1. You fight dirty. I’m not saying you have to be flawless communicators right off the bat, but if you resort to calling someone fat or rubbing their imperfections in their face, that’s not someone you really want to spend your time with.
2. You’re kind of avoiding introducing them to your friends. If you keep making excuses to push off those plans for you guys to finally hang out and meet each other, you may want to consider why you keep doing that. If it’s because you’re embarrassed of them, well, I think you know the rest.
3. Their future plans make you cringe. I’m not talking about the little things, I mean the big deal-breakers like they do or don’t want to have kids, they want to move to Japan, they want to spend their life as nomads living off the land, they want to be a two-faced politician, etc. Because their future hopes and dreams actually say a lot about them.
4. It’s hard to have great conversations with them. This one is a deal-breaker for me, because I’m all about just sitting down over a meal and talking about anything and everything. If you can’t connect with someone at this most basic level, or it’s like pulling teeth to keep a conversation going, it’s probably not going anywhere else.
5. They don’t accept you for who you genuinely are. You have to be with someone who not only accepts you, but admires you and loves you for all the weird, quirky things you do. If you let your guards down and show them who you really are, only to be met with a less-than-ideal reaction, you’ll most likely be calling it quits.
6. Your gut feeling tells you this isn’t the person for you, or your mind and heart keep going back to someone else. This is the hardest to realize and accept, but probably the most important. Your gut always knows.
1. You fight dirty. I’m not saying you have to be flawless communicators right off the bat, but if you resort to calling someone fat or rubbing their imperfections in their face, that’s not someone you really want to spend your time with.
2. You’re kind of avoiding introducing them to your friends. If you keep making excuses to push off those plans for you guys to finally hang out and meet each other, you may want to consider why you keep doing that. If it’s because you’re embarrassed of them, well, I think you know the rest.
3. Their future plans make you cringe. I’m not talking about the little things, I mean the big deal-breakers like they do or don’t want to have kids, they want to move to Japan, they want to spend their life as nomads living off the land, they want to be a two-faced politician, etc. Because their future hopes and dreams actually say a lot about them.
4. It’s hard to have great conversations with them. This one is a deal-breaker for me, because I’m all about just sitting down over a meal and talking about anything and everything. If you can’t connect with someone at this most basic level, or it’s like pulling teeth to keep a conversation going, it’s probably not going anywhere else.
5. They don’t accept you for who you genuinely are. You have to be with someone who not only accepts you, but admires you and loves you for all the weird, quirky things you do. If you let your guards down and show them who you really are, only to be met with a less-than-ideal reaction, you’ll most likely be calling it quits.
6. Your gut feeling tells you this isn’t the person for you, or your mind and heart keep going back to someone else. This is the hardest to realize and accept, but probably the most important. Your gut always knows.
Being single used to mean that you were an unwanted, pitied spinster. It used to mean that you were just getting by until you found someone to settle down with, but I don’t think that’s the case anymore. Being single now means that you’re independent and have goals and that you care enough about your life to not just settle for whoever comes along, but to really get out there and experience different kinds of people and make sure you’re spending your life the way you want to. Being single doesn’t necessarily disregard the importance of companionship and love. It didn’t before and it still doesn’t. Single people surround themselves with friends and family and dates and lovers, but they also know that being in a relationship is not the end-all-be-all of your awesomeness. It’s wonderful if its something you have, but it’s not necessary. There are so many other things to be learned and experienced in your life, and that’s only one reason that being single is completely awesome. Here are a few others:
1. There is always the possibility of tomorrow. You are not legally or otherwise bound to someone, and if tomorrow while you’re sitting on the subway someone who completely takes your breath away comes and sits next to you, you don’t have to feel guilty about being enamoured. You can even strike up a conversation with this person. You could even date this person. Your next great love could be right around the corner, and you always have that possibility to look forward to.
2. The only person you are responsible for is you. You don’t have to check in with someone if you want to travel or spend an exorbitant amount of money on a gorgeous new floor-length dress from The Loft. Not that I did that yesterday. You don’t have to miss a holiday with your friends and family because you have to go to your significant other’s home. You don’t have to worry about anybody else’s student loans or life plans or goals. A little selfish? Yes. Ideal if you’re someone who wants to be able to pack up your things and travel at your own discretion? Yes.
