Incidents in the life of.....

Monday, May 01, 2006

Currently

I'm in a good mood right now. I'm just happy. My friend LJ and I went home this weekend and spent time with the family. I don't know. I just had a nice little time. God is working on my fam right now. He is taking us throu something. We all have our moments when it seems like we are at our worst. My sister went through it a few years ago. My brother is going through something right now. I really think God has a divine purpose for his life and he has to go through his current situation to get to it. I don't exactly know how I feel about it right now. I know what is going on, but I almost feel like it's not. I haven't fully accepted it. Sunday we had dinner together and took pictures. I don't think my brother really understood what was on my mom's mind because he left. I think if he really knew why she wanted us all to eat together, he would have stayed. Yet, with his current mindset, he probably wouldn't have. Before we went to eat, we took family portraits. We hadn't done that since I was in kindergarten. The only reason I remember it was then is because I had long pony tails. When I was in the first grade, I traded them in for a gheri curl! :) I don't know. I cried Friday on my way home, but that's it. Maybe tomorrow when something actually happens, then I will cry. I don't know.
Anyway,though it doesn't seem like it, I am in a good mood. Nothing particularly good happened today. Class was boring. We watched Scotland, PA. It's a horrible adaptation of Macbeth. It sucks. It's a comedy. It just wasn't good. The other people in the class liked it though. KH is trying to steal my man on facebook. They both are going to come up missing! I need to work on my final paper. I can knock it out later. It shouldn't be that hard.
Aww man, I have been reading ASSATA and it is awesome. The woman is great. Her story is educating me. I've known for sometime that Lincoln didn't "free" the slaves because he loved black people. I knew it was for economic reasons, but when I read his words quoted in her book, it's unbelievable. There is a part in there where he says that if he could save the union without freeing any slaves he would. If he could save the union by freeing some slaves and leaving others where they are, he would. Then there is a part where he says that the only thing a black man can do it shine his shoes and something else. Then he talks about trying to find a way to send all the slaves somewhere else. He says he really doesn't care, just as long as they leave the U.S.
She briefly mentions Congress purposely giving blankets that were infected with small pox to the Native Americans. It was weird because I'd just seen an episode of South Park where the Native Americans gave small pox infested blankets to the white people. People kept telling me that the directors of South Park are politically correct, but I'd never watched it. Kinda like The Boondocks. Well, I guess they were right, but if you don't know what they are playing off of, you wouldn't get it.
The other day, I was reading something. It was probably the part about her name change. I almost went and cut my hair off. I wanted to change my name. I love Ashley because it fits my personality. I think I could have been a Tiffany, but I think Ashley fits. I just wanted a name that meant something, not the name from the white girl on Young and the Restless. She talks about people with perms being revolutionaries and people with fros not being revolutionaries. That was good. I need to figure out when I am going to fight.
I also started reading Jasmine Guy's biography of Afeni Shakur. The tone of it is so different than that of ASSATA. Assata's book is more dramatic, I guess. From the first page, I was drawn into it. I had to know what was going to happen. I had to know what made her a Black Panther. I needed to know why she was charged with such heinous crimes. Afeni's bio is more so a story. It's like a conversation between two friends. You can see the mutual respect between her and Jasmine. Afeni just seems like a nice, down-to-earth country girl. I know she's a Panther because Assata mentions her in ASSATA and Nikki Giovanni talked about her when she came to Tougaloo. I'm sure once Afeni starts talking about "the revolution" I am going to be just as engrossed in her book as I was ASSATA. Afeni makes it clear that she does not want to be "fascinating." I just want to be enlightened. It's so much I don't know. She tells Jasmine about the Native Americans in a neighboring town running the KKK away and Jasmine asks her if that was her first taste of "revolution." She quickly corrects her and tells her that it was her first taste of "resistance." It was when she knew she wanted/needed to resist certain things. She tells her she knew nothing about a revolution, nothing about changing the world. That's a good point. Oftentimes people don't recognize the difference. I am really going to enjoy that book when class it out and I can read more.
Happy Day

Posted by Nik :: 5/01/2006 :: 2 Comments: