Hey everybody,
It is indeed my 24th birthday today and I just wanted to give everyone a shout out and say thanks for all the support over the... year (lol).
As you know I've been uber-busy in the past few weeks and I haven't been posting as much, a lot has been happening and I'm gonna be getting some really interesting and new content up here in the next few weeks so stay tuned.
Thanks So Much,
-Adam
Y'all know on July 12th my segment on BET's "The 5ive" aired. It was on in the afternoon and a lot of you missed it so I put it up on YouTube for y'all and them hoes took it down talkin' 'bout some copyright razmatazz! So I re-uploaded it, this time on my web server where it can be viewed peacefully for years to come.
Check it out at:
http://www.onehundreddollarwebdesign.com
or to make life much easier:
I'm actually starting this post feeling kinda pissed, it's not anything that you did, it's me I'm upset with. Now that I'm all in love with Chrisette Michele's debut album "I Am" and think it's the best thing for neo-soul since "Who Is Jill Scott..." I'm mad that I didn't go up to her and say hello at that party we were both at back in the beginning of June. If you've been reading you'll recall that I wrote a post about a function I went to at Jay-Z's 40/40 club back in June, she was there but due to the fact that I didn't know much about her at the time and that I wasn't really in the mood for small talk I didn't make my way toward her and to be honest, while her work singing the hook on Jay-Z's "Lost Ones" and NaS' "Can't Forget About You" was all I knew her for then and was good, I didn't expect for her album to be as great as it is. If only I had knew I would have kissed her hand and done a curtsie.
A few days ago I did get a chance to see her again, alas, no small talk though. Unfortunately it was a busy day for me so I couldn't stay that long but luckily I was able to take some video of her performing four songs from her album and upload them on the A. Benjamin Irby YouTube Channel for your viewing pleasure. Check out her performance of her current single "Best Of Me" produced by Babyface posted below. I won't go into specifics about her album except to tell you to GO BUY IT! If my iron-clad word isn't good enough the songs speak for themselves. Check out the videos below.
Check out the other four parts of Chrisette's Show live from Borders Bookstore at Columbus Circle in New York City at the A. Benjamin Irby You Tube Channel.
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Song Of The Day:
"Sock It To Me"
by Missy Elliott feat. Da Brat
from the album "Supa Dupa Fly"
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It's the most wonderful time of the year rolling around again, it's my birthday, one year older, one year wiser, and so much better.
I'm having a birthday party this year. I haven't had a real birthday party since I was like 8 so it's way overdue.
Birthdays are also a time of reflection so lately I've been righting all my wrongs, reconciling with enemies, dotting my i's and my j's and crossing all my t's.
I'm using this party as a way to gather all of my newer Harlem friends and reunite with all my Brooklyn friends I haven't seen in ages and I also want to use this opportunity to meet some of you, my friends and readers in blogland. A lot of us have talked via email, IM, etc but we have never actually met. Even though my birthday is Saturday, July 28th the party is on Friday night, the 27th.
So if you want to stop by my party hit me up on my MySpace page and I'll send you an invite.
http://www.myspace.com/adambirby
Feel free to hit me up and add me as a friend.
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Song Of The Day:
"Let It Go"
by Keyshia Cole feat. Missy Elliott and Lil' Kim
from the album "Just Like You"
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I LOVE the summertime, besides the fact that I am a July Leo baby (July 28th MARK YOUR CALENDARS), the summer, especially in New York, a city known for its hot, humid, muggy-ass, tourist drenched, wonderful summers is the time where everyone, myself included, beaten down from the cold, dreary winter longs to show a little skin. Walking down the streets of Harlem everyday there are all these sexy chocolate, mocha, and caramel men as far as the eyes can see, shirtless or in wife beaters, shooting dice, playing basketball, wallking, talking on their cell phones, doing pull ups on the traffic pole on the corner, abs, biceps, and triceps flexed. Some straight, some gay (a lot more than you think), some bi, whatever, but all sexy. Sometimes you even exchange lustful and/or curious glances with them as you walk by, other times you don't. Either way the essence of sex is so thick in the air you can cut it with a knife.