3. You are free to pursue things that won’t wake up one day and leave you. The thing is, love and companionship are beautiful and wonderful and what most of us would like to settle into eventually. But it’s delusional to think that flawless love and companionship is attainable. It’s not. There will always be struggles, and you have to realize that being completely invested in another person without anything or anybody else in your life is dangerous because that person could leave you one day– and what will you be left with?
4. You can own your independence. You do not have to be married to be a functioning, happy and successful individual. In fact, you don’t have to be in a relationship either! There was once a time when women depended on their husbands to sustain them, and unfortunately, this may be a reality for many women still. However, if you are able to attend school, work for yourself, etc. you are privileged and extraordinary lucky that you don’t have to rely on anyone. Take advantage of that privilege.
5. You can do what you want on the weekends, not shave your legs/face, pig out on chicken wings and watch Netflix by yourself, spend all your time with your best friend and above all else, not have to be the friend that is always talking about leaving the party to get back to your old ball-and-chain. You can, instead, be the friend who was talking about your latest dates, the fantastic lovers you’ve taken, the goals you’ve set for yourself and the goals you’ve accomplished, all while being proud of understanding the role that you want love to play in your life, and maybe the fact that you will not just settle for someone for the sake of having it.
Being single used to mean that you were an unwanted, pitied spinster. It used to mean that you were just getting by until you found someone to settle down with, but I don’t think that’s the case anymore. Being single now means that you’re independent and have goals and that you care enough about your life to not just settle for whoever comes along, but to really get out there and experience different kinds of people and make sure you’re spending your life the way you want to. Being single doesn’t necessarily disregard the importance of companionship and love. It didn’t before and it still doesn’t. Single people surround themselves with friends and family and dates and lovers, but they also know that being in a relationship is not the end-all-be-all of your awesomeness. It’s wonderful if its something you have, but it’s not necessary. There are so many other things to be learned and experienced in your life, and that’s only one reason that being single is completely awesome. Here are a few others:
1. There is always the possibility of tomorrow. You are not legally or otherwise bound to someone, and if tomorrow while you’re sitting on the subway someone who completely takes your breath away comes and sits next to you, you don’t have to feel guilty about being enamoured. You can even strike up a conversation with this person. You could even date this person. Your next great love could be right around the corner, and you always have that possibility to look forward to.
2. The only person you are responsible for is you. You don’t have to check in with someone if you want to travel or spend an exorbitant amount of money on a gorgeous new floor-length dress from The Loft. Not that I did that yesterday. You don’t have to miss a holiday with your friends and family because you have to go to your significant other’s home. You don’t have to worry about anybody else’s student loans or life plans or goals. A little selfish? Yes. Ideal if you’re someone who wants to be able to pack up your things and travel at your own discretion? Yes.
3. You are free to pursue things that won’t wake up one day and leave you. The thing is, love and companionship are beautiful and wonderful and what most of us would like to settle into eventually. But it’s delusional to think that flawless love and companionship is attainable. It’s not. There will always be struggles, and you have to realize that being completely invested in another person without anything or anybody else in your life is dangerous because that person could leave you one day– and what will you be left with?
4. You can own your independence. You do not have to be married to be a functioning, happy and successful individual. In fact, you don’t have to be in a relationship either! There was once a time when women depended on their husbands to sustain them, and unfortunately, this may be a reality for many women still. However, if you are able to attend school, work for yourself, etc. you are privileged and extraordinary lucky that you don’t have to rely on anyone. Take advantage of that privilege.
5. You can do what you want on the weekends, not shave your legs/face, pig out on chicken wings and watch Netflix by yourself, spend all your time with your best friend and above all else, not have to be the friend that is always talking about leaving the party to get back to your old ball-and-chain. You can, instead, be the friend who was talking about your latest dates, the fantastic lovers you’ve taken, the goals you’ve set for yourself and the goals you’ve accomplished, all while being proud of understanding the role that you want love to play in your life, and maybe the fact that you will not just settle for someone for the sake of having it.
