the silent treatment when you're in their presence, that's the power they have over you and that's energy you're wasting on someone that may or may not be worth it. So my suggestion is to just build a bridge and get over it, forgive that person and let it go. No matter how big or small their transgression may be. You don't even have to tell that person you forgave them, nor do you have to be friends with them after you forgive them. Just get past the anger and the hurt and keep it moving. Folks say life is a journey, so travel light it'll make life easier.

Divorce and the Grown Children

Divorce is hard for everyone involved in them, they just all around blow a$$ chunks. But they can be especially hard on the children. I know of what I speak, since my mom and by step-dad are tossing they're marriage of 23 year down the toilet. You know it is what is it, and honestly its kind of been a long time coming. But I'm not trying to make this a tragic tale about my parent divorce, this is just something that has been on my mind for awhile. I was talking to one of my co-workers and his parents are going through a divorce too, and he made this comment, "this would've been a whole lot easier if they would've just done this when I was 7 and not now that I'm 28." I have to concur with his statement.

A lot of the time people don't get divorces when their children are young, instead they wait until their kids are grown up. Their reasoning for this is that it would be too hard on the kids at such a young age, so they stay together and try to work things out. In a way that's real noble of them putting their children best interest first, but I also think that staying in a marriage just for your children is also an epic fail. Because if you two have serious problems, those problems just start to manifest in other ways and you just wind up making your children miserable and just as unhappy as you maybe.


When the kids are young and a divorce happens, parents tend to handle the situation with finesse; the kiddy gloves are on. They try to make the experience as smooth and painless as possible, they at least try to be civil in front of their kids. I'm amusing that they're attempting to protect their kids because they're too young to understand what's really going on or they just want the kids to have the same love for each parent as they always did. Well I wish this same courtesy would be given even when the children are adults. See when the kids are grown, all caution is thrown to the wind, the gloves are coming off and there will be bloodshed. Parents at this point start telling you how they really feel about one another, I guess they figure you're grown and can take the truth. Well damnit I can't handle the truth, so lie to my a$$. I don't want to hear about how mom was Marvin Gaye's groupie when you met her, or that dad has been using Vigara for the last 4 years (I'm not saying my folks have been saying such things). Is this information needed?  This is just a classic case of when keeping it real goes wrong , I can't handle such realness. The same coworker was telling me that he recently went over to his dad's new place, which calls "the ultimate bachelor pad." He said it was equipped with a bearskin rugs, red light bulbs, and martini bar (because that's what all the ladies want).  Then his dad want the two of them to hit the club and "get up on some b*tches" to quote his dad, he said just can't handle this new version of his dad and that night at the club (yeah they went) it was one of the saddest things he's ever witness in his life.

Look parents we know your getting a divorce and that we maybe grown. Although we understand what's going on, we still don't need to know everything. The courtesy you would've given us at 7 can still be applied at 27 because we are still your children. We don't want to take sides, no matter who's fault it is that the marriage is ending. The gruesome details of the marriage are not needed, save that drama for your friends. So with that being said divorce is difficult on the kids regardless of what age it occurs, so sometimes the kiddy gloves are still needed.