On our trip to Los Angeles a few months back with my boyfriend I remember asking him "Where are all the gay people in this town?" I wasn't picking up a vibe anywhere, and then I asked "Where the hell are all the good looking straight men?" Of course I have my baby but I ain't dead, right? I'm just kinda used to seeing good looking men around. It's very rare that I leave the house and don't find someone to catch my eye.
It's weird but it wasn't until I left New York I realized how gay it was, especialy Harlem. Growing up in East New York, Brooklyn I was never really exposed to such open gayness before. While of course we live in a straight man's world and everybody isn't open and out about theirs, Harlem was the first place a dude ever tried to come and try to talk to me on the regular public street (125th Street to be exact) no where close to Greenwich Village or any gay establishment. I remember it scaring the hell outta me, I remember thinking "Is this nigga crazy? Don't he know we on the street?" I remember the first transexuals and ultra-feminine boys I saw walking down the streets of Harlem, in the daytime, paying it like it was no big deal, and then there was that time this dude tried to bag me, asked me for my number, at in the gym, right here in Harlem, it was definitely culture shock but it quickly wore off.
Harlem is the black gay mecca, I recommend that every black gay person visits Harlem before they die, or at least before they gentrify it beyond recognition. Besides all the sexy men, Harlem is home to many openly gay professionals and business owners. I can only imagine how refreshing it would be for a black gay young person from a small repressed town to come to Harlem and see black gay folks like him or herself thriving in their business and personal lives and being pillars of the community while not having to compromise who they are. I have to admit that it even opened my eyes and I'm from Brooklyn, right across the river. Shortly after moving to Harlem from Brooklyn I last year I realized, "I'm finally home," well, at least for right now. Who knows where life may take me?
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Song Of The Day:
"Disrespectful"
by Chaka Khan feat. Mary J. Blige
from the album "Funk This"
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Whaddup Everyone,
As I said before BET profiled me and my web design company ONE HUNDRED DOLLAR WEB DESIGN (http://www.onehundreddollarwebdesign.com) it aired yesterday and I know that because it was on in the afternoon a lot of you missed it. It was on YouTube but those spineless bitches removed it citing a copyright thingy with Viacom. What, ever so I plan to have it loaded up onto my own server in a few days.
PS: If anybody you know needs a website feel free to hit a brotha up!
http://www.OneHundredDollarWebDesign.com
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Song Of The Day:
"Still Standing"
by Kylie Minogue
from the album "Body Language"
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About a month and a half ago I taped a segment for BET on their show called "The 5ive" hosted by Alesha Renee.
They are doing a story on my web design business ONE HUNDRED DOLLAR WEB DESIGN (http://www.onehundreddollarwebdesign.com).
I know this is real, real, real short notice but it is airing today, July 12th at 1PM on BET so if you're near a TV check it out or at least tape it, TiVo it or DVR it if you're at work.
After it airs I will get it on YouTube for everyone who may have missed it to see.
==========Someone visited the blog recently and commented about its explicit nature. They said that it was "T.M.I." (that's too much information, for those of you not up on the lingo) that I was giving way too many graphic details about my sex life. They went on to ask whether I had thought about the ramifications of it all. What kinds of employment promotions and opportunities it could keep me from? What people would think? What they would say...
My first instinct was to jump into a defensive place. You know the fierce queen inside of all of us (yes, she's in you too) puts on her reading glasses and is at the front line of battle when she thinks we're being attacked. My thoughts went to the disclaimer at the front of the site, "if you don't like it then why are you reading it, ain't nobody ask you to come here", and of course the proverbial "who do you think you are, you can't tell me what to write, I'll write what the hell I wanna write" defenses. Then I realized that without giving the reader's words, or any words for that matter a moment of unbiased thought I could start to sound irrational, hyper-defensive, and downright faggot-crazy (and ain't no crazy like faggot-crazy). So I stepped back for a moment and let the genuine concern from this reader wash over me.