1. Complete happiness with standing outside in terrible weather.
Everyone around you is rapidly developing frostbite and shedding extremities like a freshly-cracked piñata, and you’re sipping your margarita in your bathing suit, thinking about how great it is to be alive. You can’t feel anything on your body besides the vague burn in your esophagus every time you do a shot (and, oh, how good it burns), but you’re generally taking it as a positive. You just can’t believe how much of an uptight asshole you used to be, always so concerned with petty things like basic shelter or not standing barefoot in the snow to yell at someone on your cellphone. Now, you are so much more enlightened, so in-tune with the world around you.
2. Viciously desperate honger.
You don’t just want to eat. Eating is for the simple, for the weak. You are looking to find a pizza and ravage it like you’re a sailor coming back from some long, arduous, violent war and need to be as close as humanly possible to the warmth of your long-lost lover. But just passionate mouth love with your food will not suffice. Soon, your honger — your hungry anger — will drive you to eat that Jumbo Slice and/or pack of nuggets as though it dishonored your family name and this is feudal China. You’re basically going to be the guy who is beating another man and who won’t stop punching and kicking until he’s been dead for like five minutes and your friends have to pull you off and you’re like “I don’t know what happened, I just lost it there for a minute,” except with a plate of nachos.
3. Burning desire to be an enormous ass on social media.
I would use the “bull in a china shop” metaphor, but this is actually much less refined than that. You’re basically just some 60s-movie Godzilla, rampaging through your Facebook feed, commenting about how ugly people’s babies are and making statuses about your ex and proceeding them to “like” them yourself. Everything you see just elicits an enormous fart noise in your head and makes you want to write things like “OH YAY ANOTHER STATUS ABOUT HOW BLESSED YOU ARE TO BE VOLUNTEERING WITH POOR CHILDREN. LOOK AT HOW GOOD OF A PERSON YOU ARE.” It’s just a mess.
4. Simultaneous apathy towards and desire for sex.
Half of you is ready to bone the pants right off of the next hot thing that walks in that door, ready to do all the positions and moves and techniques under the sun, ready to surf into the sunset on a wave of water-based lube. The other half just wants to sprawl out on the bed completely alone and not be touched by a living soul, lest they interrupt your incoherent internet searching and eating of Funyuns. And you are likely to switch from one half to the other
5. Tearful love for friends that was always bubbling inside of you.
Don’t ever be ashamed of the time spent crying into your friend’s lap whilst confessing to them how similar to a butterfly they are — in beauty, in fragility, in honesty — for that time is magical. No matter how many Long Island Iced Teas preceded it. Drunk-crying friend love is a precious gem, and should never be cast aside with embarrassment. Friends are butterflies.
So I had another dream about you. I know, I know — predictable, pathetic, and pathological. Isn’t it time you moved on with your life? Isn’t it time for your dreams to transition?
Well evidently the answer is no because there I was, who I am today only in a foggier world of slumber, and there you were. Same smile, same nose, same gait…Jesus Christ I think I could even smell you in my dream.
I was at a party. Or maybe it was a pool at dusk. Who knows. I was sitting there alone, but happy and there you were with the wrong her. In the waking world, your new lover is no friend of mine, but in this world, she was. One of my best friends actually. But our eyes were glued to each other from across the pool (yeah, it was definitely a pool, I remember now) like they used to adhere themselves together so many years ago. You did that thing with the right side of your mouth that showed you were ready for my lips on yours — I remember sitting around a table with my family way back when and seeing you do that out of the corner of my eye and hating you for how badly it made me want you.
I digress.
So there we were, communicating via pupil across the pool, and my friend was just so unaware. So pathetically, blissfully unaware. Like I said, in the dream, I was exactly the me I am today—same life and circumstances. But in this world, you were in my life and I wanted you and that was that. I got up, felt your eyes grace the curls in my hair as I walked away, and knew you would follow me. Even though you were all the way across that pool, I somehow heard you whisper in her ear that you would be right back.
I walked around the house where the pool was (Jesus Christ, it was your best friend’s house, how typical) and heard the grass rustle behind me, harmonizing with the sound of my skirt grazing the blades of green. I felt those old, familiar hands whisper across my right shoulder blade and I stopped. You came up behind me and stood very close to me without actually touching me. So typical. So you. I heard you smile. I closed my eyes and laughed.
“Why are you laughing?”
I turned around.
“Because we are just as fucked up as we’ve always been. I am just as fucked up as I’ve always been.”