Before I started this blog all these thoughts and questions entered my mind. Not only had they entered my mind but they bought real estate, built condos and Starbucks' and started to gentrify my mind. Trust me I had given this a lot of thought. What if my boss came online and ran into my blog or one of my co-workers, or my mother, or one of her church friends or one of my aunts or one of my old friends from high school or junior high school, what if, what if, what if? If if was a fifth we'd all be drunk. I knew what I wanted and needed to do and I was not going to "what if" myself into rife mediocrity. No thanks. The day my mother told me that if I continued to live my life as the gay man that I am I'd die before I was 30 (and a happy Mother's Day to you too Mom) I knew it was time to cut the apron strings and start living my life for me. Psst **whispering** I used to have mother pleasing issues. Your life is God's gift to you and he gave it to you for you to live it not for anybody else. If you live your life for other people and you get hit by a bus tomorrow, what's gonna happen? Yeah, they may cry, they may even miss you but they will move on and you would have just wasted your life.
The main reason why I talk about sex as freely as I do is, well, because I can. Why the hell shouldn't I? I'm human and humans like to fuck, especially gay humans. It's just as simple as that. God gave us sexual needs and urges so why not talk about them, they're beautiful. I'm so blessed to be in a country where I can say what I want and live my life freely so I ask again, why the hell shouldn't I? For so many years gays have been vilified and have had to live out our days hidden in some damn mental closet afraid for our lives and our well being and now we have a chance to have a voice and dammit I'm using mine. I am a man who has sex with other men which involves me putting my erect penis into my partners rectums (and even his in mine on occasion) and it's something I enjoy and what's so wrong with that? Oh yeah... that's right, the Bible says it's wrong, that's right, the infallible word of God that's been passed through thousands of fallible mens hands like the cheese plate at cocktail party, the same Bible that has been remixed more times that a Deborah Cox record... riiight. I'm so glad to have a personal relationship with God and not be bound by the hypocritical brainwashing of the church (especially the black church) any longer. Because there is no queen as messed up as the double minded church queen. While I do believe that there is truth to the Bible, what God inspired and what we have today I believe are definitely not the same thing.
To address the employment situation, I totally understand where the reader is coming from on this one. Employers now are actually Googling (searching on the search engine Google.com) prospective employees as a part of the interview process. I know already that if some staunch corporate employer Googled "A. Benjamin Irby" (try it) they would probably be at their desk gagging or maybe even titillated with their hand doing the ok grip jerk on their small, hard corporate dick, either way I probably wouldn't get a call back, at least not for the 'job' they listed in the want ads... well... I guess that depends on the newspaper because the back of the Village Voice... anyway I digress. Thankfully I'm not staunch corporate lawyer, investment banker, accountant guy. I'm artistic, graphic designer, web designer, writer, free expression guy so that's not so much of a worry for me. Even my day job is in a very liberal field working for an even more liberal company so I don't have to worry much there either. But that's not to discount this concern because it is very real for many people and I do what I do for them as well. I'm sure it's good to know that after working hard all day at being homo-geneous (and not homo-sexual) among the breeders in corporatia (my nickname name for the corporate world, you heard it here first) it's good to come home to my gay ass writing about life, relationships, drama, and hot sweaty man sex from our point of view. And besides, anybody who wants to deny me any job or any anything because of what I have written on this blog can take their job and shove it up their ass and then call me and tell me how good it felt and then XTube it so we all can watch. What God has for me is for me and if I have to compromise myself and my values (yes, even I have values) to get something then it's definitely not meant for me to have. period.
Lastly, I do this blog for the newly out gays and the gays who still have issues coming into who they are, the ones in that small town that may not have another positive gay influence or person they know to discuss issues and concerns with. My prayer is that by reading about my real (not sugar coated or watered down) exploits you can learn from my mistakes and be a more well adjusted homo. Cuz lawd knows half of these homos out here are crazy as hell and are suffering with all kinds of issues. I also do this for straight people. I know y'all reading cuz y'all email me too. The theme for this blog is that "we are all way more alike than we are different" and the straight people that read and enjoy the blog are coming to learn than besides who's what goes in what hole and who doing what to whom, heartbreak, love, and emotions are all the same, we're all human at the end of the day. And most of all I do this for anyone who is nosy and loves a kee kee, and a good read.
Thanks reader for your question it has given me a reason to re-evaluate my motivation and as a result has strengthened my zeal for my writing. Again, thank you.
PS: And to any haters, this does not count the reader who asked the question that inspired this post (you know who you are) but to anyone who may have malicious, hateful feelings toward me or my blog:
IF YOU DON'T LIKE MY BLOG, DON'T FUCKIN' READ IT THEN... BITCH!
Have a nice day.
LINKS:
- Google.com Search For "A. Benjamin Irby"
- XTube
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Song Of The Day:
"The Workout"
by Utada (Hikaru)
from the album "Exodus"
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I was never really into the movie thing. Sitting in a cold-ass, dark-ass room with people I don't know on a day when I'm probably already tired as hell from work was a recipe for naptime and a wasted ten bucks. When I started dating though the movies became a place where a horny guy like me who still lived at home and had no privacy could take a date and get his feel on and if he's lucky maybe even get some head! And all it would cost me is twenty bucks and having to sit through the first thirty minutes of some corny-ass, terrible-ass movie the date du jour picked out before my payoff came (or rather I came). Ah to not be so young again. Now that I'm a grown-up and have my own place whenever I do get to the movies (which is like three times a year, in a good year) I don't sit in the back in the corner anymore and I actually watch the movie.
Last Friday night I went to the movies, something I really don't do very often but after hearing all the great reviews I was inclined to finally go see "Knocked Up" starring Katherine Heigl of the hit TV show "Grey's Anatomy" and Seth Rogen of a whole bunch of stuff.
I'm not gonna give away too much of the movie but I'll give you the skeletal plot. A really hot girl, Heigl meets a loser guy at club one night, Rogen they get drunk and sleep together. She realizes in the morning what she had done and they end up having to walk "the walk of shame" across her yard (you ever walked that walk?). Then to top things she gets a really, really big promotion at her job to find out that she's pregnant and it's his. They are from two very, very different worlds and throughout the movie they are trying their best to make it work, much to the chagrin of her high strung sister.
As stupid as this movie sounds at the surface it is the witty, clever dialogue that makes this movie great. There were times in this movie where tears were running down my face I was laughing so hard.
I guess you are wondering whether it worked out? You gon' have to take ya ass to the movies to see. So after you've seen "Transformers" or one of the other blockbuster movies du jour "Knocked Up" at least deserves a sneak into the theatre across the hall and don't act like you ain't never done it!
LINKS:
- "Knocked Up" Official Website
Where you can watch the trailer for the movie.
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Song Of The Day:
"Precious Is Your Name"
Richard Smallwood with Vision feat. Chaka Khan
From the album: "Journey - Live In New York"
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Before I start I just wanna wish everybody a Happy 4th. I went out to the MenAreFromMars party last night and someone walked up to me and said that they read the blog and that's always nice to hear. If you ever see me out anywhere don't be afraid to say "Hi." I don't bite unless provoked.
====================
So like I was saying I went out last night and you know what that means... ex-date central. Everybody you've ever hooked up with or dated you know eventually you will see them in a club somewhere, it's inevitable, especially for me.
Some of you know this better than others and some you may even have first hand experience with this (as many of my ex-dates are readers, whaddup y'all?) but before my current relationship I used to be, well, a whore, a nasty top, a say-anything-to-get-in-some-ass-dick-slinging-smooth-talking-whore. My dick has been in more dudes mouths than a thermometer and I've been in more rectums than well... a rectal thermometer (all safe sex of course). A few months ago I sat down and tried to make a list of all the people I have had just intercourse with... I gave up. Needless to say, I can't go to a club, a ball, or anywhere below 14th Street, scratch that, 23rd Street without seeing someone I've had a tryst with and last night was no exception.