He looked at me with his head cocked to the side, as if he were pondering a Pollock or something.
“What is it about you? I don’t get it.”
I paused, laughed again, then quietly,
“I miss you, ya know? But I don’t at the same time. I don’t miss this. I don’t miss how you always fuck things up for me.” He didn’t know what to say to that so he just kissed me. I guess that’s the only way he knew how to respond. That’s the only way he ever knew how to respond.
He raised my chin to meet his lips more closely and I gently placed my hand on the back of his neck. Hot, as if he was blazing from the inside. Just like I remember it.
He pulled away as I removed my hand and that was it. He walked inside his best friend’s house and I walked back to the pool. I sat down in my original spot, looked up, and smiled at my friend, still happy and thinking she knew him.
I laughed again at myself. I laughed again at him. I laughed again at the world now fading around me, finally realizing that this was all a dream. Finally realizing I am still the same person he molded me to be.
If there’s one thing Grandma Moore always beat into my head, it’s that I would be stupid if I voted for anyone outside of the Democratic party. Ever since I reached the legal voting age my grandma has insisted that I choose the Democrat, whoever it was, no matter what. And this was way before there were viable black candidates. She respects my prerogative to think for myself, of course, but with a stern warning that I would be making a great big fool of myself if I voted for any other party. Like I would be committing cultural and ethnic treason by voting for people in the other party.
“Even if you don’t know the issues, just vote for the Democrat,” she told me.
On the other hand, if you are a black Republican you might as well just keep that info to yourself. When a girlfriend of mine found out that Stacey Dash is a Republican, she freaked out and vowed to never watch another Stacey Dash thing again…which isn’t really all that much stuff, let’s be real! Even among my circle of friends, many of whom are also “blackademics,” if someone is a black Republican they are going to get nothing but eye rolls to eternity. To be black and to vote Republican don’t seem to go together. But where does this distrust of black Republicanism come from? Are black people really slaves to the Democratic party?
Bishop E.W. Jackson is a black conservative minister cum politician who was recently nominated by the Republican Party of Virginia for Lieutenant Governor. In a viral video that shocked the whole Internet, Bishop Jackson talks powerfully and passionately about putting an end to the black community’s “slavish devotion to the Democratic party,” once and for all. Anchored visually by black and white photographs of iconic black leaders, Jackson delivers a potent message to black Christians specifically, and to black American much more specifically:
It is time to end the slavish devotion to the Democrat party. They have insulted us, used us, and manipulated us. They have saturated the black community with ridiculous lies. ‘Unless we support the Democrat Party, we will be returned to slavery. We will be robbed of voting rights. The Martin Luther King Holiday will be repealed.’ They think we’re stupid, and that these lies will hold us captive while they insult us.
Sensationalism aside, the most interesting thing about his remarks is how tightly he draws a color line in voting patterns. He says that the voting patterns, causes and concerns of the black Democratic party are not black political causes. Even more ridiculously, later on the Bishop says that Planned Parenthood has been a bigger threat to the black community than the KKK ever was. Oh Lord!!! As if I needed ANOTHER reason to get out of the state of Virginia. What’s really interesting about the video, though, is that it’s a bold move to rush more black conservative voters to the Republican party by way of fear. Propaganda is about instilling fear, and as a piece of propaganda, the Bishop’s video is expertly crafted. The basic message is that black people have for too long been slaves to the Democratic party and now it’s time to wake up and smell the elephant. Liberal Democrats, with their progressive causes like gay rights and abortion are ruining America and destroying the fabric of the black community.
According to a recent article in The New York Times, Jackson uses a long-tried Plantation Theology to compare the black community’s dependence on the Democratic party (at a rate of about 90%) to slavery. The story goes: democrats use free governmental social services to attract black audiences which keeps them from voting for the other party.
The logic is insulting. While it is interesting to think about why black communities support the Democratic party in such large numbers, we need to strive for a politics that is blind of race baiting rooted in simple fear of the other. Vote for who you want, not the person who knows how to scare you the most. We are never going to get anywhere if our political rhetoric is constantly focused on this narrative of “us” versus “them.” If the only way to win votes, on both sides, is to conjure up people’s worst racial fears (black people just want free stuff; the Democratic party is enslaving the black community, etc), what does that mean for democracy?