I arrived at Mars 2112 at aound 1:30A and took my perch at the front with my boo where they collect the money, tickets, etc. From there I saw everyone as they walked in and out. Faces, eyes, lips that had been wrapped around my dick before, deep throating it ravenously, looks that say remember the night that we... and how it felt when I... and what I did when you... my dick jumped at the memories. On the dancefloor could-be conquests giving me lustful glances with while the music blared from the speakers.
Now back in the day this would have been my cue to get phone numbers and send text messages and I definitely would've had something popping off by the time I started typing this blog post. But now that I'm in a relationship I look at things a little differently. While temptation is ever present, the random hook-up thing is just not as appealing as it used to be. Maybe it's because at this point I've had sex in possible way one could have it. So now I look at it like okay, I can fuck you, and then what... ya know? I'm learning how to think before I act in my old age.
Even in my whore days as nice as it was to be getting some on the regular I really wasn't so much into the variety aspect. If there were someone then that I could have just been with and wanted to be with me all at the same time I could've settled down a little earlier. I remember meeting dudes, fucking the shit out of them, oohs, ahhhs, cum everywhere and then they never call back, or maybe they do call back, only when they want some more dick. Being a top I never understood, how are you gonna meet a dude, let him fuck you, and then that's it? That seems crazy to me but how could I question a bottom for doing it. I'm a top and I sure as hell did it so it would be wrong for me to hold up a double standard.
In my current relationship, my boo (who's no alto in a castrati choir either) like me came into this thing as a top so we are both learning to compromise (that's a whole 'nother series of blog postings) and our relationship is open, no, not in that way, I'm talking about communication, people. It's good to be able to love someone and not feel trapped. We're honest with eachother, we check out dudes together, we tell each other everything, I guess, but whatever he may not be telling me I don't wanna know anyway, as long as he keeps respecting me. We were friends first and that's always important and he means so much to me so I wouldn't wanna do anything to mess that up.
So in the war for independence, my brain, the bigger head, after years of being under the tyrannical rule of the mighty penis (as he likes to be addressed in third person) has finally seceded and is a fully functioning independent republic.
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Song Of The Day:
"Fourth Of July"
by Mariah Carey
from the album "Butterfly"
My favorite Mariah song EVER!
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Links:
"Oh... my.... Gah!"
-Shawn McCormack as Jack McFarland
from "Will & Grace"
So I was talking to my friend (who shall remain nameless) the other night, he's a pretty good friend but not one of the ones I talk to all the time so our phone convo consisted of a lot of catching up. In the midst of our conversation about my upcoming 24th birthday on the 28th (MARK YOUR CALENDARS!). We eventually got onto the subject of work and I was telling him about my web design thing and I'm not sure exactly when the segue happened but he began to tell me that he was a sex worker. You know, kinda like the guys you see in the back of the Village Voice or Honcho or something, but he advertises via the internet. He even went as far as showing me his ads online with his rates and everything. Needless to say I was shocked, in a non-judgmental way of course as I'm nobody's angel. Sensing the tinsiest tinge of uneasiness from me he recited his mantra, his retort to our puritanical, hypocritical, judgmental, self-righteous world:
"I'm gettin' paid for what you bitches been givin' away for free!"
Wait a minute, it's no shade, but he's kinda right. I've been giving dick away for free for years and it hasn't gotten me much of anything (except a lot of satisfied ex-lovers) ;) . This nigga is making money and I know I could turn a coin doing it, I got skills! LOL Having said that though I could never see myself having sex for money. It's not that I'm so perfect or great or even that it's beneath me I just couldn't do it. If put into the situation I'd probably bitch up and not even be able to go through with it.
During our conversation he cleared up alot of escort related misconceptions 'cuz ya know I had questions. He told me that the escort business has alot less to do with actual sex that we think. A good night for him would be to get the client off without any type of penetration and that a lot of clients don't even want to have sex. Some of them really want massages, some want company. I also asked him whether he feared for his safety and surprisingly he said no. He said a lot of these men are professionals, some even wealthy, in relationships, and even married (which I totally don't agree with!) so trying to hide the body of a dead sex worker isn't exactly in their calendar of upcoming events. I asked him about safety, condoms and such and he said that everything is very safe. Then I asked him the million dollar question; how could he do it with someone he wasn't attracted to. He told me that he just imagines that it's someone else. He went on to tell me that all his clients weren't unattractive and that he even enjoyed some of his trysts. Very interesting.
I remember a few years back this guy offered me $1000 for sex, at the time I was really broke and the money woulda been nice. Of course I didn't do it but every now and then when I get a little low on cash I wonder hmmm... maybe I should... nah! As shocked as I was, more because I never thought that he would do something like this I wasn't really appalled. After all, it's the world's oldest profession and I'm sure he's not the only person I know doing it.
My friend's new occupation won't change anything between me and him. It'll just make our conversations a little more interesting from now on.
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Song of the day: "Best Of Me"
by Chrisette Michele
from the album "I Am"
===================
"God has not promised me sunshine,
that's not the way it's going to be.
But a little rain, mixed with God's sunshine.
A little pain, makes me appreciate the good times.
Be-e-e-e-e-e grateful...
God desires to fill your longings.
Every pain that you feel, he feels them.
Just like you
But he can't afford to let you feel only good.
Then you can't appreciate the good times.
Be grateful
Because there's someone else that's worse off than you
Be grateful
Because there's somoene else who'd love to be in your shoes.
Be-e-e-e-e-e grateful...
For it will be alright."
from the selection "Be Grateful"
by Walter Hawkins & the Love Center Choir
from the album "Love Alive 2" (circa 1978)
and like one of the best gospel songs... EVER!
As sadistic as this song makes God sound it has been ringing so true in my life, especially in the past few weeks so much so that I've been working out to it at the gym and it's hardly your standard work out song. Trying to get my web design business off the ground has been just that... trying. I'm doing well but I'm always striving to do better. So that's the song and here's the story.
==============================
So ends another glorious pride weekend here in New York City, well, it was last week, I told y'all I was busy, but anyway. My boo, the party promoter had functions jumping off back to back Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights. After having a light panic/anxiety attack-esque episode on the Acela coming back from Washington Friday morning I really was not in the mood for clubbing.
We had gone down there the Thursday before to celebrate a family member of his receiving a prestigious honor. After hanging out down there with friends of his relative, mid 40's early 50's, professional, established, gay and lesbian black people, I looked at their homes and cars and lifestyles in awe as I have a lot to aspire to. While it was comforting to see gay black professionals in their 40's and 50's still looking good and living well it was also a little scary because having seen that raises the bar in my mind higher, much higher than it was before. If they can do it, I can do it and I've only got twenty years to make it happen. While to some twenty years may seem like all the time in the world I know that if I don't break some of my counterproductive bad habits today there's no way I could ever be that successful. I am learning that financial independence and physical fitness in middle and upper age is more a result of a lot of planning, proper decision making, and time management while you're young and much less a result of hard work. All hard (and not smart) work gets you is an early grave and many wasted years.
This glimpse into the lives of the black gay elite mixed with my total creative drought is what caused my breakdown. I had a few websites I had been trying to complete and the ideas just didn't seem to be coming. Being creative can really suck sometimes and along with the fact that I'm a perfectionist and my own worst critic it was a recipe for disaster ie: my episode outside of Wilmington, Delaware.
I'm currently a hotel concierge. I like my job, people even say I'm good at it. But my dream is to be a designer, a graphic designer, web designer or even doing layout for a magazine, I want to eventually have my own business and working for myself and employing others. While my current job is paying well. I don't want it to get in the way of my dreams. So easily we can get caught up in quote-unquote good money right now and totally miss out on what we were put on Earth to do. The paycheck is decent now but I'll be making even more money and be happier once I have achieved my dreams. But I know that achieving a dream isn't easy and it's gonna take me having to deal with the two things I tend to run the furthest way from; risk and sacrifice and having a temporary hiatus from my two best good good girlfriends: disposable income and financial security.
Lately I have been making a lot of sacrifices to get my web design business off the ground. I've taken on less hours at my good-paying day job in order to have more time to grow my business. Most people, (myself included at times) would think I was crazy to be giving up my steady money for something that hasn't been paying nearly as much lately. Especially because I'm so fortunate to be where I am and do what I do at such a young age. But at the end end of the day all I would have is a job, a quote-unquote good job, but a job nevertheless and it doesn't even belong to me. Slaving away in retail and in some of the shoddier of New York hotels in my late teens and earlier 20's has already withered away any false sense of security I've ever had in working for other people. If you are not a doctor or lawyer and work for a company or a business, especially if its not municipal, or for the government, or non-union, no matter how good things are going... Beyonce, said it best "...Don't you ever for a second get to thinkin' you're irreplaceable." They can have "another you in a minute..." It's not even about getting fired so much as businesses close down every day. Remember the .com boom? Nuff said. Of course there are exceptions to every rule but it my experience here in New York this has basically rung true.
Entrepeneurial blood runs through my veins. My mother is an entrepeneur, a holy hustler if you will. Besides making and selling hats to all the church ladies of the world, she did weddings, sold vitamins, real estate, and anything else to keep money in her huge leather pocketbooks growing up. My father worked for the State of New York 40 years before he retired. His job was pretty secure but it wasn't always easy dealing with the higher-ups. I remember days when my father would come home stressed out about work wnd would talk to anyone who stood still long enough about it, enough to bore us all to tears. I didn't realize it then but talking it out was his way of relieving the stress and probably even dealing with worrying about the prospect of losing his job. I found myself doing the same thing with my boyfriend, coming home and regaling him with the boring-ass hotel drama of the day, all in an attempt to deal with my worries and fears. That's when I knew I had to make preparations to work for myself. I'm twenty-three years old. Yes, I've come very far but I'm still young enough to start over and as much as I love him, I'm not my father. I can't even imagine spending 40 years of my life working for someone else to finally, finally have the freedom to enjoy my life in my sixties. Right now I'm working on not being so afraid to start over but in order to succeed I know I must take risks and risks make me very scared.
Oh yeah, and the worst thing about not making as much money is: not making as much money. Yeah, the whole not being able to spend like I used to spend thing is really starting to wear on my psyche! I haven't even gone summer shopping this year. I'm over it! Even my friends are used to me having more money. I was at my apartment a few weeks ago and I was saying that I need money for something and my friend (who shall remain nameless) was like:
"Gurl, don't you always have coins? Since when you been needin' a coin?"
There is no worse feeling than that. Especially for an extremely proud Leo like me. I hung my mighty mane down and placed my paw over my eyes in shame after that comment, that shit hurt me and what was worse was that I know he didn't mean to so I couldn't even be mad. While I know that it's really unhealthy to base any of your self worth on the money you make I can't help it because I've always been making money. I know this sounds terrible but money is the key to my heart. Some people get all wound up over relationships and this guy and that guy... what... ever. I don't love them hoes (of course this doesn't apply to my current boo), it ain't nothin'. As long as my bills are paid and i can still go shopping I'm quickly over relationship drama. It's when you start messing with my money that I'm affected. This is different for me, I know that it's temporary and I'm trying my best not to whine like a little bitch because there are people who have it much worse off than me. And at the end of the day I'm really putting this financial burden on myself.
So like Walter Hawkins said I'm learning to be grateful for the hard times and the good times. Nobody ever said that the road was gonna be easy, right? Success is gonna take a lot of smart (not hard) work and I feel like i'm getting closer every day and even on my worse days I can always find somethng to smile about, I'm still here aren't I? And fortunately, I'm still young and strong and able-bodied. I may not have everything I want right now but all my needs have been supplied and that's what's most important. I'm making to more time for worrying and anxiety attacks, I'm way too busy being grateful.
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Song of the day: "Be Grateful"
by Walter Hawkins & the Love Center Choir
from the album "Love Alive 2"
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